When I was a young girl, With a tilted chin, Passed I by this door and that Laughing at my kin. Then there burst a red sun, Spilling windless flame, Spattering my ash-white bones With a secret name. Ran I to a wide door, Where a candle burned High above a hundred heads, Not a face upturned. "Poof!" I snapped my fingers; "Poof!" I tossed my chin, As the withered whispers begged By the dance-way in. In the strew of twilight, Through the kitchen door, Dragged I like a blinded hare With the wounds I bore. Now I am an Old One, Remembering it . . . And that old red cow of Christ's Fallen in a pit. |