Image: “Princess Mononoke (1997)” from Studio Ghibli.
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WOLF PRINCESS, TO THE IRONWORKS
NOVA WANG
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“Cut off a wolf’s head, and it still has the power to bite.”
—Lady Eboshi from Princess Mononoke (1997) In these woods, my sins bare into brand: I undaughter myself and turn to the wild, release my blood from human hands. They grip my arm, leave bruises thick as snakes. Rage blistering into open palms. But I hold this honest flesh even as it barrels to beast, whipping into gunmetal pelt, a cry slicked silver by wind. Mother, I am knife- bound to the past. Victim to the future. I halve my reflection and cut the girl away, a gash the shape of the moon. I confess, I thought our gods would never die. I thought we were less metal than earth, I buried the shot and waited for it to grow. Mother, what do we do with all this iron. Do boars know the predator evolves, a new technology of hurt? In these woods, I watch you transform, alchemy, wring bullet from blood. You balance on cliffsides and search for flashes of fur, the musket eating demons out of deer. You, cannibalizing land, more teeth than stone, more bite than bite. A jaw hooking twin crescents around home. But human, tell me how you fuel your machine—its smoke and its meat. The sweat, rotting your joints. Tell me how you aim the gun in the lake, and shoot reflections of trees. |
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Nova Wang is probably thinking about ghosts. Her writing appears in Gigantic Sequins, Fractured Lit, and Up the Staircase Quarterly, and she tweets @novawangwrites. You can find more of her work at novawang.weebly.com.
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