she kneels down in front of her altar: a large stump standing alone in a dark forest. she has never felt more at home. her forehead presses against the wood, if her eyes were open she would see ants crawling over the rot with red blood mites sucking at them hungrily she is starving for her own magic; the bugs are starving, too. out of the corner of her eye, something moves swiftly past her perhaps a person perhaps a ghost or a spirit or nothing at all. she places her palms flat on the stump, her teeth holding her lip, a fat drop of blood runs down her chin splatters on the wood. “let it eat him alive,” she whispers and the universe hears her and the universe tastes her blood. it wants more and she wants to give more. above the girl, a full moon rises, about to tip back into its waning cycle, but she only feels herself growing bigger. the picture is serene: the waning moon and the waxing witch. she moves one hand to the pouch on her waist, releasing a handful of salt on the ground a single, red candle burns in front of her as another drop of blood falls to the altar, she extinguishes the flame with precision, squeezing it between two tips of her fingers. she whispers, “let it swallow him whole.” the night wraps itself around her body, holding her like a lover when she started, she swore to herself that she would never do it, that she wasn’t dark and so she didn’t need the darkness. now that she’s had it, now that the power is rushing in through the wound splitting her skin, she knows that she’ll never turn away from it again. she’s never been so happy to break a promise.
self-discovery; l.m.
