Honey & Thorns

 I dreamed I was in a place, a house

with walls of honey and thorns. In borrowed flesh, I picked grapes from a stem, sliced cheese from a wheel, and waited for the years to come around again. There was a woman there, born of blackbird and strandwolf. She was warm, her hair light, and she was not mine. Taking my loneliness, she carved a half-moon off and held me in her calm-water arms in a shaded hour. It was the closest I have been in such a long time to the glory of the temple or the bells in the open tower. I dreamed I was in a place, a house with rooms made of mist and ash. I was the one who arrives as the season allows, the Janus-faced magpie of a moment the one tile out of place in the famous mosaic, the one who was fed, and held, who came, and went.