Anne Leigh Parrish

originally published in Q/A Poetry

 

when a cliché, she’s wily,

cunning,

crazy as a fox

in her foxy coat

made slyly

of her own fur

 

when not,

she escapes the brush,

crosses the road,

cut by hunger’s knife

to seek the fleeing prey

 

when a cliché, the

a gentleman farmer

slows his late-model rig

to spare her thieving life,

impatient then

for his game of golf

 

when not,

he marvels at

her leap into

denser wood,

her drive just to live

and not be seen