It is a great pleasure to welcome back poet, writer and visual artist Rachael Ikins, this time with a poem that speaks of her reclamation of her life and talent after years of being over-medicated and silenced, “Ars Poetica.” It is deeply moving and inspiring that we humans can find our way again after time and autonomy have been stolen from us. Rachael reminds us that, even in our darkest hours, we do not have to take anyone else’s narrative of our life as “truth.” No one has the insight or knowledge into our minds that we have, even if they are medical doctors or professionals who know other things and have their own talents. Our awareness matters. Rachael’s wonder, joy and unyielding desire to create, expressed in the sensuous imagery of growing things, is profound. “Nothing/nobody can take this heat away again. No more darkness-bringers.”
Order your copy of “Wild” to experience Rachael’s story: https://synkroniciti.com/the-magazine/purchase-individual-issues/.
Rachael Ikins followed her pen into the forest as a child. As happened to Gretel in the Grimm Brothers’ tale, a wicked witch forced her to reroute through valleys so dark she doubted the existence of the sun at times. A fabulous wizard held her heart in his hand. They fell in love. He urged her to release poetry from her soul.
She lost everything before she understood her truth: write like a motherfucker, write or die. For poetry was the constant through all storms, the beloved she refused to relinquish.
She won some prizes, published in journals and then books. When last seen Ikins was feeding pickled jalapeños to a large dragon perched on the roof of her house—a dragon who bestowed her name upon Ikins’s cat. Sister souls of fire and passion.