Rebirth

Midsummer I walked with myself to the lake, in the dark of the black moon rising.

Black silk I wore, down to the ground and a crown of red roses and amethyst. Naked was she as the morning she came to  the world, but for a long string of pearls wrapped thrice round her delicate neck. She chattered like a bird at my window, and how I wished for a moment I could save her. But she was a sweet thing- too tempting to live. The wolves of the world would tear her to pieces.

And so we walked down to the lake under the black moon rising, and I felt the spirit of Lilith as she took me, felt her dark magick in my blood and the bones of me, and I ached to become her. What I would do I would do for her. What I would do, I would do for myself and for all my sisters who walked this brave path before me.

I held myself, at the water’s edge. Bare skin scratched and bramble-bloodied. With trembling hand, I cast the circle around us as I called down the quarters and whispered the rites. Anointed myself with Abramelin’s oil, and with a breath deep and clear took myself by the hand, and we waded both into the still water.

And she was me, shivering in her naked beauty- but I was not her, anymore. I was something much greater. And Lilith sang to me an ancient requiem as I kissed who I was goodbye, and I pushed her beneath that dark water.

There was no fight in her. She was a sweet thing after all, and obedient. I knew her well. She was me, but I was not her now. Never again would I know her. I stood resplendent in my power, no longer afflicted with her passivity. No longer a treat for the wolves of the world, but a threat. I held her under the water that midsummer’s night, that girl I had been. I held her under the gaze of the black moon Lilith, and I felt nothing for her, and the black moon she moved me. I held her under, ’til all the life was gone from that sweet chattering bird, then I laid her to rest forevermore, white pearls amongst the lily pads, and I was free.

I closed the circle, but Lilith she stayed. In my blood and my bones and the steadiness of my hand. In my gaze, in my words and my gait. Black silk dripping, amethyst and roses, I walked back through the woods, and no wolves would come near, and no bramble would dare scratch me.

Midsummer I walked with myself to the lake, in the dark of the black moon rising, and only one of us returned.