Today’s poem was inspired by the image Changeling. You can read all the contributions and see the images on Paul Brookes’ blog here.

Síofra

Her mother called her Síofra, fairy child,
a changeling with blood of the good folk
fierce and wild,

and cried for her lost infant, golden haired,
rosy-cheeked and longed for, stolen
while she slept,

cried for the ghostly child she saw in dreams,
in flowing white, with folk too bright
to look upon,

but tears ran dry and turned to furrows
in her aging face, when the scrap
tugged at her sleeve,

when the dark-haired, wiry changeling scrap,
with leaves and tree bark in her hair
and scabs upon her knees,

tugged and called her mother, smiling climbed
into her lap, to lay a kiss
on that dry cheek.