Rob Carney

Hansel and Gretel

 

In this one, we know what’s coming:
The kids will shove that witch in her oven, 

her shrieks—Oh, Lordy—like knives 
in the gingerbread air.

Slam the door 
and they’re muffled, then 

they’re none, then probably 
a smell we shouldn’t dwell on.

But what comes next?
A lot of walking; 

birds have wings, 
but kids don’t. 

Birds can get by on a scatter of seeds, 
but not them.

Then finally the border,
and a cage with a Thermo-Lite blanket,

or a cot in a tent next to other tents—
how high can you count? 

And how long is each week of this? 
Who would invent such slow clocks? . . . 

The new witches here have policies
and gingerbread excuses.

They have employee parking and, I guess,
some way to muffle doubt.

Best Healing Witch in Louisiana

 

Processional

      “At least that’s how I figure it,” is what she’d say
       at the end of every story. “That orange one across the street 

      is full of sass. It needed its ass kicked.
      And my Mackie’s the cat to do it, too. He’s the man.”

      Mackie, short for Mackinaw,
      her favorite kind of lake trout

      since sometimes they grow to be enormous,
      bigger than lies, bigger than a kindergartner.

      “He probably saved you a car wash,” she tells me,
      “kept your tires from getting sprayed on.

      At least that’s how I figure it,” and then she’d nod.
      Or she’d lean in and elbow me,  

      say, “It’s time you got her dress off, Handsome.
      Women don’t want it so courtly. I’m not wrong.”

      Madame Kafelnikov.
      That woman was some kind of neighbor.

      I used to sit on the porch with her, 
      believing and believing,

      and the only thing that seemed unreal 
      was the time, the clock outrunning the evening.

Arrival

      But I’m jumping ahead. And she’d have hated that,        
      said, “Don’t you get there before I’ve gotten there.

      A story is never for the teller, you know.
      At least that’s how I figure it.”  

      She was the reason I got my apartment; she gave the landlord 
      her approval, said, “Lighten up, Babineaux, 

      forget the deposit,
      a fool could see he’s a good kid.”  

      My story was the reason she liked me.
      About walking home from school.

      I needed to pee but was too shy to knock on someone’s door,
      even on the door I knew:

      Stacy Purgatorio, Meeker Elementary, 
      three seats over and one row back in class.

      I couldn’t make it in time, ran home
      embarrassed and furious.

      She said, “Your mama just over-taught politeness, that’s all.
      Of course you can use the bathroom. Come on in.”

Burial

      She healed things without even trying to,
      and put spells on bedrooms to keep out mosquitos,

      and could cure a cold 
      by slapping you in the face.   

      I don’t know why it worked; it just did.
      All kinds of minor miracles. 

      One time the bulb burned out in the lamp,
      and all she did was talk to it—Are you feeling okay?

      Should I move you by the window? 
      things like that—as if the lamp were a person.

      I was sitting right there in the dark
      when it turned back on.

      Another time she found a bird in her kitchen—not stiff, 
      but dead by Mackie’s water dish.

      She lit three candles, opened the door, and it flew
      as soon as a breeze swept its feathers. 

      Maybe that’s why I figured
      she would never die; if the time came, 

      she’d heal herself. 
      But no. . . .

      I heard later it was quite a funeral:
      geese and egrets and pelicans, hundreds,

      flying over
      and landing on the cemetery pond.

Recessional

      When I moved away to Utah, she sent me a note:
     “That’s probably a crazy place.

      But you’re there now, so be about finding 
      instead of looking back.

      I figure you know what I mean.”
      After that she never wrote again.

      I haven’t forgotten, though.
      And when I’m sick, I mix up her medicine:

      cheap red wine with a shot of Jaeger, 
      and Geno Delafose on the stereo. “Like a slap,” she’d say,

      “without the aftershock.
      Now come on over here, I’ll pour you another,”

      my old neighbor, Madame Kafelnikov,  
      Wielder of Charms, the Exorcist of Ordinary. . . .

      I know there’s a heaven for her.
      Even if it’s only in my memory.

      I imagine she’d tell me
      she figures it that way too.

“Tell Us a Secret”

 

When night’s aloft and the sky’s
torn up,

someone’s brother 
has to journey.

Half to, half from, half
until doesn’t matter

as long as the myths aren’t skipped:
the gold cup, the hovering 

firebird, the path 
to the lake. 

This is lightning, 
and it wants a story.

This is summer, and it wants
more wine.

One time, I was the brother they sent;
that part isn’t secret. 

The storm took the shape of a woman. 
That’s the part that is.