The Hare Queen

she wears the moon in her hair like an old colonial relic
of when she sang wild nouns into being and triumphs
that ran like veins through the land but quietly and hard to catch

like most that worry more about staying than living
a life already lost

born before the subterfuge and after the detonation she runs
like one possessed by all her future children
each one a sign of what’s to come
the plumage
the strangled light
the concrete rot, swelling like lacerations upon the skin
the mandibles, the hunger

the terrible hunger
to lay claim
to what isn’t yours
and then, to gasp
when it still knuckles up

at night she leaps into the dark of blue gods
or turns divine herself
momentarily crackling
into ashes
and spins, becomes
riddled like a bullet, lank, forgotten, the ancient
protections encased on her back

whereas in the morning
she lets the sun wary her into
a tale to scare the reckless with:

watch out here comes
the hare queen
with her long teeth
she’ll

decipher you
into an endless strain of lies
best left to their own corruption
or carve you into
a spine
of feathered girls
that trouble the edges
of where her eyes turn black

– Milla van der Have