Fox in the Neighborhood
a riff a rant a love piece
There’s a fox in the neighborhood.
There’s a Fox in the neighborhood.
This suburban neighborhood where, recently the main streets were all lined with tiny american flags. flags which made me cringe with horror, made me quiver in rage - fuck state sanctioned violence, fuck the military industrial complex and your memorial day bingers and your memorial day sales- for this american greed complex just won’t stop ravaging until when, what the fuck will it take?
But there’s a fox in the neighborhood!
Fox is in the neighborhood
Fox!
Where last time I saw Fox cross Tram road from a mixed forest of Oaks, Pines, Sweetgums, was when there still was a mixed forest of Oaks, Pines Sweetgums
All gone now to brick spec homes, not a shade tree left, much less room for Fox
to hide or burrow
Why didn’t anyone think about where Fox is supposed to go?
And then there is my parents backyard
A half acre of shade
oaks and pines an unruly compost pile
fallen limbs brush piles
the hedgerow between them and the old man who died last year’s yard
rich with vines and underbrush - honeysuckle, azaleala, wisteria,
dogwood, virginia creeper
a maple on her last legs towering over it all
fecund and tangled inviting in the carolina spring
Which is exactly where I saw Fox dart
last week, as I sat, talking on the phone to
first baby daddy, perched on the windowseat
of my high school room, and there
Red fox ran across the road
and into my parents yard
”Fox!” I yelled into the phone.
Grabbed the toddler from her laptopped Netflix show and ran
outof doors, nevermindingthe hot pavement
singeing my heels, and boy did it
Of course, Fox
was no where to be found
having ran fast
into cover
safe under tangled yard brush
Now at night we hear this noise,
a wheezing hairball scratchy noise, piercing the night sky
and it’s not Cat, it’s Fox!
Fox wheezing and almost two year old Aubrey points
to her ear and says
“Hear dat! Fox!”
And how can I impress upon the person who put those flags in the ground that I can’t go on if Fox doesn’t make it? How every day I worry someone is going to hit Fox with a car or worse gun Fox down since we know how so many people with guns feel about seeing someone they don’t care to recognize running wild
And why is Fox always alone?
Is this Fox alone?
Is this the last Fox of the neighborhood?
And if so, who’s to know when Fox is gone?
What songs will be sung?
Who will tear their hair and drench their black dresses with their tears?
Who will tattoo a tear of mourning on their upper left cheekbone?
Who will tell Foxes ways?
who will carry Fox forward?
Who will bury Fox with due propers?
And why do I care so much what happens
to Fox
meanwhile, always carrying the always ever
sinking feeling
sternum seizing
understanding that too few give a damn
about Fox and that I am alone
so alone
in this neighborhood in my sky high regard
pure adulation
awesome awe full
love and appreciation
for Fox