What is this thing? This Riding Hood,
and yet the girl does not ride.
There is no horse to lure the wolf,
only the girl, who carries the hatchet
hid in her basket. The weight worries
her wrist as she walks, quickly, with stealthy
backward glances, barely avoiding
the roots and the branches.
Where is the woodsman and his ax,
invented by the Brothers Grimm,
or men like them, to save her?
Red was tougher than she knew.
When the woodsman came at last,
he peered through the open window,
turned and ran away, the forest
closing like a door behind him.
The Main Street Rag, Fall 2022