FAIRY TALE

You wake,

and there before you, standing

with an ax in hand,

and eyes piercing into you,

is your nemesis.

You got something to say to me, boy?

The voice, a smoke of whispers.

The real question though is: Are you ready

to pry the ax from its hands?

Are you ready

to end the conversation

once and for all?

What will it take to grind 

the ghost into grain?

What will it take to set the barn

and its brimming buckets of water,

on fire?

What will it take

for you to see the flames

as a blossoming thing.

What will it take, little man,

what will it take?

To hack the beanstalk down?

To sell the goldsmith back his ax?

To heal, with a tattered rag, the wounds

written into you, once upon a time?