The prompt: Write your own poem titled “The _____ of ______ ,” where the first blank is a very particular kind of plant or animal, and the second blank is an abstract noun. The poem should contain at least one simile that plays on double meanings or otherwise doesn’t quite make “sense,” and describe things or beings from very different times or places as co-existing in the same space.

The list is endless, there’s always something
More to add, the bucket list lengthening
While we sit, bellies full of the holiday just had
Talking like jackals around a Ouija board.
Eyes as dark as sin, should we let the wolves in?

The list expands as though it never stood still
Like the stream we almost crossed, the thrill
Of rapids, of a past we long to return to,
For nothing short of satisfaction will do.
It’s as old as the hills, should we let the wolves in?

The list is not mine, it never was. And yet it is
Like songs lost upon forgotten shores
How uncomplicated childhood was, happy to be
Playing in mud and water, unbroken, complete,
Blazing trails of ice within. Then we let the wolves in.

The wolves they howl from tales long ago.
Memories wash away in soluble streams
Perched on scales of lives gone before
All my wants are nothing, but for the dreams.