Mud Girl

In midnight moonlight entered I
in flannel nightshirt and torn blue sweats
into the forest of lost imagination
along the muddy path I went

Twigs and leaves brush my bare toes
as I pass along each dip and rock
I am searching when it’s dark
and none can see me among the trees

In a clearing in the forest path
she rose from the mud
bedraggled clothes and pale girl face
scarred eyebrows raised she smiled at me

I stumble stop remove my brain
she puts it back in again
standing framed by charcoal sky
floating clouds and shadowed trees

She takes my hand, she leads the dance
she’s spinning me around too hard
I’m cough, falling, hit my knee
on the half-buried root of an ancient tree

I am breathless, scratched and scraped
matted hair in disarray
she is silhouetted in the moon
laughing with her shining eyes

I am feeling scrutinized
fingers digging up the dirt
I can’t hid my elfin face
I can’t hide my racing heart

She’s on one knee
boot sinking in the mud
stoops to kiss me
dirty fingers smear my blood

With whispered canto
she calls out the night
the forest fairy beasts emerge

All regailed in military lines
howling, sloppily marking time
she presses against the mud to stand
upside down on stumbling hands

I’m crawling toward the trees,
toward the darkness on bleeding knees
Forget I ever called to the night,
forgot I ever tried to fight

This is all a dream you see
her sudden scream, the flaming tips of tress
I’m back safe upon my couch
of imagination I have my doubts

I only think I see those boots
perched on my books
but I’m afraid to take a look