• We caught ravens at sunset, together
    with our wide nets, woven
    from folly and hope
    We bore them to the ground,
    panting, laughing
    and the ravens told our future
    scratched runes upon the dirt
    with their char-black beaks:

    You will be queen
    of a strange land, and wear
    rings of brass and silver
    and bells braided in your hair.
    In a chariot of silver
    you will lead your armies
    and they will say,
    white fire flashes from her eyes
    and when she sings,
    she calls the valkyries to come.
    On the day of your death
    you lovers will cut you
    into a thousand pieces
    and devour you
    In this, you will live on through them
    and never die.

    The ravens turned to me
    and said,

    You will be imprisoned
    within a rose of glass
    within a tower, ten-thousand steps
    above the ground
    And you will sleep there
    for fourscore years
    until a man climbs the tower to find you
    and place you in his button-hole
    and go to propose to his beloved.
    His bride will carry you in her bouquet
    and in years to come
    you will hang above their mantle
    until their youngest child
    knocks you from your perch
    and the rose shall break
    and you shall be free.

    We let the ravens go
    and they flew into the sky, a dark and seething whorl
    against the bright sun.
    We let the ravens go
    and together ran on beyond the hills.