From The Big Book of Fairy Tale Jokes for Grown Up Girls
by Jessica Hudson

When music crushes the evening’s chiffon & flowers scurry to twirl
& alight | when candles carve brushstrokes into the night | when

magic grips the ceiling, fingertips, mice | when ballrooms undress
& fancy dresses marry slippers | when dim lights produce an ambrosia, 

my eyelids drunk on the flicker | when dancing rescues us
from our words, elaborate dinners scribble their courses | when fireflies worry 

over the depth of the darkness & butterflies knit themselves
into trellis & paisley & medallion & flamestitch | when sunsets pause 

at the crescendo | when wind widens perceptibly | when the beauty
& power of nature kneels before us, eyes closed, hands stretched out 

for the hopeless gift of us | then |        What am I?

Jessica Hudson is a graduate teaching assistant working on her Creative Writing MFA at Northern Michigan University. She is an associate editor for Passages North. Her work has been published in The Pinch, Sweet Lit, and perhappened mag, among others. Find her on Twitter @JessicaRWHudson.