The Waking

The Waking

Carla Funk

Let our waking be like stars
cracked open, the seams of soil
furrowing to light. Let caskets
split their glitter, and every urn
confetti up the cells of those who sleep in dust,
and let that dust be shaken off
in constellating fireflies, moon-shards,
feathering swarm of luminous hum.
Let every shadow bow.
Let every tongue unscroll and sing
how once the earth was home,
sweet home, but now,
no more. Let night
receive its rightful king,
and darkness, its reward and flame.
The all-bright one has come
to stitch-rip morning’s veil,
to strip the sunrise of its blaze
and bear it, be it, breathe it
over ashes, stones, to kindle
from shadow to shining
every valley’s bones.

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Carla Funk
Poet & Writer

Carla Funk is a poet and memoir-writer who has taught in the University of Victoria’s Faculty of Arts, and served from 2006 to 2008 as the inaugural Poet Laureate for Victoria, British Columbia.

Photography by Jose Figuera