I just learned that this poem will be set to music, by composer Dale Trumbore! Yay!

Gretel

It was like waking up.
One minute she was doing as she was told,
stoking the fire so Hansel could go into the pot,
the next hearing a tiny voice inside :

Push her into the fire, it said,
Push the mother.
Push her hard as you can
into her own fire
so it will consume her.

Her hands then,
on the witch,
like they had been on the sweets
she’d won them over with,
only pushing away this time,
unlocking the cage of addiction
that held them both.