Netherworld

The Dead Sea brine seeps

into sinkholes, where the earth fell open

without warning. Blackened salt formations

conjure a giant clam; an octopus,

half buried,

with tentacles that can grab

still; 

a dirty, fallen stalactite,

more like an amputated leg

 

I wander on damp, soiled sand,

seafloor mud laid bare

by the receding waterline

with deep, erratic cracks

like an icepack starting to thaw,

and fear myself adrift,

alone,

on a floe of earth   

though I know one does not sink

in this sea of salt 

 

Into the night I walk

as the blackening cliffs transform into bodies

torn

from their sisters across the Great Rift.

A solitary boatman

on the jigsaw-block of earth I pictured

drifting

in the bottomless brine

makes me wonder how much further down 

the Kingdom of Hades would be

 

In time, I cease to dread the swallowing

pits, the earth

that caves in beneath my feet,

burying me

in an avalanche of dirt.

 

And now I laze

on the shores of a black

and stilled

under-earth sea, not caring to join

Persephone

in her spring awakening

 

*

Rita Mendes-Flohr

(published in Hawaii Review, Fall 2016 - Occupying Va)