I dream of winter, her antlers closed in thistle, milkveiled and weighed with longing
how does someone ever know what to believe? the lilies fester sticky sweet in the belljar of something dying
the first theft is discernment, I no longer differentiate between the strange realms of wake or sleep, a dark’s diminished creature
like childhood, certainty has fled from me forever. I am no archer, I must accept the irretrievable or perish beneath the wound-weight of its bow
outside, summer chokes the sky somewhere in my hallway a lily tips in its glass, unknown perhaps I never believed in the first place
-- Haley Wooning lives in California where she works as a therapist and writes poetry. Her poetry book, Mothmouth, is available on Amazon and through its publisher, Spuyten Duyvil.