The Witch Series

               Collage by Romare Bearden

Conjure Woman

She’s got them all teetering on

the tips of her fingers, tiny as mice.

One flip of the wrist and all the men,

who ever tasted her; then turned 

their faces away, and all the men,

who drove them to ruination, 

go flying to who knows 

where, and who cares?

She holds them up in yellow

curtain light, watches them shift

their weight to keep from falling.

Each one of them knows what he’s

done or not done. It’s chilling them

to the bone to see she’s wearing her

haint blue dress. No more feathers,

no Adam and Eve root. That’s how

very much danger they’re in.

Outside, her bottle tree glistens,

as she squeezes them for good measure,

rolls them between her palms, before

laying them out like sardines

in the bottom of her reddest meanest box.

The Witch Series

Effigies

Dolls for stubbornness, their

heads made of smooth river stone.

Dolls for finding water, with

long dowser legs and splintered feet.

Dolls for snagging memories,

in teasel heads and little burr hands.

Nut eyes, leaf wings, bark body, red leaf fire

Dolls bound head to toe with string,

to make a lover cleave and cling.

Dolls sitting in little boats

spiriting nuisance people away.

Dolls full of pins, their

crisscross faces in pain.

A white shell face, wild grass hair, a toadstool bed

Straw dolls with their hair on fire

turning all worry to ash in the wind.

Wrap a doll safe in a mullein leaf, tuck in

milkweed seeds and a child returns from fever.

Nail a doll to a tree and watch grief twist in pain,

go brittle and crumble; each tiny loss a bit of letting go.