Selected Poems by Keisya Cleine

dear mulberry tree,

pass me through to olympus

(a thisbe’s prayer)

my lover bleeds bright, his wound

gouges mine. why does it

gush red? is love so mad,

we bleed just to know its hue?

spring bears catkins.

you bow, low for nesting;

a bough brushing

my lover lying red.

pyramus whispered once,

through the chink in our wall—

of his mother’s jewels, their lovely

clink; how he rubbed them to a

shine.

his touch now is stranger

than a dream. but in it,

i’m a pearl with a rainbow

sheen.

is it so wrong to bleed?

as birds do, now

mulberries too.

i place my wound in his

bright, daring

red.

dear mulberry tree,

pass me through to olympus.

to the gods who tremble

before mortal love.

europa is dead

she died, a virgin in the womb;

a child without a tomb.

where sea churns like broth,

she returns untouched – a froth.

to be beautiful is to beckon the bull;

to write her elegy. dream the world,

call for the tide. born a girl and

never abide.

she died in an orchestra;

her playmates

were princesses, flutes

singing pleas.

no one mourns,

not even the gods.

did no one warn her?

stars are snares too.

europa is dead—

childless, unwed,

holy,

obscure

phoenician.

a daughter, no

father came for.

but the sea remembers

everything,

the salt still sings.

Editor's note: Inspired by ovid's Metamorphosis, these two poems eloquently retell the myths of star-crossed lovers Thisbe and Pyramus, and Europa. Keisya explores catharsis in a way that shoves you to your senses - her poems are all sacrifice and divinites and prayers. I love the entwining of nature with the divine, the similarities that are drawn to the colours of mulberries and wounds. Not to mention, I just adore how accurate they are, how well they draw from the ancients.

About the author:

Keisya Cleine is a Communications freshman from Indonesia and an avid Homeric lit enthusiast. Though she has long been writing in her mother tongue, she now focuses on English storytelling and has since uncovered the joy of publishing with literary magazines. She’s the Founding Editor-in-Chief of Culterate. When not consuming or creating art until she loses all sense of time, she can often be found speaking on stage. (IG: @kkeissya)