Poem for Thursday and Cross Country Celebration

The Wolf Reader
By George Szirtes

for Marilyn Hacker

There were the books, and wolves were in the books.
They roamed between words. They snarled and loped
through stories with bedraggled wolfish looks

at which the hackles rose and the world stopped
in horror, and she read them because she knew
the pleasures of reading, the page being rapt

with the magic of the fierce, and she could do
the talk of such creatures. So one day
when teacher asked if there were any who

could read, she rose as if the task were play,
to claim the story where she felt at home.
The tale was Riding Hood, the wolf was grey.

The fierceness was the wood where grey wolves roam.
She read it round, she read it through and through
It was as if the wolf were hers to comb,

like those bedraggled creatures in the zoo
that, trapped behind the bars, would snarl and stride
as you'd expect a page or wolf to do.

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Quickie because I have spent the evening at an enjoyable but verrrry long cross country banquet at Adam's high school (ostensibly potluck, but we were all required to pay for Chick-fil-a, which pisses me off not only as a vegetarian but because I loathe giving money to religious fanatics who donate it to anti-gay organizations -- yes, I complained to the organizers). I ate way too many carbs (various noodle dishes, bread, fruit, and desserts were about all I could eat) but it was nice to see Adam get a second varsity letter, a captain's pin, and part of the team spirit award.

















Otherwise, my day involved rushing through work, chores, and a walk in the beautiful chilly woods so that I had time to fold laundry very slowly while watching Man of Steel on DVD, though I didn't have time for the extras. There's still too much Jesus imagery/religious parallels, but I love Amy Adams' Lois Lane and I adore Russell Crowe's Jor-El and Michael Shannon's Zod, so Superman just kind of slides by and I sorted photos for our annual calendar during all the disaster porn. We got home in time for Nashville (not enough Rayna) and to stop the cats from starving!