Lupina

 

I was the baker’s wife.

I used to dance,

late, on our floured floors,

spinning in my sequined red.

He’d called me

the fire dream, back then.

 

Until, through the window

a shapely shape, a shadow, and in

the moonlight, a darkness rose,

lingering at our door.

 

My raven hair flew wild

as night, my delicate hands

grew gnarled and tight,

and with them, a hunger

which would not be refused.

 

My baker and his lover

are gone, they tell me,

and ask if I remember

and regret the bite.

 

I answer, yes,

but what else could I do—

the fire dream inside me

became a chilling howling

when I caught the glowing

in their eyes reflected by

the telling moon.

 

 

© Jennifer Wagner

 

dVerse Poetics

Cresting the Cascades (the Feathered Scent of Hope)

 

A thousand trees from sunset,

each with a hand held out our windows

 

cupping an apricot wind,

a warm pine breeze combs through our hair.

 

We curve, and twist,

take one last dip

 

before the fall of the sun

and the rising

 

of a champagne moon

bubbling up,

 

spilling the glass,

jealous of day’s light.

 

And just like that,

she’s cresting the berried branches,

 

nesting on the seat

between us,

 

that thing with feathers,

suddenly thirsty, opening wide,

 

suddenly bright.

 

 

© 2025 Jennifer Wagner

  

For The Word Garden Word List and

What’s Going On?  Fragrance

 

Hope is the thing with feathers – Emily Dickinson, of course.

 

On Lake Chelan at Dusk

Drop another pebble in,

splash—dimple,

sink—ripple,

out to bluer, deeper water,

where the moon drops,

golden-soft, like a whisper

                        I want

to hear again

and again

and again.

© 2016 Jennifer Wagner