How to Survive a Hex
Hunter McLaren

---

Isn’t this how we do it? Isn’t this how everybody does it?
With mint leaves in one fist and a spade in the other,
rounding stone bends and decorating our hallways with empty frames
and horseshoes. Isn’t this fair? Isn’t this justice? With tawdry
eyes and agonizing carpet stitches, reading palms like obituaries and
playing board games with knuckle bones. Don’t we all spell out things like

P R O P H E T I C or L A B Y R I N T H ?

Didn’t we agree that it’s better this way? With elastic spines
and our father’s hunting knives, like snake fangs in the fog, like
dog teeth in the dirt, like human molars in a jack-o-lantern’s grin.
Aren’t we all just lovely and violent riddles? Just stained glass cages for
secret powers such as: 

Licking envelopes with unbloodied tongues
Burying vases where only stray dogs can find them
Eating shadows
Catching the luckiest rabbits
Trimming the hedges just enough to spy