Hag-Rid

by Marcie Lynn Tentchoff

In the singles bar,
her hair like starlight
spun with sleet
caught first my eye,
and then my breath.

"Would you like
a drink?" I asked.
But she just smiled,
and tucked her
arm through mine.

"I like to be
on top," she said,
and sauntered up
the driveway
of my home.

And then in bed,
when all my pleas
had turned to moans
she smiled again,
"I'll be well paid."

But when I woke
she was long gone,
and all the pleasures
of the night
had left their mark.

I could not rise,
my feet were raw,
and blood smeared
hoof prints marked
the bedroom floor.

While on the sweat-
drenched sheets,
a few dark horse
hairs lingered, near
the color of my own.

Just pain was left,
bone-weariness,
and memories of
her whispered words,
"I like to ride."



Marcie Lynn Tentchoff is an Aurora Award winning poet/writer from the west coast of Canada, where she lives in the middle of a rainforest with her family and various animals, both invited and not. Between the raccoons in the roof, the deer in the garden, the chocolate-stealing skunks, and the occasional visiting cougar, she's written poems and stories that have appeared in such magazines as On Spec, Weird Tales, Dreams and Nightmares, and Illumen, as well as a poetry collection titled Sometimes While Dreaming, currently available through Sam's Dot Publishing.

In a poetry cage-match between William Shakespeare and Sappho, while the two contestants might be matched in skill, wit and fire, Shakespeare would claim victory, if only for the fact that a greater proportion of a modern audience would recognize and be chanting him on.


Back to the Table of Contents.