And as in Alice
BY MARY JO BANG
Alice cannot be in the poem, she says, because she's only a metaphor for childhood And a poem is a metaphor already so we'd only have a metaphor inside a metaphor. Do you see? They all nod. They see. Except for the girl With her head in the rabbit hole. From this vantage, Her bum looks like the flattened backside of a black and white panda. She actually has one in the crook of her arm. Of course it's stuffed and not living. Who would dare hold a real bear so near the outer ear? She's wondering what possible harm might come to her. If she fell all the way down the dark she's looking through. Would strange creatures sing songs. Where odd syllables came to a sibilant end at the end. Perhaps the sounds would be a form of light hissing. Like when a walrus blows air. Through two fractured front teeth. Perhaps it would Take the form of a snake. But if a snake, it would need a tree. Could she grow one from seed? Could one make a cat? Make it sit on a branch and fade away again The moment you told it that the rude noise it was hearing was rational thought With an axe beating on the forest door.
