in the forest

                   (from my Hansel and Gretel poems)
in the forest

it was always moonless
starless night.

top-thick trees
shut out sight,
creaked and wheezed
ancient shadows
over moss-draped boughs,

un-invited visitors
and lost children

who held each other
trembling small
across unspoken landscapes
of imagined plight

‘til sleep unsettled fear
and shivered them
to morning light.