1 <br /> <br />the legend is whispered <br />in the women's tent <br />how the moon when she rises <br />full <br />follows some men into themselves <br />and changes them there <br />the season is short <br />but dreadful shapeshifters <br />they wear strange hands <br />they walk through the houses <br />at night their daughters <br />do not know them <br /> <br />2 <br /> <br />who is there to protect her <br />from the hands of the father <br />not the windows which see and <br />say nothing not the moon <br />that awful eye not the woman <br />she will become with her <br />scarred tongue who who who the owl <br />laments into the evening who <br />will protect her this prettylittlegirl <br /> <br />3 <br /> <br />if the little girl lies <br />still enough <br />shut enough <br />hard enough <br />shapeshifter may not <br />walk tonight <br />the full moon may not <br />find him here <br />the hair on him <br />bristling <br />rising <br />up <br /> <br />4 <br /> <br />the poem at the end of the world <br />is the poem the little girl breathes <br />into her pillow the one <br />she cannot tell the one <br />there is no one to hear this poem <br />is a political poem is a war poem is a <br />universal poem but is not about <br />these things this poem <br />is about one human heart this poem <br />is the poem at the end of the world<br /><br />Lucille Clifton<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/shapeshifter-poems/
