Dayna Patterson
ab ovo
OBERON: I do but beg a little changeling boy
To be my henchman.
TITANIA: Set your heart at rest.
The fairyland buys not the child of me.
His mother was a vot’ress of my order,
. . .
And for her sake I will not part with him.
A circle drawn with ivory wand around the expectant.
A tree planted over placenta.
Baby shaken gently in a sieve.
In my dreams, the one with brown eyes like desert fountains.
Eggs dyed red. Eggs for change. Round harmony. Red happiness.
Head shaved, hair weighed, the weight given in silver.
Six months of feet never grazing earth, holiness like a stork bite lingering.
Across the threshold, a steel knife blade to keep wicked sprites away.
A ritual fire. Head shaved to shear off past lives’ evil.
Glass eye beads, göz muncuğu. A nazar, black and blue.
A bracelet, mano de azabache, a fist carved from jet.
Red slippers. A crucifix hung from crib slits.
Water trickled over fontanelle.
Begin again, a new name in my mouth like wine.
A thorned cattle enclosure where father and elders await the naming.
Taste of water, taste of palm oil, taste of kola nut, salt and pepper. A necklace chain of names.
My daughters in white bonnets with silk ribbons. Handsewn blessing dresses in lace.
Begin again, not scribe this time, but oracle, voice.
Silver anklets, payals, for girls, to celebrate arrival.
A silver coin seeded under pillow for the hanseling.
A silver spoon to feed a future of winter-plenty.
In my dreams, the sand-pillowed infant.
A bearing cloth for a squire’s child. A bursa of fairy gold.
Across baby’s brow, spittle, a dab of honey, a smear of flour. A thimble mixed into batter, baked.
Biscuits with mice, beschuit met muisjes, pink or blue licorice bits.
Fairy bread crusted with hundreds and thousands.
In my dreams, the unclaimed baby, particle-blown.
Mass in the morning. A bolo at the bautizo.
An alpaca wool chullo a father knits for his son.
The first sound—a call to prayer—the sound of azaan.
Red and black bean cakes at cardinal points.
When I wake, the gorgeous gift sifts out of mind.
Weeks of seaweed soup.
An egg for fecundity, salt for wisdom, bread for goodness, and a matchstick.
Wrapped in a doll kimono, a piece of umbilicus in a wooden box.
Self-Portrait as Perdita, Reperta
What I’ve come to is the unstable
nature of stone,
mother a holonym of daughter
To out-mother my mother is easy
as staying this side of a one-inch threshold,
webbing them tight with stories, returning
the skylight’s blue stare
to keep tyrants away
Tapestry unwoven, heddle and reed,
in shades of red
a warp and weft of { }
All I have to do is
Don’t disappear. Don’t lapse into grim
leave them
in forest dusk with only wind to knock
blade against wood
All I have to do is swan
across the river and feed them the last
crusts and not the untested mushrooms
If the lantern’s never blown out
it won’t need a wildfire to blaze it back
There are nettles that lose their sting
when desiccated
to boil for a pot of tea
Jars of preserves and lavender jams
high on wooden shelves Scarlet
cloaks pooled on the honeywood
You can’t imagine beasts more deadly than these
Every mother bear has learned to use her teeth
At the heart of stone, water At the heart of water, stone
Sit cozy here with me Now it is now I enfold