discarding the sackcloth

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what i learned
of being human
those years spent
speaking through the bars
of golden cages
did not serve me
in the mountain-forest
or in the home
of she who haunts it:
the fear of a fallen nature -
when all i have ever prayed for
is to sink into the earth,
the slipping off
my green mantle
to don the sackcloth
of the penitent --
dishonoring the wild gods
and feral human ghosts
who wove their dreams
into that verdant garment,
the fear of being backed into a corner --
in a place that has no walls
the cowering attempt
to hide my beastliness
and barbarity
even from myself --
that separates voice and mind
from the beating heart
that feels yours.
the only blasphemies
worthy of regret
are the denial
of my nature
and my lineage
and the forgetting
and dishonoring
of yours
and the barbarous tongue
attempting to speak
the spells of self-containment
it learned within the walls
of civilization
even when you sang to me
in the language of our freedom.
when I tried to speak them
my voice trembled and whimpered
and the false shape i shifted into
shook and writhed and rocked
to try to hold off explosion --
only then did i bring terror  --
not eldritch or monstrous
but all too human
that replaced the scent of moss
with the sourness of adrenaline
and the acridity of the smoke
of the fires that threatened
to destroy the thorny grove
and brought down on me the exile
of the one who failed to answer to
my true names at the threshold
of the sanctuary
because i mistook it
for the gates
i had passed through
only by appealing
to the mercy of the merciless
and failed to recognize in time
the wild mercy of she who insisted
only that i come naked and unarmored
and ungovernable in my love.
ii.
now i know
the answer
to the perilous question
is that the graal serves
who would drink from it
not doubting his worthiness
of the grace of she
who poured the libation
when she herself
is the one
who brought the cup
to his lips.
iii.
all that is left
is to shed armor and sackcloth
and pick up the green mantle
i discarded
and wash myself
in dark wild waters
and listen to the echo
in the cavern of my chest
of the kennings
that remind me
of my true form
and sing the songs
that unweave the spells
of my concealment
and summon the forest
within me and around me
not knowing you will accept
its sanctuary and its welcome
after i dishonored yours