Linda M. Crate- Three Poems

battle raven

don't toy with my affections
i am like
artemis and athena
i don't need a
man,
and i will use every animal and
weapon of war
known
to earth and beyond to rip
you to pieces
should you play with me;
there's no need to
mess with
a
soul if you don't plan on catching
it—
usually i am soft as
the laughter
of persephone's flowers
i prefer to be this way,
but i can
be as harsh as demeter's winter;
i am a raven
singing sweetly,
but i can also tear you to pieces with
my talons become
a battle raven—
love is something that i've always longed for
as it evaded me,
so don't tell me you're super interested
and smile in my face
only to disappear into the spine of
void's oblivion.


independent girl

i am sick of the mixed signals
either you like me or
you don't,
and if you've decided you'd rather
not be with me
then at least have the decency
to say;
don't leave me here to keep guessing and
fighting off the urge to make
assumptions—
i don't know why you expect i'll
just keep holding on
until you make up your mind:
i'm a pretty girl and i have more than a beautiful
face i also possess a mind full of thoughts
and wonder,
i plan on living while i'm alive i've
waited too long for too many people;
so before this elevator
breaks me down
i'm busting open the door and running down
the flight of steps into the meadows
of my dreams,
and if you hope to catch me then you
better hurry up, boy,
i won't wait
forever—
i am a raven who has stopped singing for every
fox that would pool the wool over her
eyes,
and i'm done making the dreams of other's come
true now it's time to make my dreams
come to bloom
because a woman doesn't need a man to flourish.


make up your mind

i was fine
before you came
walking
into my life,
and so i wonder why you needed to
play with my affections
just so you could become another that
let me down;
you came crashing into my world
painful as it was
i accepted it because i know
there are some
ways i still have to grow—
but i have always been independent and fierce
if you cannot accept i am maiden, mother, and crone
then you cannot have me;
i have no time to explain myself to everyone
else
for i am strange
that will never change,
and i am happy in my own little world
my characters know me
probably better than you ever will—
so take me or leave me,
but don't do a little bit of both
because i am not a toy
you cannot pick me up and then decide to put me down
thinking there will be no consequence
for i am a raven summer born
and like sun star gold
i will burn you in the gaze of a thousand flames;
so should you stay or should you go?
there's the door if you don't
know the answer
then why would you expect me to want you here?
i have always been strong, it is the only
choice i have
and so if you must go then go
i will endure without you.