Poem: BOLD REYNARDINE

BOLD REYNARDINE 

(answer to ‘The Daytime Fox’ by Pattie Khan) 

at the loft-party after the gig
we pass joints between us
and I say tell me how you wrote the poem
you read today about meeting the ‘Daytime Fox’,
was it the vulpine shapeshifter who
invites you back to its cottage in the dark-wood
where it wears grandma’s nightgown and nightcap
and draws you into bed to devour you with
wriggling tongue and the erotic piercings
of small pointed teeth?
or maybe you saw the fox in the taxidermist window
posed in black velvet huntcap and scarlet huntcoat
wearing a monocle on one amber button eye,
its brush severed to blood the face of children?
‘John, John, the grey goose is gone
and the fox is on the town-oh!’
was it Vulpes vulpes the urban fox
scavenging pizza from the gutters or
perusing a Chinese take-away menu?
or Beatrix Potter pen and ink sketches of
wily Mr Tod in jacket and walking cane,
or was it no real fox at all, but a metaphor
for the fleeting lover who steals your heart
with a sweet intoxication of kisses
for just one night of delicious joys
leaving such beautiful pains of loss
and yearning separation? tell me now
she tells me no, it was a daytime fox
I happened upon by chance while walking,
nothing more, just a daytime fox…