I was told the best rituals
are cast by children
inside covert forts, hedges
carved out by older
siblings or the wolf-man from
a nightmare in the nineteenth
century. In their spaghetti jars:
ghosts, not June bugs or ladybirds or
unreasonable expectations
to be happy. Some children are not
happy. Some rake their own
backs with pinion
pinecones & play possum
under their father’s duvet &
some make potent teas—
concocted potion of molecules—
rage wrapped in devotion &
some keep diaries on how to trap
light, rituals that sever
the head of anyone
who grows up without
healing their wounds.
Shannon Hardwick
Shannon Elizabeth Hardwick's work has appeared, or is forthcoming, in Gulf Coast Journal, Salamander, South Dakota Review, Plume Poetry Journal, The Texas Observer, Four Way Review, The Missouri Review, Sixth Finch, and Passages North, among others.
