Gloucester Daily Times
It’s a tough job wasting all that extra lockdown time. But it can be done. First Step: boot your computer and guiltlessly, mindlessly enter the click-bait world of the mindless web. Second Step: call it research. As, exploring the history of the T-shirt cannon. Or geography: did you know the United States is 22,348,900 times bigger than the Vatican? And Cardi B, who is happily married to Offset, is worth only $750,000. And in 2009, scientists looking for the Loch Ness Monster found, instead, 100,000 golf balls. See? Time flies.
Speaking of animals, I recently learned about anatidaephobia – the fear that somewhere, somehow, a duck is watching you. (At least, according to Gary Larson, creator of The Far Side.) A group of flamingos is a “flamboyance.” Continuing the bird theme, an estimated 3% of Antarctic glaciers is penguin urine. And, in the humble pie department, 94% of our DNA is identical to Chimps’. (Which perhaps explains belief in the Loch Ness Monster.)
When I need a computer break, but still want the deep comfort of animals, there’s The Incredible Dr. Pol. And a slew of other vet, zoo, and wildlife shows. My own reality-show backyard is becoming important for wasteful escape, too. Wildlife does not care about Washington, heat waves, or Covid-19. They go right about their business: digging worms, building nests, spilling garbage cans, eating your tomatoes – when they’re not eating each other. Yesterday morning I saw a small rabbit in the yard; this morning I saw a small rabbit pelt in the yard.
Which brings me to poetry. There are love poems and grief poems, sports poems, seasonal poems, holiday poems and, of course, animal poems. I lean on animals, in the yard or on the web, because they are wise, because they are innocent, because they are careless of chaos. Below are two creature comfort poems which appeared in my book Marrowbone Lane a few years ago. I hope they are some small consolation – and not too much a waste of time.
Strange Gravy
The diaper’s dead – thrashed
on the lawn like cotton candy.
Puppy’s fond of flies,
lining, eau d’ammonia,
presenting now a shred
at the door, holding it high,
like a prize. But she’s not
interested in similes from me –
junk’s enough, a bribe to come
inside, spread her affection.
The kids spit perfunctory “Yucks!” –
Their unit of disgust. Propriety?
The dog yawns like a soprano.
Pride’s on a frequency too high.
Adult Dog
A decade ago, she’d say hello
with a leap, bolt for the door,
chase the neighbors’ cat, chase
the neighbors… Now, never.
Or only the refrigerator door,
Followed by three turns,
adagio, collapsing at last
in her own corner of the house:
a bowl, a blanket, old bones
like a pale, dismantled moon.
The sofa’s wonderfully warm.
She winks.
We’re a conspiracy. Age is the caper.