No Nursery Rhyme
My good friend Phil was plagued by small invaders
looking for lodging in his rural home.
Rustling through his cupboards in the night,
they left unpleasant tokens of their presence.
Finally, he set traps. Success! He woke
to a gruesome scene in the middle of his kitchen,
and hastily disposed of the cadaver.
Next day, though, he was rattled to discover
a row of small starved newborns, evenly spaced
from largest to smallest in a dead-straight line,
drawn by the scent of mother: three blind mice.
Susan McLean, a retired English professor, is the author of The Best Disguise and The Whetstone Misses the Knife, and the translator of a book of Martial’s Latin poems, Selected Epigrams. She lives in Iowa City, Iowa.
Pulsebeat Poetry Journal 