he’s not a bird
eating fish
or worms
see how frantically he spades
without weeding
how voraciously he climbs out
on the seeded maple twigs
* * *
incisor
domestica
rodentia
in residence
* * *
a squirrel with a martini
too much too often
fog in treetops before the wind blows
how do sparrows remember
once nested in this eave before rats or squirrels
found them out?
if it were only hickory nuts for high-fat content he’d
look shiny with such thought snickering abounds how is it
they acquire a taste for the Big Bad Wolf who bought the house?
* * *
nobody charged extra
for the vermin
* * *
in the walls they’re all wild creatures
of course, considering the jerry-rigged affairs
the preceding landholders had undertaken within this plot
(oh, the stories the neighbors were relating, all hinting
at more scandalous expansions now lost to posterity,
nobody could remember much in the way of detail,
except for the wild noises and all the coming and going)
the remaining evidence held no apologies
so what if we live
in cages of our own making? we still escape
into further flames or muck or fencing, all depending
on the company we keep
everyone’s a social creature,
the chattering
he’d considered birds was more or less
incensed squirrels, tearing about his estate
with that obscene flick of the tail
Poem copyright 2015 by Jnana Hodson
To read the full set of squirrelly poems, click here.
