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skirt,
    then rubs her hands together.
    Ann, Abigail, Margaret and Betty
    all mimic Martha Corey
    with the sharp jerking movement
    of a wheel catching in a rut,
    then pulling free.
    â€œStop praying, Elizabeth,”
    Ann speaks without moving her lips.
    She pulls Elizabeth up from her knees.
    â€œForget not, Martha Corey beat you too.”
    â€œPerhaps I was deceived.
    Perhaps we were all deceived.
    It is not too late to beg forgiveness.”
    Elizabeth looks to Margaret.
    â€œI know Goody Corey is a witch, Lizzie.
    She pricked me last night.”
    Margaret reveals red bumps on her back.
    Elizabeth nods. She rubs her arm
    and curls her hands into her sleeves.
    Abigail says, “The Devil whispers
    in Goody Corey’s ear.”
    Ann hollers, “I see the turning spit
    and a man roasting on it,
    just beside Goody Corey.”
    Abigail speaks again,
    a cavern’s echo of Ann,
    â€œGoody Corey roasts a man
    for the Devil.”
    Margaret and I are to suffer next.
    We feel jabbed and strangled
    and collapse to the floor.
    Margaret kicks her boot
    a little too close to my head.
    Through clenched teeth I tell her,
    â€œMind yourself.”
    Margaret points at Goody Corey,
    but it is me she names sinner
    with her eyes as she screams out the word.
    â€œAny woman who bears babies
    out of wedlock must be a witch.”
    They bind Goody Corey’s hands
    with sailing rope. Still,
    she flutters her fingers.
    Each time she does, our fingers wrench,
    shot up by her Devil’s lightning.
    I stare at my hands,
    fingers hooked in pain,
    and see something new.
    These hands are not just
    implements to serve.
    They are weapons.
    The gavel smashes down.
    Goody Corey,
    like all other witches
    the girls and I name,
    shall face trial.

CAN WE SEE GOOD?
    Mercy Lewis, 17
    â€œI told them witches
    I will not eat. I will not
    drink. It is blood. It is not
    the Bread of Life.
    It comes not from Christ.
    And I spat at Goody Proctor,
    the wife of the tavern keeper,
    the one selling whiskey blood.”
    I pant, uncertain whether I can continue.
    Mister Putnam strokes my hand
    as though I am his child and says,
    â€œDo tell us, Mercy, what next ye saw.”
    â€œA shining figure comes
    and all the witches fled.
    All I could see was a glorious light,
    and the voices of Christ
    singing like crystal bells
    and telling me I am worthy
    to take the book, the Book of Life
    from Christ. And then the angels,
    all of them in rows singing psalms,
    and I pled, ‘Please let me stay here,
    let me not leave.’ But then I woke.”
    Ann says, “Mercy is chosen.
    She’s been shown good, not evil,
    in the Invisible World.
    She is the first to see it.”
    But Missus Putnam is quick
    to shake her head,
    â€œNo, Ann dear, others
    have seen a man in white.”
    Mister Putnam hovers near my cheek.
    He kisses my forehead.
    â€œMercy, Satan doth love to present
    himself as an Angel of Light.
    Good that you did not sign that book.
    It were Satan in disguise.”
    The tears come fast
    as a mudslide down my cheeks.
    We must see evil.
    But then the man I serve
    kneels to me,
    comforts me
    with his kerchief.
    What shall I do?

POWER BEYOND THE PULPIT
    Mercy Lewis, 17
    The meetinghouse during lecture
    might well be the courthouse.
    All of us girls sit in the front pew
    like we are the town council,
    the heads of family, like we are
    disciples of his Grace.
    The Reverend blasts,
    â€œHave I not chosen you twelve?”
    He looks past us girls and declares,
    â€œAnd one of you is the Devil.”
    Whispers whirl around the room.
    Eyeballs wander like seeds in wind.
    Who is the Devil among us,
    the one who betrays?
    Which of the good folk
    is really a witch?
    And then the eyeballs settle,
    how water smooths after storm.
    The eyes look not
    to the preacher to answer
    their questions, to guide them,
    but to us girls, the Afflicted.
    We are the ones who see witches.
    The good folk nearly plead,
    â€œPray tell us who be the