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Land Raccoon

Poems

SophiaAtlas Mar 2019
It happened in the dead of night while I was slicing bread for a guilty snack.
My attention was caught by the scuttering of a raccoon outside my window.
That was, I believe, the first time I noticed my strange tendencies as an unusual
human.
I gave the raccoon a piece of bread, my subconscious well aware of the consequences.
Well aware that a raccoon that is fed will always come back for more.
The enticing beauty of my cutting knife was the symptom.
The bread, my hungry curiosity.
The raccoon, an urge.

The moon increments its phase and reflects that much more light off of my cutting
knife.
The very same light that glistens in the eyes of my raccoon friend.
I slice the bread, fresh and soft. The raccoon becomes excited.
or perhaps I'm merely projecting my emotions onto the newly-satisfied animal.

The raccoon has taken to following me.
You could say that we've gotten quite used to each other.
The raccoon becomes hungry more and more frequently, so my bread is always handy.
Every time I brandish my cutting knife the raccoon shows me its excitement.
A rush of blood. Classic Pavlovian conditioning. I slice the bread.
And I feed myself again.
But what does that mean?
I am the raccoon
Oblivious I’ve been

I once was a monkey
To make laugh was to live
I still am a monkey
much joy I still give

The monkey inside me
Might act as a cloak
Was the monkey inside me
Joker or Joke

The monkey, the mask
I thought it not me
The monkey, the mask
I did not yet see
That the monkey, the mask
Is a part of me

I am the raccoon
In case someone asks
I am the raccoon
Master of masks

A fox I once felt me
and foxy I was
A hunter I felt me
slick tongue and sharp jaws

The fox he was smart
And good at love’s game
But the fox he knew
Quick love ain’t the same

The fox, the mask
Charming and sly
The fox, the mask
Was wondering why
Why the fox, the mask
So hard he did try

I am the raccoon
Though cute my appeal
I am the raccoon
Your heart I will steal

The lion I’ve played
When time came to lead
The lion I’ve played
By word and by deed

When I was the lion
The orders I gave
When I was the lion
Like a king I’d behave

The lion, the mask
With a queen by my side
The lion, the mask
At the head of the pride
Felt the lion, the mask
Was not my true hide

I am the raccoon
I finally see
I am the raccoon
The masks they are me
Yet behind all these masks
Hides my curious mind
A little raccoon
Caring and kind
When he scavenges life
Happiness he does find
He shares it with all
And leaves no-one behind
🦝🐵🦊🦁🐘🐅🦓
The Raccoon is my spirit animal
And an artistic lense through which I view myself
This poem is my artist manifesto
It grows as I obtain new masks
And learn to put those to good use
Jim Hill  Dec 2017
Raccoon Man
Jim Hill Dec 2017
At 104th street
a great bulk of igneous rock
heaves itself from Central Park—
wet black-green in halide streetlight
like a breaching submarine.

I hadn’t seen this place before;
still, I passed, all a funk,
mind inside itself (a typical brood),
moving past with just a sidelong look.

By a low stone wall
at the foot of the cliff, a man
(black parka, pants
too long, high-top shoes)
leaned as if in muttered
collusion with the ground.

He spoke to someone as I passed
(I figured he was drunk).
“Fella,” I heard him say,
as if to me.
I stopped, and looking back,
saw from across the wall,
crouched on the side of the cliff
a raccoon, black-masked,
capacious gray coat,
tiny hands.

It sat there watching me,
or rather, just watching,
attentive to some
attraction I didn’t see.

And then another.
And another.
And all along that black expanse
must have been twenty raccoons
(I didn’t think they could be so varied)
quietly foraging, awaiting,
I came to understand,
the man in the black coat.

He threw bread to them
like the old pigeon lady in
Mary Poppins
and five or so gathered nearby
on the other side of the wall
not minding his humanness,
only eating.

“I come out here every night,” he explained.
“I don’t got a girlfriend anymore,
so I come out here
and feed them to **** time.”

He tore a piece from a half-gone baguette
and threw it to a little one.

“There’s like fifty of them now,” he said.
“There were twenty when I started;
they have four or five babies every spring.
Nobody knows they’re here except me.”

As he spoke, a baby raccoon
climbed up a sapling
by the wall, extending its sharp black nose
toward the man who held a scrap of bread.
The raccoon took it unreluctantly.
I flinched at the thought of tiny
raccoon teeth missing their mark
on my index finger.
But habit was fixed and easy
here between man and raccoon.

“They’ll come up and sit on my shoulder...”
he said at last and then trailed off.

I stood and watched for several minutes—
this assembly of raccoons
along the black cliff
and the man who called them “fella” and “baby.”

At last he said with satisfaction,
“They call me the raccoon man.”
Deciding he had said his bit,
I gave a soft, enthusiastic whistle
between my teeth
as if to say,
“Well done.”

At 105th street, I felt remorse
for not having said more
to the man who drew
his nocturnal congregation every night
right there on Central Park West.
And in a gesture of regret,
I turned slightly back as I walked
to the see his black form
bent over the low wall
dispensing bread.