Bertha's Gift

I am
a storyteller's granddaughter,
storing up and storied.
Found in epic myth
and a day's labor quietly shared,
I am all stories.
Through me, currents flow
and I spill rivers of stars
still unborn.

Dreamers dream a farmer's harvest
envisioning goods a merchant markets.
I am their imagined storehouse of plenty.

I hold dazzled the emperor's court
in exchange for my daily bread.
I am welcomed as circus act,
a curiosity of temporary diversion.
This, for those of lidded vision
who glance neither up, out nor beyond.
I am entered into their story.

Oh yes, dangerous am I
for I might awaken in shuttered breast
a glimpse of wider, untamed skies.
Tempting, I am forbidden fruit.
I hint of incense lit
where passion is life's perfume.
A snake eaten apple of knowledge
as yet unremembered,
I am phallus seed sown in fertile imagination.
Foretold to deliver with each breath's birth,
whole Universes arise to die away
in my singular story.

A pirate's map to buried pleasure,
I am spun threads
and woven yarn.
Squirreled to be savored
while carpet laid,
I kindle winter's warmth.
A cresting wave of story
that changes all with my passing,
I am tsunami's teardrop beginning.

I am the day's take and a life's ledger.
I reconcile accounts
to balance the illusions.
These, mere curtains,
that once opened
reveal eternity's listening heart.

I am
a granddaughter,
telling stories.