It grew that winter under the ice
When everything else died
As though it had taken from them to give itself life
Black crooked stalks
clawing up between the old fence posts,
those old white posts he asked us to paint every summer
when the sun was still high.
But now it's twilight
and the shadows are
twisting again
twisting in the bramble bush
          Waiting there
in the dark corner of the back yard
where we finally refused to go because the
bramble bush watched
          we knew
but mother wouldn't listen...
even when the thorns caught her that day
and soaked blood into her best satin dress
but it was night when the air grew thick
in our dreams
too thick to  breathe or scream...
When the thing that lived in the bramble bush
came out to play.