In another life
 
perhaps I was a field mouse
 
hiding from a hawk.

 
 
 

Moonlight serenade—
 
an owl swoops down from the oak
 
to embrace a mouse.

 
 
 

In the melon field
 
a mouse nibbles one choice fruit:
 
sweet and warm and fat.

 
 
 

Near a patch of woods
 
a rusting Buick Skylark
 
cradles a mouse nest.

 
 
 

The homeless woman,
 
shifting in her cardboard box,
 
startles a field mouse.

Shelter

 
 
 

The year’s second day—
 
in a castoff running shoe
 
a mouse takes shelter.

 
 
 

Halloween cloudburst—
 
a field mouse burrows down deep
 
in the dead man’s shoe.

Nest

 
 
 

A field mouse mother
 
unravels my old sweater
 
to line her new nest.

Dinner

 
 
 

Autumn afternoon—
 
a hawk intent on dinner
 
chooses a grey mouse.

Mouse

 
 
 

Last day of winter—
 
a mouse peeks out of the shoe
 
where she keeps her nest.