Dancing the Wheel
I was meek
as I picked up river stones,
deep gray, some quite large,
others quite small.
These millennia old stones,
smoothed and polished by chilled water
for thousands of years,
each one, heavy in my hand.
I danced the wheel without jade for wisdom,
without amber for strength,
no peridot for renewal.
Only my opal offered me guidance
from the edge of Raven, the coordinate of the spiritual.
I danced the wheel hesitantly
unsure of the order of the rocks,
unsure of how the others wove between me,
and I zagged between them,
the ritual smoothing like the waters over the stones.
The gray stones took formation
balance and purity
something sacred that I felt was not mine to take.
I was given the last stone, begged
for the others to tell me where to place it.
They said it didn’t matter.
But it DID matter.
All of those patterns,
one had to show me my path.
I walked in the candlelight.
placed the stone nervously into the inner ring.
The ancients were with me, circle and cross completed perfectly.
I had laid down my fear with that stone, and my shoulders light.
Each stone was placed back into the bag,
to be freed back into the river.
I bowed and thanked them
and took the power that they gave me.
Kim Malinowski earned her B.A. from West Virginia University and her M.F.A. from American University. She studies with The Writers Studio. Her chapbook Death: A Love Story was published by Flutter Press. Her work has appeared in Faerie Magazine, War, Literature, and the Arts, Mythic Delirium, and others.
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