using story to ask for forgiveness

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in this version I am the woodcutter 

 

i am the woodcutter’s wife

 

i am the dead mother

  

i may also be the witch

 

sometimes you are hansel

 

sometimes you are gretel

 

sometimes you are their whispers

in the dark of the hungry night

 

 

for brevity’s sake we’ll dispense 

with the pebbles and breadcrumbs and crying

 

 

always it is six days before your ninth birthday 

 

always you are thirsty and i don’t take heed

 

always your body’s cellular mutiny 

the sickly fruitiness of your breath

 

 

like most stories it goes back to an absent mother

 

a fearful father 

 

a blindsided moon

 

 

in one version a parched forest

crawling on its knees begging for water

 

a gingerbread house eating itself from the inside out

 

and dry-eyed death salivating 

rattling your cage 

 

 

trying to sweeten you up