Red Cap

by Sarah J. Sloat
Wild Poetry Forum
Honorable Mention, January 2008
Judged by Fleda Brown


Tarry, stray,
and you fall into his lap:

a pillory and bellylaugh —
for that is the plunge of strumpets.

Down the hatch lie rooms
strewn with wool, stockings

and children’s shoes,
lined with moss and stumpage.

No surprise to hear
the village hiss, complicitous.

Gossips consider it
no mystery how girls

go down, kindling appetite,
when the wolf asks what you have

under your apron, little
mistress, and you reply —

wine and tarts, old beast,
a ruse, a rosebud.