Naked Lady

by Elizabeth Buckner

Poetry

$15.00

Purchase on Amazon

74 pages, October 2012
Published by Penciled In
Designed by Benjamin Daniel Lawless

“The brightest light comes
from the darkest night
if we will walk through the shadows”

So begins the illustrated telling of a transformative journey, of rape and “breaking the cell of isolation and anger her silence caught her in... the details are visceral but the tone is not.” — Jim Cherry

Homeless, boyfriend in jail, drugs not working, disillusioned Elizabeth Buckner abandons the fading San Francisco counter culture for a weekend at a Marin commune. Warnings flare before she even gets tp the compound (a creepy coffee shop stop, the detour to a Hell’s Angels camp), but Buckner ignores her gut’s advice, sealing her role as sacrifice in a brutal Hell’s Angels “Red Wings” ritual.

In blameless, unflinching prose, Buckner embarks upon two separate, yet intertwined journeys; that of the older woman looking back wide-eyed, and of the lost, younger woman groping forward. The former is a steadfast, linear journey guided by the heart; the latter meanders and twists upon itself like a snake biting its own back.

The seeds of the Angels ritual take root in Buckner’s soul. Fertilized with shame and guilt, they grow for twenty years. When innocently asked to preview a rape video for work, the blood seeds begin to bloom. Buckner lets them. Encouraging painful memories with bravery, compassion, and wisdom, the seeds planted deeply in the silent past, at last bear fruit, flowering into the graceful and resilient “Naked Lady” of the present.

— Baxter Clare Troutman

Learn more about Elizabeth Buckner at her website.

POST SCRIPT

After this blood sacrifice
on the Angel altar
I do not get death
disease or detention
The portal of transformation
opens   and I walk away
refuse the call become small

20 years pass
before I begin to talk of it
10 more years pass
before I begin to write of it
3 more years pass
before I begin to accept
my metamorphosis

When I finally write
about this
blood mystery rite
I free myself
from this bondage
Healing begins
the door of creativity
opens and I enter

I sing songs of sorrow
that will free me
Silence holds me hostage
keeps me clipped-wings-crippled
I must share my story
re-shape silence into song
Silence is my captor
Story opens the door
I sing songs of memory
I sing songs of reformation
I desire the grace of release

Other books by Elizabeth Buckner