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Sabbat
I saw the moon in the devil's eye
when October rode in on her horse of bone.
The night began to weave the sky
dark and darker, cold and high,
in deep black strands from a witch's comb.
The heart of a bird pierced on a knife
hides a ferric flute and a rusted ladle.
Her blue feathers dropping, her downy white,
leave her butterfly bones to the freeze in the night
while the moon shines bright in the devil's cradle.
Nine shadows come and then three more
to swing five times round the balefire's flare.
The wind robs the roof and opens the door,
puts a wet salt skin on the bedroom floor,
slips on a sorrow too old for despair.
Wash him with blood and dry him with silver.
Float him away on a lye-thick river.
Cross his red forehead with your gnostic brand
but the moon still shines from the devil's hand.
~October 2024
posted for Word Garden Word List at
where she asks us for a bit of rhyme this week
Images: Walpurgisnacht,© 1923 by Heinrich Kley Public Domain
Skullshot © joyannjones
