Fisher Queen/ poem by Colleen Geraghty

Stunned silent by the maiden’s light. Crimson crown,
sunlit beauty. Radiant hands swooping, soaring
bridging earth and heaven.
Peace doves fly from her sun-kissed lips—a benediction.
Her heartbeats winnow through
a rutting see of lies. She unwinds the clock
and winds it again. Amazing the grace
the maiden bestows. She shapeshifts to cormorant
plunging deep into dark waters – never unclean
as the old gods declared,
bold as an over-ripe plum, ancient as a sturdy oak,
flexible as a feather – all at once
and everything.
Blessed be the fisher queen,
the storytellers’ goddess inhaling mysteries of the dark moon.
Winged maiden diving deep, spinning new light.
She shapeshifts insufferable divides!
Her salt glands run deep. She exhales
possibilities, sets the inaugural dawn aflame. 



*This poem was written as a tribute to Amanda Gorman
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Colleen Geraghty is a certified Amherst Writers and Artist Facilitator and founder of The Hudson Valley Story Cottage,a creative space for writers. Her work has appeared in Wallkill Valley Writers Anthologies 2012/2013 and in Slant of Light: Contemporary Women Writers of the Hudson Valley, and in An Apple in Her Hand, a 2019 anthology published by Codhill Press. The book’s title and the first chapter of poems were inspired by Colleen’s award winning-sculpture entitled Citióg.