The goat and I, a fable.

All day she tends the garden behind 

the house. Every morning she lines up 

clear jars on the kitchen counter, 

like rows of pacifist soldiers. In the 

evening they are filled with fresh

yogurt. Some evenings we sit by the 

fire and she reads Haiku poetry aloud.

Nothing expository there, she says, 

then winks and laughs like a church bell.

One night as I was passing by the

drive-in movie theater, I saw her 

up on the screen, playing a spy 

disguised as a goat. Last night she 

sat in the meadow, in the moon light, 

wearing the robes of a Buddhist monk. 

In the morning I asked if she was 

rehearsing for another movie role.

Oh no, sir, she replied, I can assure

you I am entirely the real thing.

Then she crowed, exactly like

a rooster at morning’s first light.