Jean Linville
squirrels
February 4 - February 8 Week 58/72
my dad used to shoot them
and mark their passing with a penciled
hash mark on the inside wall of the garage
I remember standing nearby out in the sun
barely chest-high staring up wonderingly
as he tallied up his count for the year
to me this was a mysterious and unknown
sliver of him that he would take to his grave
actions incongruent and shocking
as if the loud crack of a gun were
to reverberate right now through snow
silently stacking itself on branches
empty bird house roofs and the backs
of grey squirrels safely eating beneath
the line of bird feeders as I recall how he
patiently taught me to read the sky each season
for signs of an approaching storm