The Mouse

My computer had a little trouble waking up on a recent morning ... I guess we're becoming more alike ... I say "a little trouble," but that translates as BIG TROUBLE for me.

I'm still struggling to understand the electric typewriter (anybody remember those?) ... and, no, the first typewriter I used was not a wood-burning model ... it was a standard, mechanical ... clackety-clack ... sturdy, understandable, non-electric typewriter.

When something got stuck, I could usually track down the problem and ... with the help of a paper clip or a brush ... perhaps solve it.

Computers, though, are a different breed. I know nothing about their workings. 

Well, I do know that this one seems to be working now ... (how many times have I thought that, though, only to be wrong?) ... and if all goes well ...

But I digress.

What I started out to talk about was today's poem, based, as are most of mine, on the material at hand ... you know, tangible stuff ... things I understand ... at least sorta ...

Now that I think about it, though, it seems that this particular poem kind of tells its own story, so here goes: 

THE MOUSE

I slept serenely one blustery night

while a timorous sweet-toothed mouse

stole into my house, chewed a jagged

hole in the right-hand pocket of my

old blue robe and took a foil-wrapped

chocolate by surprise.

Discovering the theft, I, Superior

Creature I, smiled at such waste

when my poor pocket was open

all the time.

But who has dined on prized chocolate?

And who stands here holding crumpled

foil while a finger waggles foolishly

from a hole?

© 1998

(originally published in Capper's)

Today's word: timorous