I have been the girl
given a sack and told
to sort grain from stone.
And I have been the girl
unseated from a horse
whose head was nailed
to the top of the city wall.
I wanted to lie in my cell
and let the rodents eat
my heart out of my chest,
but the bees kept returning,
wanting to be let back
into the womb: they scoured
its walls, taking the last
cache of honey, stirring
the last pool of sulfur
in its depths. In the night,
a bell struck the sound
of its cracking;
it lingered, echo
becoming darkening brass.
In response to Via Negativa: No toll.