Goldilocks
& on the highway, the woman almost drives into a railing. An accident. Perhaps. Lost in
thought. What thought almost causes this kind of damage? The usual one. About the
other woman. Is a bed not its own sort of a mind? & don’t they both sag with weight
when an extra person slides into them? Don’t they collapse
onto a hard
new truth?
The woman still driving thinks of fairytales. Especially this one. The
one of the young blond who wanders into a house. So fucking entitled. Who sticks her
fingers in the porridges, & tongues the spoons. Deems another’s daily bread too hot,
too cold. Too hers.
Who settles into all the chairs & breaks their legs. This destruction is
easy. (No one ever thinks of the carpenter.) She lays on the bed. Falls asleep— her
outside clothes all over the sheets. Ain’t got no home training, this golden haired woman.
They never do.
& this is the moment the woman, the first woman, our driver is
confused by— when Mama bear comes home. She’s never read the original story. Maybe
it’s not the same. But in the childhood one, this bear, big & grizzled & not at all gilded,
on hind legs in her own house, finds the blond in the bed. & instead of claws, & teeth,
& blood & gnaw, instead of knuckles, instead of a feral shriek
the woman
offered the blond a ride home. It was
a late night & really, the city isn’t safe
at that hour. She knows now that
exact moment of rupture: when she
beckoned the sunshine woman into
her car & said, “I promise, it’s no
trouble at all.”
