Interview with a Bear
We recommend arriving well in advance
of your appointed hour, for you will need
time to accustom yourself to the smell.
The bear does not know that he smells,
nor can he help it, but the reek of the shaded
forest where he made his small fortune
digging up the remains of bishops and kings
from old mud is a shock, you will not
be able to disguise your expression of disgust,
you will lift your hand to cover your mouth
and it is best that the bear not see this.
Also we remind you that during the interview
the bear may fail to ask the questions
for which you’ve prepared your answers,
he may merely roar, stiff and huge
with memories of killings on piney paths,
for the bear has led a grand and boisterous
life and has witnessed many like you,
timid and fragile at his door, hoping
to be the chosen one who will tell him
his food is spread upon the table,
but nonetheless rehearse your answers
out loud as you pace around your miserable
small rooms with their tallow candles
and dead flies along the window frame,
rehearse with your whole heart
for the bear might pick a question
from a tangle of fur, and do not be afraid,
and if you’re afraid do not show your fear,
many have come before you and will come after
when you’re but a rag fluttering on a mountain pass,
and if you hide your fear the bear
may believe for a moment that he loves you
and you will feel this love, inordinate and wild,
a great warmth beyond all names,
be ready to receive it with graceful composure,
and then he will send you away
with a cold gesture as if dismissing
a waiter with a dish he did not order,
and you must leave without protestation,
there are no locks on the doors
and nobody waiting to show you out,
do not look back, don’t ask
if somebody will let you know how
well you did. You did do well.
Editor’s note: if viewing this poem on a mobile browser, turn the phone sideways.
Elizabeth Loudon is a fiction writer and poet, with work published in the Gettysburg Review, INTRO, Denver Quarterly, North American Review, and South Florida Poetry Journal, among others. Her debut novel, about an Anglo-Iraqi family in mid-twentieth century Baghdad, will be published in spring 2023 by a university press (announcement forthcoming).
Loudon has an MA in English from Cambridge University and an MFA in Fiction from the University of Massachusetts Amherst, and has taught English at Amherst, Smith, and Williams Colleges. She worked for many years as a campaign strategist, writer, and teacher for NGOs and universities on both sides of the Atlantic. She now divides her time between London and Gloucestershire in the UK.
