The Werewolf’s Desire
She knew from the start
that the wolf within
was not a thing to share.
—
Though how she knew
puzzles her still.
That. First. Time.
A Hunter’s moon rising —
painting her room
red as blood,
while she becomes —
something else.
Trapped by walls
and windows and doors —
with latches and knobs
her paws can’t manage.
She paces the room,
her low and feral growl
— unheard —
over the TV downstairs.
Survival is an instinct
born of difference,
Of the shiver of close calls
and the constant thud
of slips of the tongue.
But then the moon rises
full and red as blood —
and this time,
the window’s propped open
and there’s a
long, leaping drop —
To the ground,
To the woods,
And freedom.
Silence is a habit
as familiar as old clothes
and worn as thin
as her patience.
How to explain
what it is
when the body aches
with the need to change.
She hates to leave the wolf
dissolved in morning dew,
knowing what she’ll miss
in the nights to come.
The surge of power
the thrill of freedom
and all the lies
shed with her clothes.
Oh, to tell of the nights
when the moon shone
full and low in the sky,
red as blood
and she is reborn,
in the forest,
in the mountains,
with room to run.
Years pass,
and with each
blood red moon
she swears a dark
and growling oath,
never to go back,
but to live out
her wolf’s life.
To run, to race
against the dawn
until her heart pounds
and her tongue lolls
and flecks of foam
dapple her jowls
like the last patches
of spring snow.
Yet morning always comes.
the sun strands her.
The intricate webs of scent
fade with the dew,
and she is poorer for it.
And always —
always — angry
But the memories live on,
of long nights
and wild runs
to windy summits.
Then one night
her quickening senses hear
a call that echoes her own.
And when the moon
shines full
and red as blood
— twisting her true shape
from the false —
She rides the change
out into the wild woods
and whatever waits there.
No stranger to the woods
yet still there is the sense
that something has changed
that the eyes staring
back from the shadows
know what she knows.
Know the pain of change.
Know the glory of it.
They runs through the night
a pack of black wolves
under a Hunter’s moon
that shines red as blood.
But this time,
when the sun rises,
the wolf remains.