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Solitude and Nuts

by S. Pelham Flood

I watch the squirrel forage
for nuts. Twenty-seven
trips up the tree.
It's only June. He's greedy!

Up and down, up and around
pendulums and clock faces
the world races on.

The open well keeps spewing death
into our life system: the sea-
bed like the rice-fields of Cambodia.

Unemployment lines are long,
longer than the mid-summer queues
of Orlando, faces worn with eyes towards the floor.

A friend was proposed to last week--
just seven months ago I had to pat-dry
his broken heart, hide the vodka cache,
lock away the prescription drugsā€¦
How many nuts
did he store away?

Class of 2002: 2002 miles away,
8 years, 217 muggy Jacksonville
nights later and here I lie
amongst evergreens and park-side condos
in Colorado

haunted by photos and updates on Facebook:
classmates' weddings, baby-showers,
office promotion parties (how lame!)
The last photo I took was of damage,
damage a tenant left behind. Not Facebook appropriate.

Squirrel is back--rigid on hind legs,
beady eyes locked on me, fat tail
shifting in the early summer breeze.
His cheeks are full, the cheeky bastard!
his future is clear to him

a long, cold, nut-less winter.
And so he prepares. Machine-like.
No need for companionship, no time
wasted on introspection, dreaming.

He does not lie in grass yearning
for clouds to part
or an angel to come to him
breathe his breath
give him goals to pursue, a role in life.

He has nuts. And summer.
Because
winter is coming
and he'll be prepared.

06/08/2010

Posted on 11/09/2010
Copyright © 2024 S. Pelham Flood

Member Comments on this Poem
Posted by George Hoerner on 11/09/10 at 01:27 PM

Maybe more introspection than you know. Maybe he feels an early snow that just might hide the nuts he needs to get through this winter. And why is it some feel the need to put every living moment on face-book? Is that really what they want history to know about them?

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