In a labyrinth-like forest, 

pitchy-black and numbing, 

I come upon a fire. 

There’s a figure 

warming hands close in.

She smiles and gestures. 

I sit, 

watching sparks and smoke, 

letting the heat wrap 

around my spine.

She invites me to stay, 

rest, eat, sleep, 

near the fire.

 
I ask her name:

Hope, she replies.

 
And so I move on, 

for I know 

she is a will-o-the-wisp,  

incalculable and vacillating  

as the fog which settles 

and obscures the sight 

of what is right in front of you. 

  
Hope is not my friend, 

not in this wilderness.