A Valediction Forbidding

By Margaret Wack

Do not move stones, they will become angry and refuse to stay flat.

Do not build with concrete: it will last beyond your death and haunt your children.

Do not walk on purple cloth with proud feet into the bloodstained house.

Do not swallow the sea or it will haunt your insides, stir longing in your heart.

Do not love bulls or rain or swans or men of any kind lest they abandon you.

Do not forget that living is like licking honey off a thorn.

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Margaret Wack has had her work previously published in Strange Horizons, Arion, and Liminality, among others. More can be found at margaretwack.com.