the next video I watch of myself
she says “It is my favorite month.
It is Libra season;
the season of air,
soon to be Scorpio
as you know that is my
month.
Halloween is my favorite season.
It is the celebration of the dead,
resurrection of the dead;
the ancestors we refuse to look
and talk about.
I am here to remind you
that I burned a sigil for this.
For this month, for this year,
for this spell coming at you
right now like a slow sidewinding
hell like a snake, like a scorpion,
like a spider in a broom,
like it’s datura like a moon,
what fresh hell is this?
like a dinosaur on my body,
exploding. ”

things get closer and I run.
I am still in the hole,
my eyes are green,
I am thirteen years old.
I am watching myself
rise from a well.
I am watching the sky turn red.
I am watching myself
with grace and patience
waiting for me to
watch myself.

the last thing I hear of her
is
“I assure you I am real.
I assure you I am long.
I assure you of my strength
in siren song.
I assure you of the power
of reverse.
the power of a curse.
I burned a sigil for this. ”

“the well”

i must interject to remind the audience this is a horror story based on magical realism.

I wanted to use my self expression
to explain a cage.
When I died in that well,
I was mired deep in a belief of
magic and I began to weave a spell
that would open when I was born
again. I would find each of the three
men. I would make them pay
their amends.
they warned me not to die
with anger. we believed
in witchcraft then.

they warned me
not to write the spell.

right before you die,
your entire life flashes before your
eyes but so does the next
one.
I drew the sigils like
a web knowing it would be
hard for me to find them.
it would require diligence and practice.
I knew that I would say the names wrong.
I knew I would be immured in something
entirely new.
I wouldn’t remember the names.
they promised me I wouldn’t
remember the names.

they promised me one thing:
I’d remember my name.
eventually.
I was thirteen years old.
I would spell the threads like this:

sarah, am I lying?
are you being haunted
by a ghost?
sarah, is it real?
say my name, sarah sarah.
say my name.
when you started the black
magic did you know
which girl would visit you
the most?
it’s only as real as in your head,
sarah sarah.
say my name sarah.
SARAH SAY MY NAME.

you are hunting blind my dear.

“13” or “arachne”

I watch several videos of me dressed like Glinda the good witch.

I do not know who i am talking to but it is clear

i am strangeness
uncontrived.

the floor falls out
and one of them throws me
a rope.

when they ask you what
you are, say humbled.

the floor falls out
and I go deeper and someone throws
me a bouquet.

“this is useless,” I yell.

not quite charming girl,
she bellows from above.
be careful what you say. 

the floor falls out
and I go deeper.
I once died in a well
in the middle of the woods
and no one ever found me.

my name was catarina kacrek.
somewhere around Czechoslovakia
but another place altogether.
a place with no name,
a different territory.
we were wanderers.
nomads.
I was a child
when they came for us,
attacked.
three men led me to the middle of the woods
in the snow and raped me
and threw me down a well.

the last thing I heard before I closed
my eyes was may you
get your revenge or
may you die trying.
someone throws me a bouquet.

“tell me how to forgive,” I say.

the floor falls out
and I go deeper.

“the story about catarina kacyrek”

what I should have said was
be careful what you say
what  I tell them instead is
last lifetime i planted a book
that I would find next lifetime 
by writing it.

it is when i no longer care
that the floor falls out
and i am taken even
deeper into the earth.

they want to know if
im dedicated.

they say the same thing everytime.

are you attainable?
we want strangeness,
uncontrived.

I began by rewatching all my old
videos to find my motivation:

there are three in particular that stick out.
glinda,
light play
and the ace of wands in scorpio
where i dress like a ballerina and
chant over and over
for a male audience
“I watch myself with grace
and patience.”

if he decides to ask how I felt when
I heard that, it was floored.

the woman on screen,
who I decided is not me
but a derivation
of some form of me
then proceeds to
repeat:

when she comes to me,
when she shows me what i should be,
the domme, the alpha,
the lead; what do you believe about
me?

I say:
I am datura moon
out loud.

right after that
i hear her say

I am a dancer.
I am quite flexible.
irate when challenged
yes, like all good cats.
I am a princess you
see, a real princess.
what have you been dreaming about?

“ace of wands, new moon in scorpio”

men don’t like wanton women, i wear this defense:

leave a job every three years,
never say yes
and never hold their hands.

become wildly successful.

they all want to know the secret and the secret is
I  don’t care.

that’s how i woke up.

in the bottom of a hole in the middle of a forest with a shovel.

said you better dig your way out.

but first wake up.