There seems an apple to her face:

the harsh cheeks and shining skin,

tincture of red and sunlight in the eyes.

They bode a canny mind, a lady prone

to others’ misconceptions.

Smaller minds perceive a hungry dagger. She 

has a tight belt and a heart no one counted on.

Admirable, misjudged, uniquely

mistaken for a black sheep when she has nothing

but a sharp tongue to recommend her to the resistance.

She’s read the theory in a schoolbook. She’s strong,

but not your soldier. Watch her turn the fork at luncheon

and you’ll see the private knuckling of a mind

cornered and underestimated and wrongly slated. 

Let her be. What you cannot see is 

hidden or absent, neither affront nor fault. 

For her part she must beware these critics,

who will call her cynical for it, and mind 

that fork be proper. 

For her it turns the world.