Witch Doctor

Written by: Ava Venuk

Second Place Winner of the 2026 Wallace Stevens Poetry Contest

The waiting room 

has free glass-bowl almond packets.  

 

 

As if stolen, 

I slip one hundred sea salt calories in my pocket. 

 

 

A woman calls me in. 

Her office is a green couch, a noise machine.  

 

 

It’s the first time I’ve heard the ocean uninhabited. 

 

 

Okay, to me she says, 

 

 

What is your life 

plan? 

 

 

I would like to write someplace  

and live with a garden or  

 

 

write with a garden and live  

someplace or  

 

 

garden someplace 

  and write to live. 

 

 

Or water my own window-basket of peonies, 

though, 

 

 

 I am not sure  

they would grow. 

 

She writes a yellow notebook.