“succor” by Sherry Chandler

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Listen you hairless, overfed, clumsy,
two-legged oafs, I’ve got another clutch
of kits coming whether I like it or not
and you won’t even let me experience
a cozy parturition, call it a home birth,
behind the partition in your attic.
All that insulation gone to waste.
This is gratitude? Ten years I’ve kept
your bugs and worms in check,
kept you from being overrun by robins,
pawpaws from rotting on the ground.
(Okay, I broke a few limbs. I’m sorry.)
I’ve taught your ever-changing clowder
of pampered stray cats a little respect,
greedy things, and cleaned up their vomit.
I’ve even run all my yearly litters off
to find their own home range. Well, nearly all.
I’ll admit I’ve let you down a little there.
But hey! I can’t help it. It’s my biological
imperative. Still every night I try to open up
that rotten spot in the eaves and every morning
you nail a bigger board over it. Forget about
saving your hunting spiders. I find them savory.
But these kits will be sucking the life
out of me and you’re gonna make me
give birth in the barn. You call that succor?
You expecting a virgin birth or something?
Well, don’t look at me.

-Sherry Chandler

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