Rollicking

Boys with concave chests,
Ribs as tent poles,
Mouths as tenterhooks,
Today cornered a common
Prairie mouse and with it beckoned
The novelists and poets
To coming-of-age clichés.

The shit stained Texas sky
Seemed to say “so what?”
And wafted on towards the gulf.

The nearby motorists too
Ignored the game and
Pubescent squeals.

Houston, on the horizon barely,
Swung a wrecking ball,
Cleared debris, and called it a day.

A quarter moon played a cameo role
As a sketch of potential energy-
But even God himself,
Haggard with craters
And veiled by smog,
Could not prevent the amusing death
Of a common Prairie mouse.

This poem originally appeared in "A Word", a publication of Colombia College's Graduate Writing program.