MICE

By Scott Thomas Clark Campbell

There they were, at the bottom

of the sawdust bin, curled like cabbages

layered like onions, freckles on the cheek

of the wisp wood tundra,

three iced mice,

that would never see summer.

Frozen grapes in my paws, I scooped them up,

to a final resting place, so cold, fur marbles,

and marvelled, at the quiet panic they

perished in, and how could it be,

that they were punished as flowers

that bloom too soon, as moons

that sleep-in morning blue, as bluetits

that whizz, crack, licked clean by the cat, that die

and died a bewildering death, for doing what they do.

How the bin’s colossal walls must have towered over them,

as they pleaded for it to let them go, to let them leave and be on their way.

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