Gypsy Queens

She’s an explorer

but she just wants to be free.

~

Toying between life and death;

corpses, not breath;

earth and spirits;

the unclean and the free.

~

“Gypsy, gypsy!”

They brand on her soul

lost in translation

between art and form

a deadly curse,

less a blessing

only the comforted and worn

will grow to see.

~

Frigid crows guide the path

to these measly scraps

but seeking ravens rewards beginnings

seen in visions.

One without sorrow or lack

serving crowns of many nations

with heads drawn back.

~

Home is not a place

but a sense of knowing

of believing

not seeing.

~

Feelings lack meaning

while intuition is guided

grounded in a deep sense of being

the aliveness.

~

Romani queens treated like witches

Cast into the shadows of society

As if belonging in ditches.

Royalty turned prisoner

will they ever have a home

one to call their own?

~

From courtyards to nooses

their despair hangs loosely

in the air near land

once serene and translucent.

~

Their faux thoughts fly

with the shadowed birds

of the night-bound sky.

An olive branch extended,

but never fully accepted.

Beautiful sorrow,

melancholic, tragic.

~

Her beauty knew no bounds,

but her soul travelled around

seeking eclectic facets,

not knowing her future impalement.

~

Another life may soothe and suffice,

one with joy

bringing shimmering lights.

But nothing as rare and free

nor as inexplicably complete

as the one experienced by

a gleaming Romani queen.

~

Copyright © 2023 Kalina Bethany. All rights reserved.

Thanks for reading my first elegy! This was inspired by my Romanian background and my research into the history and genocide of Romani people (gypsies), notably during WWII.

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