Squirrel • National Poetry Month

Thank you for spending National Poetry Month here with us at Hedgehog Lover. Keep reading poetry, keep sharing poetry, and keep loving poetry!

Squirrel

It's not a dignified end, dangling

from my fingers, held fast with

a candy wrapper salvaged from

my car floor. I found no napkin, so

I improvised, judging the safety

of the road while drudging about

for a makeshift shroud.

                                     She is small,

light, and I whisper a prayer. No,

more of an apology: had it been me,

I would have stopped, she would have

made it across. When one stops,

others follow, whether out of shame

or habit or kindness I never can tell.

I lay her gently at the curb, tuck

the wrapper under her, too small for a shroud.

A prayer, unbidden, escapes my lips:

for her, for me, for the careless driver

who brought us here, together, on the side

of the now-quiet road. It’s too late for

the peace I beg for in my fervent whisper.

It’s too late for us both.

By Chris Fow Cohen
Shared with the author's permission