Kitchen Horrors

“Wake up, wake up

We caught the mouse

But he is still alive

Please please go down to the kitchen”

“Stop poking me

I’m sound asleep

The mouse will die soon

This can wait until morning”

Then it was morning

I made my way downstairs

The mousetrap, empty, upside down

The mouse a foot away

Lying on his  back

Kicking, jerking

Squirming, writhing

Unable to right himself 

I slid a New Yorker under the helpless body

Laid an AARP magazine on the top

Rolled the bundle in a coffin-like cylinder

And carried the package to the driveway

What does one do when the mousetrap fails?  

I tossed the crippled body into my neighbor’s garden

Watched as the leaves shook about

What now?  How long?  

I walked away, stoop-shouldered, head down 

The demeanor of a guilt-ridden murderer    

My Hearing Aid Chronicle

My father-in-law hated his hearing aids

Once a week the batteries went dead 

They made screechy sounds at the opera

Which filled his poor wife with such dread 

I myself never thought about hearing aids

Because I never planned to grow old

But at fifty my ears became dodgy

An unpleasant truth, when all’s told 

I noticed this first as a teacher

Mishearing what students would say

This mean girl spoke softer and softer

A fiendish prank some students play 

I checked with my chums about hearing aids

Morris leaves his at home in the box

Catherine still doesn’t hear her hubby

Though she rarely seems to listen when he talks 

My spouse had a more upbeat vision

Her friend Martha’s hearing aids changed her life 

Martha said she became more outgoing 

A prospect that appealed to my wife 

She sent me to the audiologist and I got a test 

He said he could definitely help

But he charged twice as much as the Big Box

And the Big Box got smiles on Yelp 

 

So I shelled out a fortune for hearing aids

Then I only had worn them one week

When I lost one while camping in Michigan 

All the squirrels were distressed by my shriek

I still don’t hear well at the movies

I struggle to follow the story 

Monsters and car bombs are what I like best

Less talk and more images gory 

In the past my hearing was terrible

But now I would say it’s just bad 

“Just bad’s” an improvement after all

For small things one ought to be glad