Squirrel Meat

To cultivate her precious,
precious garden

she stabs unevenly,
impractical killing lunges,
yelling her cadenced curses,
blood-gibberish

and the poor squirrel
nabbed in an upturned
chicken-wired basket excuse
of a trap

shrieks,
not like Rocky
when Bullwinkle goofs,
but piercing.

Rocket J. Squirrel

to her, no better than
a bushy-tailed rat

who strayed to bite into
the wrinkled Miracle-Gro bittermelons
planted from hoarded seed

falls prey,

as her steely-hearted daughter
waters the trellised canopy
made of worn bamboo
and cabled silverish clothesline,
too ashamed to look.

Everyone else
stays inside.