Wild Desire

I blame the animals, little ransackers,

black-eyed screechers through our sweet rows of corn.

They feast on what they find.

O tribe of light I long to join

I am not a skunk, I am not filled with garbage.

I have not the unearned royal mien of the rabbit

nor do I seek to anoint with musk

every shrub in the vicinity.

For my brooding upon an unbrooding life

of requited wild desire, I blame the animals.

Of what do they sing all night,

if singing it is, blood on their teeth?

The cricket thumbs his stubborn lighter

for hours, clicking away in the dark.

I shall rise one day as a flame,

no swamp’s in this heart.

A bird builds his home of what is here:

a clump of human hair, a snapped thread.

A dog, the scent of his death in the air, slips

from the porch and slouches to meet it,

as if he would slobber on the hand

of his master. I won’t have that. I just won’t.