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You’re listening to the Ghost of Dog
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on the The Voice of Dog,
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and Tonight we have a poem by Rob Macwolf,
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and you can find more of his stories and poetry
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on his sofurry page.
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Read by Dralen, the Dapper Dragonfox.
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As children we fear simple things:
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burglars, ghosts, monsters.
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As adults, our fears grow more complicated:
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personal mortality,
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rising authoritarian bigotry,
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student loans. But it is well to remember,
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as a noted sage once said,
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that in the very beginning even the simplest of children’s stories
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was about blood. Case in point, a poem about an amusing character you may remember from childhood, and all the existential dread that went unspoken.
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Please enjoy “Cheshire Cat”,
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a poem by Rob MacWolf
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The glint you glimpse may be the twilight sun
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Between the shadow trees, or on the lawn
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All unproportioned, where the wild winds run
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Grotesquely. Or it may be me,
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all gone. Beneath wide hedges, wider nothings yawn,
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And nothing’s more nothing than me.
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I fear Nothing. Nothing to see here, ma’am. Move on.
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You see me smiling,
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but I am not here.
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The behemoths are bumbling overhead. The cockroaches are stirring in the wall.
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They call it a party.
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I call it dead:
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The music sours, the clawing colors crawl.
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If you’ve some sense, and would evade it all;
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The simplest way to hide is to go clear.
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Take me. I’ve faded far too far to fall.
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You see me smiling,
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but I am not here.
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Material concerns give me no pause: Like smoke
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I slide through fingers when they clutch
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To smirk intangibly between your claws, To gloat,
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on solid you and any such.
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You cannot wound what is not there to touch.
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You can’t ignore
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what is not there to hear.
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Believe me, one cannot be gone too much.
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You see me smiling,
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but I am not here.
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My mirth is contextless.
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You cannot spell The first word of my insubstantial mood.
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I’m grimacing or grinning.
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You can’t tell; Can’t rhyme or reason me, for ill or good.
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In this world, where you can’t do as you should,
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What can you do but grin and disappear?
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Poem nonetheless,
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this is an empty wood.
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You see me smiling,
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but I am not here.
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Princess, take caution.
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If you don’t see me
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Then best assume
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that I am very near.
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But if I show my teeth, rest easily:
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You see me smiling,
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but I am not here.
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This was “Cheshire Cat”
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by Rob MacWolf, read for you by Dralen,
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the Dapper Dragonfox.
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Thank you for listening
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to The Ghost of Dog.
