You Knew I Was Home, Ignoring the Bell
I would have invited you in but
there was a black dog looking
calmly at me in the mirror
after the doctor suggested I give up
chocolates and coffee --
the very things I wake up craving. Then
CNN confirmed for me the dread--
making news that a wild elephant
is slaughtered every 20 minutes. I say,
a wild elephant dies every 20 minutes to
satisfy demand from China according to
my television. The word "insatiable” was used.
I am beginning to despise you,
ancient and beautiful land of scholars
and warriors and Wu Wei--think we don't know
your fabled herbal remedies include
powder from the black rhinoceros horn?
Your reply came quickly:
American buffaloes. Florida manatees. Hawaiian crows.
Yes, the door is invitingly open now,
the black dog
refuses to leave.
Trish Saunders lives and writes in Seattle and Honolulu and (in her imagination) Paris, France during the 1920s. She’s been published in Off The Coast, Blast Furnace Press, Dead Snakes, Silver Birch Press.
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