Media Library

RIKE SCHEFFLER: Lava. Ritual

which softness may I touch?

the scars from your falls
vulva               cupped hand

to be in the world       to be with the world
even if             I don’t know               what

to do with zir

 

follow the inner flickering     tenderly

try                                           the rectangular eyes

 

with both feelers         I draw circles

in a silica script

 

 

how we practise          dangling          without holding on
off the cliff                 of Time            a finger points

 

this body was once made       for dying

 

when a raven allows me                    to stroke zir back

I accept zir invitation

for ze whispers                       a chunk of future    into my ear

zir claws                     know   the core of the earth

 

 

circling above

human size                  the anomaly

 

 

 

a turf hut                     without windows        I am

a butterfly         made of jawbones     and teeth

narrate the night

 

slow down      finger              pulse    when something   rouses from sleep

 

I           who are many             and not the same

we       who use touch             to understand

 

we are Sheila              put everything in our mouth

 

atop the volcanic rock                        hollows wait for us         mossy odes
an instrument nourished by elves

desiring these rocks

our body reveals         a tenderness    in them
they     give us a whiff           of permanence

Sheila learns to traverse
and embody them playfully               zir stony choreography

when I stroke zir         our skins         overlap
differences                  roughen up

love     being               an unknown sound
a wave            that balances   and comes boldly to its senses

direct me         upright
as a velvety     calcite

when we become bodies of water      river-like
live                  with the sei whales of Sedna

 

widen              the iliac crest

as we quietly              bop along

 

until water folds us                 into zir pockets
and within us the knowledge that our land-senses    only coalesce slowly

down here       we are             ear dust           Lilith
repositioning              the otoliths

we lift and lower our chest            tidally

darkness turns into     a light embrace
above us         swathes of water          the new skies

and the song   is a body         which sings

I awake                       in the nature that I am            and allow
also the nature            that you are     we

sense                           your quivering                                    octopus
and write                     your internal wisdom             into our genes             I

move like lava                        like fish
that flee from you       into endlessly soft contact

I dive

for a rock must                       repeat itself                 as rock
to be rock

 

 

 

follow the nose along the joint                      fern                 I am hypersensitive
watch the tips of the                           tundra              I flush from it

don’t               hold on                        no                    just feel
the urge           which is calling our name

polar fox

this is the wilderness in me               wide

on the inside               a scratching

no home

we are                         permeable       scent-driven
our life ripples                                    in cycles                      along many lines

we are enough                        omnivores

stars                as scars                        of our ancestors
intimacy as not-knowing                   as resistance

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

the light is magical     and everyone gets      a soup

rain drops        as big as birds

krías    snipes                          neighing          I fly

 

low

among the mossy plains                     the soaking poles        everything is swamp
undistinguishable       what’s river     what’s ground

 

pliant                           arctic thyme               crowberries

white caps                  ravenous genders

 

 

near the spume
wings of sweat                       grow on my back

 

the krías lead the way                        letting the crystals settle

we fall                         into the shadow of the Atlantic

 

 

a throaty voice finds its tune              I have feathers            gentle fish

centuries                     what a body is

listen to this    earth    as ze renews zirself
some days                   ze breathes      freely              under our feet

celebrating     with us            in this clump

as a sharp-edged fragment     with finely ground and glassy texture
we invented ourselves                        without a model

we are love                 wherever we turn                   our magic

flows

 

we are the so-called mistake              the untamable glitch
we are experience                              we are a firm fist

we are volcanoes

and we carry an old fire                     in our core
from the margins inward        we change       all maps

we are lava                  uncontrollable             liquid rock

 

the more we deepen our bond                       the more

 

we can unlock

 

 

Translated from German into English by Sophie Seita