It feels like whenever I need to boil the wool of bat

the sink is clogged. Or you forget to cover the ram’s blood

overnight and the whole spell is ruined.

It’s lonely, starting the incantation when you are

in the other room with your headphones on.

Though there are the little things. How you make sure

the orb is glowing before I return from work.

Nights spent side by side, weaving webs from goblin

Eyelashes, feeling like a home.

If only we’d purchased a larger cauldron!

More nets for the bird bones, an extra broom!

These wolf skin blankets, light and grey as fog

are a few inches too small to cover both our legs.

Outside, the raven’s moon rises. Or maybe it’s passed.

Who can even tell with these screaming neighbors?

And you and I huddled by the space heater in Baba Yaga’s hut

laptops open, searching through the rental listings to conjure

a new life. Sturdier walls. Wood floors.

Something with a yard for our furry familiar

who sleeps in the curl of a crescent moon

and suddenly looks up, ears perked, and barks, “Poof.”