Welcome to The Rumpus’s National Poetry Month project. We’ll be running a new poem from a different poet each day for the month of April.
Alternate Ending: My Grandmother As Gretel
“Hansel and Gretel is the saddest story;
it’s the one where hunger comes first.
~ Frederick Busch
Years in those woods,
lichen on her cheeks, vines
pulling her ankles.
Hunger clawing inside.
She finally found the candy house,
dark as licorice; the constant ticking
of days inside her skull fell silent,
replaced by the witch’s whisper.
This way. A darkness so dense
it took even the bird’s distant twitter
and turned it in on itself
The oven door swung open
so quietly, so easily.
She waited only a little time on the threshold,
fingers trailing across the heads of the swirling
white and red peppermint children
who were guarding the door.
