The Woods Witch wakes with the sun,
brewing tea from leaves she grows herself,
and humming pieces of half-remembered songs.
This is a ritual she started long ago,
back when the rain did not ache her bones
and her hair was the color of rain-soaked bark
on cool and misty autumn mornings.

Now her hair is as silver as moonlight,
and she carefully plaits it each night
before crawling into her quilt-covered cot,
listening to the wind rustling branches
and whistling through the cracks in her cabin walls.

The years have been full of peace;
vegetables from the earth,
fruit from the trees,
water from the same stream
the spotted fawns drink from.

But still, sometimes, while drinking her tea,
the Woods Witch looks at the garden and the birds
and imagines they are her family;

a sunflower son
a daffodil daughter
a heron husband

but when she’s done, she sets her cup in the sink
and walks into the woods
alone.