Once

I won’t start with once

upon a time. Because that’s the whole

story isn’t it, lovely as she was

with her hair like honey? She bled

alone on the bed when he’d left

and the queen set her to work threading

needles in the dark. She saw

what she shouldn’t have: beauty

in the place of a serpent and that’s when

she learned regret. The three drops

of tallow on his skin or the moment

the weather changed and she wished

for wings. Then a dress of rags

and the rough stones of the brook.

The whiskered fish and the trees

casting their dark shadows. I won’t

start with once—the girl

on the bed, bleeding—the task of dowsing,

the long search for the mouth

of the underworld and the lover

with his scent of appleflesh and musk.

The time it takes to turn

away—one breath—and her body

clenched around its knot of hunger.