Gateway

we are coming up

to the season of apples

the time when 

the siren’s song 

from under the green hills

is the sweetest

the most unbearable 

and I can feel

the lure of it 

burning in me 

like an ember stone 

like a road of fire 

and yet I do not

tell you stories 

of the enchantment 

of the other world 

I don’t let my sleeve

brush against you

like a web of thread 

I don’t let my pupils grow wide

like infinite pools 

from the river of ink

that the shadow self

might reach out to you 

and pull you through 

I wrap my right hand 

in silver

that you may be safe