Dave Bonta's "Sea witch" is made almost entirely of questions, though none of them carries a question mark. The speaker seems to be a sea witch, or someone speaking in her voice, and she is wondering aloud about three things: who deserves a place in her "book of thorns," which wing is best "to make the first and last," and what drowned land is calling her home.
The images are strange and a little dangerous. A book of thorns sounds like a spellbook that hurts to handle. The wing suggests a bird or perhaps an angel, something chosen for a first and last act, maybe a beginning and an ending. The final lines turn quiet and longing. A land lost beneath the sea pulls at her, and "home" is a place that no longer exists on dry ground.
The mood is eerie but also wistful. The poem moves from the sharp, almost spell-like choosing of the first two stanzas to a feeling of homesickness, as if all her magic is just a way of dealing with loss.