She’s such
a thief she’ll steal
your words before they leave
your mouth. She’ll hijack your thoughts just
because

she can.
There she goes with
a cluster in her fist.
She’s ready to drop them in a
cauldron

with fresh
forsythia
petals—a repurposed
remedy she will drink in the
wee hours.

Sunrise
the next morning,
she’ll discover a new
raison d’être as she swipes a
bundle

of her
own words scrawled on
a page in a yellow
book she pulls off the shelf, covered
in dust.

He used
to keep the light,
then bees. Now he just keeps
me up nights wondering how to
keep him.