Michael E Stone: BLACK BEAUTY

The obsidian I brought back,

Looks black, opaque.

But held to the light,

has clear, translucent stripes.

Smoky hard fragility,

Fused in Vulcanʹs fire,

Black‐veined, textured

with lucid patches.

All through some hills

are veins of black glass,

Its blackness is beauty.

On a mount facing Araʹs,

I found a stone knife,

chipped from obsidian rock

of old.

I am black and beautiful,

She sings in the Song,

and through her blackness

the Groom becomes lucent.