Rodent just means its teeth never stop
growing, my friend tells me when I confess
my obsession for the groundhog who has moved
in next door. But groundhog is kin to squirrel
and rat, is rodent, is greasy, ferocious of tooth,
is hated by my ancestors, farmers all.
Oh, groundhog! the consonants click in all
your nicknames. I say them aloud
from my kitchen window to conjure you:
whistle-pig
land beaver
ground pig
thickwood badger
red monk
woodchuck
I admire his waddle, his fur the color of rotting
wood, out early in the morning, getting fatter
and fatter on the endless
salad bar that is my neighbor’s abandoned yard.
His ears are wispy cups of velvet, upright in relief
to the gray frost of the guard hairs curving
his spine. When he stands up to spy
for my dog, he is the effigy of silence, unsocial.
Yet, in the late evening at second feeding, he grazes
unafraid while the neighborhood calico rests next
to him in the clover and trumpet creeper. He eats
till his britches won’t button at all.
Oh, groundhog! You are all I want. Let me
eat all summer. Let me burrow. Let me hide.
Let my body fevers drop to sleep in the cool
chambered heart of your tunnels. Let me mark
my own shadow to forecast the springtide
and wake to daffodils rippling.
Let me have teeth
of the rodent to bite through this world.