This child,
singing by starlight,
sitting by the river
in night’s embrace,
cannot be seen.
And yet,
he leads me,
his voice a shepherd’s staff
of sweetness,
longing,
purity.
The night hunters
watch in stillness,
amusement,
pity.
In the moonlit meadow,
the trap is sprung.
The song a summoning
of wolves,
long past life,
long past hunger.
The sweet-voiced boy
appears among them,
feral-fanged, and amber-eyed.
And so they sing again,
but not for me to wander.
This is a spell of mournful howling,
binding the legs,
draining the will,
and I am an offering, a blood sacrifice
to the verdant, loamy, pagan lore of the
forest primeval.
As my soul flees the husk of my ravaged, icy flesh,
the song of river, wolf, and tree
now blend,
and guide me anew
to take my place
among the stars.
*art by Victoria Frances
BlackQuill 