“And after the seventh month she picked
the juniper berries and ate them greedily.”
– Jacob & Wilhelm Grimm

 

I put my hands on         dead

earth hear the eggs cracking

in my belly         like falling blue

berries so withered         blotched

the last fruit I cradle

 

threadwork conifer scales

open like hands brushing

winter into skin         blue

fingers against bark

 

 

under the cone of our tree

his bleating, a bitter wind

I draw roots         patterns

some seduction

against his trunk

 

 

I am greedy         ripping

bleeding handfuls

of low-hanging beryl fruit

one         two         three

the whole tree inside

 

 

my belly           bloated

and purple           full

of ferocious red hair

when I die           bury me

under the juniper tree

 

 

Amanda Stovicek is a writer and teaching artist from Northeast Ohio. She is preoccupied with star formation and writing that resists. Her work has appeared in Us For President, Rubbertop Review, Jenny Magazine, and is forthcoming in The New Old Stock.