Her fear enters the door ahead of her.
The fragile-silk side-step fear of trespass
that tells you she knows too many dark
hours — that she is a flower from the shadow
blooms beneath branches blocking

sunlight. Moves and changes come
with strong winds, tussled leaves
and limbs spinning the orbiting petals
upward  — into this fragile day of sun
that she both worships and fears.

The sun is a powerful god she loves, but
the trepidation and fear of transgression,
suspicion, uncertainty — the suspect knowing
of humble plant to mystic star, child to Lion,
needful flower to the light which sustains it.

These fears sit down as a group on the ground
around her roots, crawl up to perch on nearby
leaves and wait and watch and then — Wisdom
cradling Mercy in her breast, breathes healing
and the fears recede for now into the shadows.

~Photo Credit: Shadow Bloom, (c)2020 Marissa Mullins