DEATH OF A ROACH

I
Roach! Roach!
Thy final hour
Does approach!

Know it not
That I can crush thee
To a tasty
Meal

Lip smackin’ good!

Thy legs & limbs
Ooozing down
My chin

Savage savage roach!

Dark useless disturbed creature

I shall finish thee
Ignite thy nature
With my higher sprite

Know me not roach
Thy tormentor!

Dark and ugly thing!

My greater reason
Perils thee

Turn thy hideous eyes roach
And flee

Thank the ignorant gods above
For thy disturbed
Miserable
Mother’s
Love!


II
Hey roach!

Not that way!

Not around the corner
In open view of human civility

Our patience we forego
When we get a view of thee


Vile mashed up pitiful thing!

How shall you vie with great humanity?

We are the lords
Reason in us does prevail

Usually!

Unless we see thee scampering across the floor
On a wooden stair or a pantry shelf
Down a greasy wall or an animal pelt

Ah! Yes! then we are unhinged
And chase thee down hysterically!

A ferocious spray
Of gaseous poison
In the hand
Pellets of corrosive
Malice
In the air

We come after thee
Mouth salivating plentifully!

Especially if you be popping from the stove
Heated to scalding & pumped with noxious fluid

Leap high roach to save thy life!

Almost to the kitchen sky!

But we have thee now

bathed in executioner’s fuel

Useless our reason now

For thy death
We ecstatically drool

Thy loathsome nature become
Our one true delicacy

Roach give it up!
On my plate your tortured limbs have dropped!!


1997
RJQ