Ježibaba

Asked to visit Moscow
By a prince of thieves
She exposes more
Than ink along sleeves.
Her tattoos proving
How her promise delivers
Beyond the wild wish
Of devoted believers,
A saint selling miracles
To royal criminals.
 
She stands naked as a promise
To any doubt who's Thomas is
In search of sure proof.
A gesture, a shark's tooth
Silencing a skeptic
With bloody empiric
Sign of her gifts.
Then every mood shifts.
 
Her tattooed body a story:
Fashioning Hands of Glory,
Torture with a verbal lancet,
Conjuring the Black Pullet,
The aspersion of waters,
Corruption of virginal daughters,
Solomon's mirror for divination,
Spells to induce self immolation,
And knowledge of seals
Revealing routes to Faustian deals.
 
Her voice a wicked rasp
Every syllable sure to grasp
The attention of these men
Who so timidly summon;
She speaks, "Let us not distort
That I am more than last resort.
Yet, no offense to this thieves' court,
What failures of yours must I thwart?"
 
So it comes that a king must die
The witch, in no need of why,
Asks, "How brutal should it be?"
The verdict demands he die biblically.
 
She dresses and departs
Anxious to practice her black arts.
Outside she takes to the air
Riding a storm to where
A shadowy tenement dares
Trespassers she never spares,
Those fools out to prove they're fearless
As well as the witch hunters peerless.
The latter, often vicious ox,
Discover she's the Teumessian fox --
So regularly sought,
But never likely caught.
In her benighted rooms
Dark as forgotten tombs
She harvests parts of a natterjack toad
While playfully reciting a witch's ode
Thanking Clotho for the shears
That all humanity fears.
Heart, liver, kidney, lungs,
Blessings in demonic tongues
Then by herbal means she enchants
Seasoning with a smattering of plants:
Henbane, oil of aniseed,
Angel's Trumpet, dash of richweed,
Safflower, fresh bladderwrack
Crushed walnuts, preferably black,
And devil's shoestring
Almost completes the thing.
Mixed in the melted fat of a suicide
She plays a chandler with pride --
Skillfully crafts a killer candle.
Lit it allows a shadow to amble
From the tenement, down the lane,
All the way to who must be slain.
It will not take all night.
Meanwhile, the witch's eyes go white
Save for pinpoint pupils glowing red
Thru which she puppeteers the dread
Assassin shade moving with celerity
Delivering death with unholy barbarity.
Mary Kelly's corpse doesn't compare
To this vicious nightmare,
Leaving no need for further discussions.
Ježibaba is the witch queen of the Russians.