Luanne Castle
Why I Always Wear Red
This cabin remembers when I dried my small red coat at the wood stove. It had grown too warm inside, so I left for the path to the dirt road. But the trail was buried by the snow that had been coming down for hours. What happened then I don’t like to think about. It does run through my mind still. Runs as an overprotected girl does from a wolf, trembling and fast.
This is the first time I’ve been back since it all happened years ago. To build a fire, I need to walk out to the diminished woodpile under its rotting canvas cover. Through the window I can see it beginning to snow, just as it did that night. While I am outside, I notice the old rusty chainsaw. As I carry back the saw and the birch logs, I spot a smudged set of tracks, the claw etchings more defined than the paw pads. I know he’s been here, waiting for me.
Inside, I load the stove and then I oil and fuel the saw. The room warms and glows, the scent of burning wood filling the air. The window’s lacy glaze has become transparent. Suddenly, eyes glare at me through the glass and breath melts the last of the frost. The image disappears, and the door bursts open, his body and hunting knife filling the space. The chain saw is ready for him. The fire is ready for the cabin.
The cabin with its ancient logs, the cooking oil and old mattresses, burns swiftly. The snow drifts will protect the forest from the fire, so I climb into my snowmobile and start the motor. Looking back at the blaze through the window, I will away the last smidgen of regret. At the open road, I spot my old friend, icy chunks clinging to his chest and shoulder fur. As I slow the machine, he climbs behind me and clutches my waist as I speed up and on down the newly plowed road.
See
how red
hides any
saw residue
That’s why I always wear red in the woods.
Luanne Castle’s award-winning full-length poetry collections are Rooted and Winged (Finishing Line 2022) and Doll God (Kelsay 2015). Her chapbooks are Our Wolves (Alien Buddha 2023) and Kin Types (Finishing Line 2017), a finalist for the Eric Hoffer Award. Luanne’s Pushcart and Best of the Net-nominated poetry and prose have appeared or are forthcoming in The Dribble Drabble Review, Copper Nickel, Pleiades, River Teeth, Verse Daily, and other journals.
