I’ve seen Canidia myself, wandering barefoot
With her black robe tucked up, and dishevelled hair,
Howling with the elder Sagana: pallor making them
Hideous to view. They scraped at the soil with their nails,
Then set to tearing a black lamb to bits with their teeth:
The blood ran into the trench, so they might summon
The souls of the dead, spirits to give them answers.
There was a woollen doll there, and another of wax:
The wool one was larger to torment and crush the other.
The wax one stood like a suppliant, waiting slave-like
For death. One of the witches cried out to Hecate,
The other to cruel Tisiphone: you might have seen
Snakes and hell-hounds wandering around, a blushing Moon,
Hiding behind the tall tombs, so as not to be witness.
If I’m lying, foul my head with white raven’s droppings,
And let Julius, slim Pediatia, and that thief
Voranus come here, and shit and piss all over me.
Why tell every detail – how the spirits made shrill sad noises
As they conversed with Sagana, how the two witches
Stealthily buried the beard of a wolf, and the tooth
Of a spotted snake, how the wax doll made the fire
Blaze more brightly, and how I shuddered, a witness
To the twin Furies’ words and deeds, but had my revenge?
My buttocks of fig wood split with a crack as loud
As the sound of a bursting bladder: and off they ran
To the city. You’d have been laughing and cheering
To see Canidia’s false teeth drop, and Sagana’s tall wig,
Herbs and magical love-knots tumbling from their arms.