Walking a lonely path, a child,
I heard the voices of those before.
The critics, sneerers, jeerers,
haters, others like myself. Wrapped my arms tighter,
tried not to hear.
“I’m a poet!” I protested feebly to the ghosts
who laughed in return. “You’re a child.”
“No! No, I’m-“ Trailed off. It was true.
“Have you ever been in love?”
“No.” I said,
clutching my little hood to my head,
blushing in the shade of the red
cloak, as they shook their heads and called me a joke.
“But I’ve read!” I protested. “I’ve seen and I’ve felt!”
“Have you done, have you been,
have you sinned in your skin,
have you lost half your soul to a dead man?”
No.
They were right, of course,
I needed to live
to write about life.
So I left my lonely path, set out into the world
with a bloody agenda, wrapped in my child’s cape.
“Red riding hood” they said,
misunderstanding the red –
it was armour, disguise,
I would leave me behind
and find a wolf instead. Would be grown up,
experienced, sophisticated.
Poet.
I found him, early one Sunday,
and lost myself on the way.
Fired treacle pouring from his hands, he wrote
and the world turned ‘round to look,
he spun his book
from icy lights and lay
in eerie shadows’ lamp,
taking in his prose with wolfy grin.
Irresistible and he knew it,
continental line – dark chocolate,
expensive wine, reclining leather seats,
meat overcooked, view of the Rhein,
silken linen sheets.
He read my scurrying pressured intent
before I even worked the courage up,
deep in the woods of adulthood
I chased his words between the trees
and chased my own,
trembling, trembling. I would endure.
Went deeper still – a wolfy quest,
dragging my feet.
Began to see the signs – paw
prints, claw marks,
deep scars in trees. I traced them with itching palms,
heard their fiery song, strong
angry pounding in the leaves,
felt my hands begin to shake,
my knees to give, but the need to live,
to write, create
was stronger, so I swallowed fear,
put up my hood,
went skipping into that nameless wood,
knowing one day they’d find my cloak
in shreds, my patent leather shoes torn up in strips,
my red hair ribbons tread into the mud,
a few tell-tale drops of blood.
All that was left of
me.
The wolf met me at his door
“I’ve been expecting you.” he drawled,
with itching paws, toothy grin.
A weathered, matted, heavy coat – spoke of years of poetry
like Dylan, wanderer, like Kerouac.
I knew he wanted his childhood back.
I figured it was a fair exchange –
experience in return for youth,
my childishly frightened, chattering teeth
contrasting with that wolfy jaw.
My pale white hands never known a day’s work,
chipped purple nail varnish,
friendship bracelets
disappeared inside that wood.
Grew older, filled with words which flowed
like honey, treacle from my palms.
On their way out they met a trap –
the wolf’s long spider web, which stretched
like lazy washing lines all the way
from iron paws to the candycane door,
met the spider that lay in wait,
met the wolf’s curving claw as he plucked them,
and raised them slowly to his jaw.
I’d had enough.
I’d done my time – had mastered rhythm,
rhyme, enjambment, metaphors,
had now known love,
if you could call it that – they said to lose my soul,
(certainly done that) to a dead man.
So I took my gun and, whilst the wolf was sleeping,
blew a hole
in middle age’s belly, took some stones
to replace my honey words,
then left my soul
as offering to the wiser ones,
stitched up the wolf and fled
with bleeding footprints from the wood,
from mud which turned to grass to sand,
with ghostly words clutched tight
in pale white hands.
Do you know, after all that,
the one thing that gets to me most?
It’s that, when I left him, furry poet ghost, with stones inside
and formaldehyde
to cover the grave of my youth,
came out of the woods with a skip in my step
thinking finally, finally,
I had taken that step –
was a poet at last
could write
at last,
they called me a tart instead.
