In ten years I will be chasing twelve fireflies
through the tangled forest. Ten years from now
I will be the wrath of the trees, the walking, moving,
constantly told fable. I will be the local witch,
the woman hiding under the back shed and
eating the hearts and souls of children and
the passion of the young and beautiful; the lovers.
I will be the woman carrying her secrets in a wicker basket
with her bread and cheese and I will be the woman
with a hundred names that nobody knows.
In ten years I will be tending a garden; my knees and
the palms of my hands will be brown and red. I will be
drinking from the river and making prophecies in my sleep.
In ten years I will keep songbirds in cages with no bottom.
I will hang a welcome sign around the scarecrows neck
and I will paint it myself. I will still live alone.
In ten years I will be pulling grey hair from my scalp
and selling it to the man beneath the bridge for the price
of silver. In a matter of weeks I will be questioned
on the value of precious metals and I will tell them
only my name. They will nod. They will let me walk free
again and forget my name. I will not tell them of
the man buried beneath my front step.
In ten years I will notice the absence of the moon for the first time.
I will be standing in the middle of my garden, barefoot.
I will be looking upwards at a wide, whole sky.
I will be found there at dawn.