Oh That Face
– Sabrina Samuel
She was so extra,
I was so ordinary,
At first I found her a bit mean, intentionally intimidating
She spoke to me of other worlds full of minstrels and masks,
inviting exploration of free thought,
my personal white buffalo.
Her lineage of colonizers had unaccounted women,
they were simply called “Mary” in the history books
stirring red skin into the blue blood.
All her ancestral mothers were saving me
They walked me to the spiritual power they arranged in her eyeballs.
She would caution me against the megalomania afflicting artists,
And temper my propensity to self destruct
with her amusing stories and hot tea.
We shared the same stage where I saw musicals as a child with my father
Only people you encounter for several lifetimes can command, “go stand over there”,
so they can crack a whip at you.
Bonds of trust formed long before,
Likely when Marys and buffalo roamed.
Sabrina Samuel
Sabrina Samuel is a prairie lotus. This prairie lotus left YYC for Red Deer almost a decade ago, for reasons still unclear to all. A lover of verse, this is Sabrina’s first formal contribution of original work. She is a mehndi artist, dreamer and empty-nest aunty to A&X.
