The Witching Altar

a candle, wafting apple cinnamon,
lights the witching altar

the room is submerged
in soft twilight tones, mystery and spice
mingling in the cidery smoke

a girl’s slippered feet paddle over
to kneel reverently at the shrine
what did she come for, we wonder
what will she sacrifice?

a boy’s name tumbles soundlessly through the room
alluring and sensual in the candlelight,
now we’re getting somewhere, sweet
saccharine danger, we whisper.

ssshhh!

her heart dances with the soft, frenzied
rhythm of the candle’s shadows
as fleeting memories of other evenings
emerge from the dark

the witches paint a circle-
ash, smelling of burnt cloves,
wreaths the tender skin of her cheeks
now, the offering, they murmur,
now give.

she spills black marbles
onto the floor, where they clatter and
tumble like liquid, glinting eerily.

beads? no not beads, more significant.
its eyes, we realize- the black orbs torn
from childhood stuffed animals.

a symbol of sacrilege,
slippery teardrops of youth, and
more than destruction, yes, sheer sin
propelled her,
to destroy the animals, snip snip snip
through their plush coats,
like they were never alive at all-
now they’re only dead glass, but even
the dead have ghosts.

it is ghosts that materialize
now in this room, breathing, watching
as she clutches the boy’s name tight
between her trembling thighs,
as the witches spin, dance on the
desecrated remains of her youth.

shhhh!

tendrils of incense-smoke curl themselves
into a figure, materializing out of shadows,
out of darkness,
a fulfillment of her passioned fantasies

as magnetic, forceful love
pumps hard through her veins,
unaware the ultimate sacrifice has been made.
she has given something away
that she will never reclaim.

and then,

out of darkness he came and to darkness
he will return, isn’t that how the saying goes?

the witches know.

By Anna K.