Strategies of the Feminine

Running hunched to the ground darkbodied by the shrubs, 
we think first it is a cat but then the long scaly tail 
gives it away.  The opossum scurries into an opening 
between the pyracantha.  

Opossums will eat almost anything: grasshoppers, 
caterpillars, carrion, acorns, wild cherries, persimmons.  
The soft ruddy body of the persimmon, like a ripe 
breast in a warm hand.  

Chinese artists adored the orangey red fruit.  
In the Sung dynasty, Mu-chi painted Six Persimmons-
Goddess of Compassion at the center, scroll of monkeys 
and a marshbird on either side.   

Years ago, I woke in a cabin on the far coast.
Outside, an opossum dangled upside down in a tree.  
For the shaman full of opossum spirit-things are dramatic, 
blown out of proportion, the normal likely to be upended. 
						
On backcountry roads when I see one lying motionless 
along black pavement, I wonder if its pouch holds a litter-
born blind, naked and grublike, having crawled 
from the womb, hungry for milk, and weakening?  					

Or is it merely playing dead, lying on its side, corners 
of the mouth drawn back and drooling?  
The beady black eyes stare straight ahead, still as glass.  
Opossum shamans take such posturing to heart.  

These shamans love all forms of diversion and distraction:
the opposable toe tucked to each hind foot, 
a tree hidden in an acorn, the tang of the cherry, 
its hard pit-a tactic within the wild purple fruit.


 

© Jan Lee Ande