The High Priestess & The Lovers & The World

II

The shade pours
into my eyes.

I wished I could’ve known
when I was younger, was there True evidence of these
seeds embedded deep within?

but I remind myself,
that I figured it out as soon as I was able—
as soon as I was capable

of turning over my arms and seeing
that they were different
from before.

of holding all the things I hated most about myself,
in a different pool of light,
and learning that I could love
who I was — throughout my entire being.

Foolish to think, I could have undertaken this quest
any sooner than I did.

“Things are unfinished until they are finished,”
and I’ll be finishing this my entire life.

VI

“Breathing her into him,”
I exhale and hold the tension at the top of my throat.

I can feel a light flooding the inside of me.
She lives in here, and will soon live within all of me.
her expressions are different, he scarcely sees himself in the
mirror, the phone,
the pictures, anymore.

He’s dying, in a strange not-death manner.
Eve was made from Adam’s rib, broken
in two, decanted,
tilt to empty the vessel,
and fill it with something more.

The state of man is corruption,
despite what language would make you assume —
the state of man is destruction,
exactly as language would make you assume.

Him, Breathing Life, Into Her.
is the wrong construction,

Truth:
Her, Breathing Life, Into Him.
Her Breathing Into Him.

XXI

destroy everything around yourself
in order to cleanse yourself
of this
specific, everlasting,
pain of being.

watch it transform,
into the shine of the light
off the glinted blinds,
the pure warmth
of tender love.

Dunk both hands into the steaming pools,
feel the water float and filter between your fingernails.
Taste The World on the inside of your cheeks.

You’re coming into being.
You’re coming into being.
You’re always coming into being.
You’re constantly coming into being.
You’ll always be coming into yourself,
whoever you are,
in the mirror,
their eyes,
faintly recognizable semi-circled hues.

Evelyn Henry is a queer artist and author currently living in Idaho.
She's interested in (de)construction of desire, gender, and identity.