Share   Print  Save   Become a Fan

Black Squirrel

The first thing I notice about Michigan
are the black squirrels

We have one in our yard
Margaret feeds him popcorn
three times a day
She’s fallen in love

Missouri squirrels are plain
If from the city, mostly bone
If from the country, fat

It came this close to eating from my hand
then you rattled home in that death trap and ruined it
He scuttled up that tree

There it was
a sun spot
hissing at me

Margaret can’t get over it
the color so dark
I’m getting worried
And the squirrel
with its hissing
scares me

I miss the dishwater gray squirrels of Missouri

those ugly old things

They are plain
common enough
scavengers
but they have a certain resilience

You have to hit them square with a car to kill them
even then, like gray hairs, they double


Through death they speak
and no one hears them

A Missouri squirrel will not come close
They’ve seen what people can do

Hell, as I child I ate them,
even the meat was tough
But we were poor
our teeth tougher

When I came home from work today
Margaret was feeding the black squirrel
It ate from her hand
communion
I’d never be part of

She waved turn off the car
The squirrel sauntered away
on its fat black haunches
I pretended not to see it

I will try to give a diamond ring
later this year
now that we can afford it.