A permanent home and museum for poets and poetry

Poems by Meg Kearney

Carnal

by Meg Kearney
with a line by Donald Hall

I suppose squirrels have their hungers, too,
like the one I saw today with the ass end of a mouse
jutting from its mouth. I was in the park;
I’d followed the stare of a dog, marveled
as the dog seemed to marvel that the squirrel
didn’t gag on the head, shoved so far down
that squirrel’s throat nearly all that was visible
was the grey mouse rump, its tail like a string
too short to be saved. The dog and I couldn’t
stop gawking. The squirrel looked stunned himself—
the way my ex, The Big Game Hunter, looked
when I told him I was now a vegetarian.
We’d run into each other at a street fair
in Poughkeepsie. The hotdog he was eating
froze in his hand, pointed like a stubby finger,
accused me of everything I’d thought
I’d wanted, and what I’d killed to get it.

from Home By Now (Four Way Books, 2009); orginally published in Poetry magazine