I bid you prick these thorns

into these women’s likenesses

for they have upset you.
             It feels so good to press and twist

             into the imprinted wooden faces,

             imagining the thorn’s poison

             spreading through the bloods’

             stream, the women complaining

             of pains, then fever, the drips

             of sweat forming, bodies falling

             to wooden floors, even then

             not seeing grime in the cracks

             they neglected to scrub away,

             clutching at their table legs, their children’s legs

             begging for water, finding

             the strength to point their crooked fingers

             at the house on the edge of town –

             ‘She did it! It was her –

             the witch!’ And me standing there,

             a poppet myself, clutching

             their mottled likenesses.