Pelting

"To kill beaver, we used to go several miles up the rivers, before the approach of night, and after the dusk came on, suffer the canoe to drift gently down the current, without noise. The beaver, in this part of the evening, come abroad to procure food, or materials for repairing their habitations; and as they are not alarmed by the canoe, they often pass it within gun-shot. [...] The most common way of taking the beaver is that of breaking up its house, which is done with trenching-tools, during the winter, when the ice is strong enough to allow of approaching them; and when, also, the fur is in its most valuable state. Breaking up the house, however, is only a preparatory step. During the operation, the family make their escape to one or more of their washes. These are to be discovered, by striking the ice along the bank, and where the holes are, a hollow sound is returned. [...] I was taught occasionally to distinguish a full wash from an empty one, by the motion of the water above its entrance, occasioned by the breathing of the animals concealed in it. From the washes, they must be taken out with the hands; and in doing this, the hunter sometimes receives severe wounds from their teeth".[1]

The North American Beaver is the continent’s largest rodent

I walked by big legs spread in fields of pylons

The steal toed men towered

Above me, legs wide, arms out with amusement,

How disruptive or perhaps not;

Pylon poles tend not to develop wells around their base

Therefore, not disturbing the quality of the snow

Though, two lines and a tennis racket

Now I’d whack the wall of rodents!

Dream them dead between boards

[1] McGill University, 2001, The Beaver and Other Pelts

Pheasant Field

June 3rd, The mulberries greened

Two weeks outside my window

Heat broke 90, palms stained

Purple someone once told me

Stood for sex

Following a feathered friend it screamed:

CHERRY RED POST NUDE, POST POPSICLE

ON A HOT DAY DRIPPING

I ate half a watermelon before the 4th of July

In that time, I too had grown limp

The carrots in the fridge sprouting,

Due to dormancy, bristled with brown ends

I ate the drooping carrots

Grown sweeter, more rooted, from the dormancy

Same day, sat a carpet on the churches stairs

I dressed a couch, yellow felt flowers and Purple

A midst that new yellow,

Frayed fronds above me, I sat

Sun-drowned in what was to be deemed:

The Pheasant’s Field

A gift of Return Upon Repeat

I learned how to kill a bird

With a raisin and a strand of hair

Not this bird, but some birds

In colored fields of clovers

Though these here, are chives.