RADIANT SOUL OF VIOLET

her feelings write themselves all over her face like fine Japanese script

strong brushstrokes of hard life lessons

impressed upon her features like an emperor's ring onto wax

shadows rise and fall across the landscape of her pretty eyes

shifting with her mood

moments of bright joy and infinite sadness alternate in quick succession

punctuated by exclamations of incredulity at the endless cleverness of her three little angels

who can turn from little pure ivory snow driven goddesses to hot red pepper devil girls in an instant

but underneath the brief flashes of anger her eyes smile at their exquisite wickedness

that she recognizes from her own days spent in the long twisting Pennsylvanian winters

she never ceases to startle me

when the brilliant supernova soul that composes her is released in a partial eclipse

triggered by antics of psychotic british comedians

or little girl shrieks related to brand-new stuffed bunny melodramas

sometimes the gateway to her soul remains open for a while

and the soft lavender scent of her essence drifts through the room

enveloping me and making me lighter

but sometimes the gateway quickly shuts down with a metallic clang

and I am left with a deep violet rouge upon my skin that seeps through my tattoos and reminds me

of the ocean of sadness that reigns underneath her

a sadness that seeps out through her long eyelashes in rivulets of invisible moisture

only seen by those who understand her spirit

the overwhelming weight of her love and her goodness

crushes her toward the center of the earth

yet at the same time allows her to fly close to the sun like icarus

her soul is heavy and light

like a dense meteor whirling around a ballroom dance floor

while the handwriting on her face flits about

rewriting itself like there's no tomorrow

invisible ink to the unperceptive

yet telling a million stories to those who care enough to see