In the Brothers Grimm
it’s a passing hunter
who rescues them,
but I prefer the woodcutter,
from the French, who acts
more out of character,
swinging his axe
to dispatch the impostor,
and on hearing the far-off,
almost inaudible call,
at once gutting the corpse
from the neck to the navel.
Uncountable occasions
that wolf is eviscerated,
and in every edition
I like to flick to those pages
to see how the illustrator
depicts the girl and her beshawled,
bespectacled grandmother
clambering out of the animal.
My friend e-mails me to ask
what I would be doing if I knew
this summer was my last.
She’s out in the woods
in Bellport, watching her daughter
race round and round the pool
and jump into the shining water,
finding everything so beautiful
it hurts.
In the earliest version
by Perrault the story is finished
when the girl gets eaten.
No one climbs out of the beast.
It eats, then exits the cottage,
sated, and heads back into the forest.