If the Witch Floats We'll Kill Her

I imagine how it would feel to watch the ice reform overhead

and through the body as I see myself swimming

into sweet-toothed spirals—if the ice would thicken

enough to block out all light, chords spasming in the silence—

a C sharp minor, silk under the fingers, strum into shivers—

a contraction of every curved turn and muscle of confusion.

It is not hard to trace the corkscrew path I wound, again, to these depths

where the numbed imagination fails itself into wondering

how hard the heart must beat to flow through icy constriction

how hard this timber compulsion must pulse until I am done

gasping, and grasp for that—caged thing—inside the chillest lands of me.

And if, by some witchcraft, I manage to float upward,

how long until my lungs fill with water again.