Signals

"Roadkill" by Deborah Lacativa

SIGNALS

Twenty-five days dry,
There's a rattle in the tree.

Middle of September and already
Brown leaves and cellophane litter
Are chasing one another
In a dust orbit on the patio.

On Cheyenne and North Ninth
Chestnut bombs are collecting
In the gulley.

Guerrilla squirrels, husky.

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Passing fences, then fields,
fields,
fields,
Full pelt down the road --
Squirrel
Raccoon
Possum

Possum, maybe

Squirrel, tell by the tail
Undetectable, almost,
just the awful whiff
Porcupine, fresh-squeezed,
Still bristling
Squirrel
Hawk -- yeah! Hawk
Wing intact, flagging

Fields, fields, fields.

Crooked corn gone to battle, gone scarecrow.

Cremola moon passing through Virgo.

Red-eyed potatoes gather the urge
To dance on top of the mounds.

Jack-o-lanterns sit uneffacing.

Golden teasle stiff in the ditch.

Decadent fuchsia, o cordial pendants.

Apples, slug-bitten, clouded with dew-loving flies.

Hoses snakeposing, unhissing.

Crimson falls, ivy streams espaliered on the embankment.

Damp shadow, animated Giaccometti doing plastic man.

Rattle. Bomb. Husks. S' squirrel.


David Gilmour