The Mouse
My husband calls me into the kitchen to show me the mouse
that has fallen into the sink during the night. “I think it’s dead,” he says
just as it begins paddling half-heartedly in the water once more
one last, futile effort to find some purchase on the slick porcelain basin
one impossible final effort. Its eyes are dull, flat, black
minutes from the end. I reach down into the water,
pull the little creature up by its tail
take it outside. “Make sure it’s dead,” calls my husband from the house
not wanting to be a part of whatever I have planned. The mouse
struggles feebly in my hand. Its eyes don’t see me. I have never
seen eyes like that before, half goggled, oblivious
like two dull nail heads jammed into its face.
I carefully set it down in the garden, place its feet on the dirt
let go of its tail. “Please don’t come back,” I whisper
as it struggles for life, for balance
before springing off into the undergrowth.
“Please don’t come back.”
_________
Holly Day
Review by Scott Beal
In my last residence, I had a problem with mice showing up repeatedly in my cabinets, leaving droppings in my cereal boxes. By the time my landlord found and sealed the path by which they were entering my kitchen, I’d caught maybe a half dozen mice in a humane plastic trap, and each time escorted them outside to a park I hoped was far enough away for them not to return. So I can relate to this speaker’s “please don’t come back” which is both a plea for the mouse to go forth and live in peace (because if it comes back the speaker may not be able to spare it again from her husband’s “make sure it’s dead,” despite his larger desire not to “be a part” of this caretaking) and for the mouse to spare the speaker’s feelings of worry or remorse if she has to reckon further with the ethics of how to behave when a mouse shows up in one’s sink. Those questions of empathy are complicated further here by the mouse’s eyes – the speaker looks to them for a sign, but finds only dull nail heads. In deciding what kind of person you’re going to be in a moment like this, the mouse is no help.
Review by Nancy Christopherson
I’m so grateful for the tender care displayed in this poem, the compassion, the concern for a being so small and removed from us, though it lives nears us always, even if we don’t recognize or know it. Collectively, we tend to think it’s dirty, a danger to our health so we feel we must remove it at every opportunity. It is meant only for lab experiments, not allowed in the house. How arrogant we are as a species. Here the speaker offers reprieve to the helpless creature, which is perhaps her first encounter with one. We peer closely at the little face, its terrified eyes, consider its struggle to survive—brave little being—as the poem suggests. Near death moments, what small creatures like this mouse must endure on a regular basis through their delicate lives. Little prey species. The terror of being caught drowning in a kitchen sink, at the mercy of pooled water and two humans: one who wants it dead, the other who cares enough though is frightened, to take it, gently, back into the landscape for another day. I love poems which examine with kindness the lives of our small companions on this planet, poems which show mercy, practice mercy, are merciful at the most important moments, especially when no one else is looking or even cares. Thank you, poet, for sharing this unexpected, cautious-yet-kind, up-close moment. Another transformation, however humble, has taken place before your gentle readers’ weary eyes.