#mice
Four mice burrow
Four mice hunt
Three mice come back
The last with no luck—
One mouse eaten
Three mice safe
Three mice scurrying to get far away
Three mice burrow
One mouse halts
One mouse returns
The last being at fault
One mouse fallen
Two mice safe
Two mice padding, shaking their worries away
Two mice burrow
Two mice stay
A vulture swoops by the den
Holding the mouse that had gone astray
One mouse cowers
One mouse braves
One mouse is taken away, for the vulture's play
One mouse left
Three mice gone
One mouse burrows until their paws are raw—
Because in reality, life isn't fair to any faults.
May 26
May 26, 2026 at 11:12 AM UTC
Two crocuses
Have the whole garden
To themselves.
The mousetrap
Is snapped shut
And empty.
Mar 4, 2025
Mar 4, 2025 at 8:59 PM UTC
If I speak honestly,
What resentment should I harbor
For how words are received;
So long as you, too
Speak the truth, earnestly?
My commitment to honesty dies
At the prospect of a lie.
Brought as like a cat,
Planting at your feet
Dead mice
May 15, 2024
May 15, 2024 at 2:24 PM UTC
winter solstice comes
bare trees, long hibernation
~ don’t risk bleeding lips
gardens lie fallow
field mice attempting entry
~ long dark frigid nights
Mark Toney © 2021
Dec 22, 2021
Dec 22, 2021 at 12:18 AM UTC
The game is old
The tokens made of ice
From under folds of hooded cloaks
Flash the eyes of mice
But every thousand years
A human player appears
And in his hands
Our fate
hangs
Like drops of blood
on yellowed murine fangs
For it is said
By those long dead
That on the day he loses
We all melt away
We all melt away
Sep 19, 2020
Sep 19, 2020 at 11:49 AM UTC
The cat licks it's ***
While the mice run free
The menu music plays
For ratatouille on DVD
I’m to lazy to press play
I'd rather listen to django
And watch the cat lick it's ***
I wonder if any of the mice know how to cook if that's a
skill that can only be learned by rats
The menu loops again
Aug 28, 2020
Aug 28, 2020 at 8:19 PM UTC
What if a mouse
Had the power of a human?
Would it do as a human does?
Or would it continue as a mouse?
What if a human
Had the power of a god?
We yearn for something greater,
Something that gives meaning
To our flesh and bone.
Answers to questions we desperately seek,
Only to find our ambition
Outweighs our ability.
We want something we don’t understand
With the hope that we will.
Should a man possess the power of a god,
That man will not be godly.
That man would still be a man,
But seen as a god to other men.
Who would teach that man to be a god
If no other man has been a god?
We shun the notion of a mouse
Being human,
Yet laugh at the challenge
Of being a god.
But what’s the difference?
May 2, 2020
May 2, 2020 at 2:46 PM UTC
To a Mouse
by Robert Burns
translation/modernization/interpretation by Michael R. Burch
Sleek, tiny, timorous, cowering beast,
Why’s such panic in your breast?
Why dash away, so quick, so rash,
In a frenzied flash
When I would be loath to run after you
With a murderous plowstaff!
I’m truly sorry Man’s dominion
Has broken Nature’s social union,
And justifies that bad opinion
Which makes you startle,
When I’m your poor, earth-bound companion
And fellow mortal!
I have no doubt you sometimes thieve;
What of it, friend? You too must live!
A random corn-ear in a shock's
A small behest; it-
‘ll give me a blessing to know such a loss;
I’ll never miss it!
Your tiny house lies in a ruin,
Its fragile walls wind-rent and strewn!
Now nothing’s left to construct you a new one
Of mosses green
Since bleak December’s winds, ensuing,
Blow fast and keen!
You saw your fields laid bare and waste
With weary winter closing fast,
And cozy here, beneath the blast,
You thought to dwell,
Till crash! The cruel iron ploughshare passed
Straight through your cell!
That flimsy heap of leaves and stubble
Had cost you many a weary nibble!
Now you’re turned out, for all your trouble,
Less house and hold,
To endure the winter’s icy dribble
And hoarfrosts cold!
But mouse-friend, you are not alone
In proving foresight may be vain:
The best-laid schemes of Mice and Men
Go oft awry,
And leave us only grief and pain,
For promised joy!
Still, friend, you’re blessed compared with me!
Only present dangers make you flee:
But, ouch!, behind me I can see
Grim prospects drear!
While forward-looking seers, we
Humans guess and fear!
Published by the English department of St. John’s College High School. Excerpted in an essay by Galkina Karolina, Institute of Humanities, Borys Grinchenko Kyiv University, Ukraine, and published on the university’s website. Keywords/Tags: Robert Burns, mouse, translation, modernization, update, interpretation, schemes, mice, men, agley, awry, nature, field, plow, den, home, modern English
Hugh MacDiarmid wrote "The Watergaw" in a Scots dialect. I have translated the poem into modern English to make it easier to read and understand. A watergaw is a fragmentary rainbow.
The Watergaw
by Hugh MacDiarmid
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch
One wet forenight in the sheep-shearing season
I saw the uncanniest thing—
a watergaw with its wavering light
shining beyond the wild downpour of rain ...
and I thought of the last wild look that you gave
when you knew you were destined for the grave.
There was no light in the skylark's nest
that night—no—nor any in mine;
but now often I've thought of that foolish light
and of these more foolish hearts of men ...
and I think that maybe at last I ken
what your look meant then.
Keywords/Tags: Scotland, Scot, Scottish, Scots dialect, night, nightfall, rain, grave, death, death of a friend, light, lights, watergaw, heart, heartache, broken heart, heart song
Apr 19, 2020
Apr 19, 2020 at 9:41 PM UTC
no wonder
it was obvious really,
we’re two mice, waving our tails
ears perched, scampering across the kitchen floor
and then, finally, out the door
Jan 14, 2020
Jan 14, 2020 at 5:31 PM UTC
Harvest is over,
Crops are in, and
Falls's first killing frost
Stirs feelings of melancholy
Sustained by winter's cold,
With its bare trees,
Migration, hibernation,
Wisdom of fallow fields and
Mice attempting entry
During long, cold nights.
Yet farmers are never idle,
Caring for their animals,
Cleaning and fixing equipment,
Checking their fences,
Cleaning fields and
Clearing tree lines.
Nov 20, 2019
Nov 20, 2019 at 4:38 PM UTC
If I told him once I told him a million times. I said to him, " Manny, this is not a magical kingdom and your name's not Mickey. So, get out!" You think the message would sink in but noooo. Manny being the stubborn sort just kept ignoring me. Well, a good couple of months have passed and I'm nearly at wits end with him. Rotten little rodent. I tried spring traps only to find the bait cleanly removed and no spring sprung. I put steel wool in every conceivable crevice and notch he could possibly enter. Somehow that mouse would find his way. Now my flat happens to be a three story walk up and it's no easy task for me getting up those stairs, I just can't figure how a short stubby grubby little grifter like Manny might manage it or even bother. There's plenty more morsels to be found down at street level, especially with Sister Dawn's Soul Food next door. Yet Manny seems to always have a hankering for whatever I might be stirring up on my stove top. Can't say I blame him after the two times I've eaten Sister Dawn's greased grime. I guess I really only have myself to blame for the second plunge into that gastronomical wreckage. So, how could I blame poor Manny for wishing to elevate his senses for more refined dining? Not that I see my own sorcery in the kitchen much finer than Sister Dawn's, it's just it is. In any case, I'm pretty sure Manny might have been pushed out of an all too overcrowded family affair next-door anyhow. I certainly wouldn't want him bringing in any others. His gal Ethel Vermen and his cousin Ratzo are no more welcome than Manny Mouse himself. So I remind him daily, this not being a magical kingdom and all business. Got some glue traps and upped the ante with peanut butter for bait. Does he bite? Well, you know Manny, too clever to be caught he is. Until, that infamous night of revelry, when no creature is silent, and the music is maddening, and the drunks are drunker, all awaiting that New Year's babe to be born. And after months of chasing, after months plotting and planning, keeping the cupboards under lock and key, after midnight raucousness chasing a furry grey bitty beast from under the fridge to under the stove then under the sink, turning over tables and chairs, stomping like a madman, finally Manny and I come face to face. There he is run into that glue trap he managed to avoid forever seemingly snickering as he always got away, but now I had him. His head cinches between the double-ended prongs of my Ginsu serrated twelve inch knife. Finally Manny will pay for all his pilfering. There he is looking so woeful as his beady reflective eyes sear a plea of mercy into mine. I draw back the curved ergonomically designed handle of my Ginsu blade and with a fast flit of one prong slit cunningly into his ribcage. The squeak is short. I see his chest swell, a tiny heart pumps its last two beats. It is over. It is a new year for man.
Jan 1, 2019
Jan 1, 2019 at 3:40 PM UTC
When they see their off spring being lifted out of their place
Hung by their tail, they squeal and cry for their parents recuse, their heart's race.
Devastation stings their round soft ears as they run for their baby's call
But as they see the hand raise their child over their height of limitation, their hopes and dreams fall...
It was too late... SMACK went the poor, frail body and skull of the little one...
The hand quickly slammed it against the table... Now knocked out...no way to escape or run
SNAP The two fingers forced its neck bone to submit to their strength
The parents time of grief and mourning had no length
Frozen shock is the only expression that defines their baby mouses face
In a Blank stare of horror as the blood dripped from their once beloved babies lips... leaving a ****** taste
They scurry away in disbelief to gather the rest of their kin
that still remain alive...
Because they'll never know who will be up next... to be forced to give up their life... and die
Because... Something always has to be sacrificed... in order to keep something else alive...
May 18, 2018
May 18, 2018 at 4:10 PM UTC
headway upon
the waters—scratching
like mice, their ears, furred
and wrapped into the overcoat
they dropped: your river was like a
cage.
Apr 27, 2018
Apr 27, 2018 at 12:10 AM UTC
the thief was me
the kisses
we're
free
we we we
let's go to France
we changed
the
third
little pig
the thief was me
?
...
..
.
Feb 26, 2018
Feb 26, 2018 at 1:29 PM UTC
After Beck kin me in One Direction, and thence
Upon meeting me (in am i am the walrus who also
doubles up as mister kite - on windy days) Act Naturally
Because Crying, Waiting, Hoping For No One
in particular who will bring delight lite, like Good Day
Sunshine prompting me to perform The Hippy Hip
p Shake while Seals and Crofts dine with the late Jim Croce.
When we r close and come together, I Want To Hold Your Hand,
I Want To Tell You, I'm Happy Just To Dance With You
The Inner Light from your being guides this fool on the hill
who needed to Get Back To The USSR boot my B52 combo
Cars getup kept Stalin this Joe Schmoe as glanced up
at passersby along Penny Lane.
Lonesome Tears In My Eyes this Mother Nature's Son
(a grown mwm), Of Love, this modest no name brand Sun King (Elvis) at two score and nineteen Van Halen ZZTop Young Blood, who sweat his tears completing Orbitz in tandem with Earth, Wind And Fire (On A Three Dog Night) for...someone to call my Eleanor Rigby, He Jude, Honey Pie, et cetera.
Friend this Marquis De Sade light skinned (caucasian) sated bloke,
who (on green Sade Doors days) ambles along the boulevard of broken dreams axe sing (as a Petty Fuel doubting Tom
please axe a Pink Foreigner or Devo tad Survivor (asper this
Heart felt gun shy yet rosey guy) to board the pearl jam AC/DC powered Reo Speed wagon to Nirvana, particularly during a Black Sabbath.
Although aye Faith No More (and doo to Bad Company abetting my bad Hair line),I seek a SoulAsylum, where Our wings could travel charged via a super duper AC/DC Def Leppard shaped device at the speed of a SoundGarden while playing in Marcie's Playground, we Nsync like a Led Zeppelin into the depths (comprising many a Puddle Of Mud) ideal for Rolling Stones unable to Journey intoAerospace amidst Talking Heads.
If an absolute nyat, no, nada...sans the opportunity for us soar
like Eagles (where Air Supply quite thin) then I (Joe Schmoe
Money less), would like me Nickelback to purchase a ZZ
Top hat to travel incognito like a Foreigner and Survivor
of Earth, Wind and Fire maelstrom that turned his Motley Crue
into a teenage wasteland of Indigo Girls.
Tis best for this fool of a Meatloaf on the hill
Envision himself to be a Killer Grateful Dead Talking Head
now lifeless per being terminally ill
tumbling while tweeting n twittering jill
whose response an emphatic nyat, no nill
to help carry my pail, which stung like a quill
bryn mawr the place name along rail road still
and quiet even for Lady Madonna
who might hear the blackbird song or a whippoorwill.
Our Wings could travel at the speed of sound
as we rise like a Led Zeppelin into the heights of Aerospace.
If an absolute nyat, no, nada...
the opportunity for us soar like Eagles
then I (Joe Schmoe Money less), would like me Nickelback.
best forU2 to text this fool on the hill
tumbling while tweeting n twittering jill
whose response an emphatic nyat, no nill
to help carry my Nine Inch Nail, which stung like a quill
bryn mawr former place name go win n One Direction (with me self as a former groupie of Traveling Wilbury's) rail road still
might hear the blackbird song or a whippoorwill.
aye ham a non Blondie passenger, Who once
didst aboard Jefferson Airplane property of one Joan Jet.
This offer meant for U2 and haint no Cheap Trick
nor available to another Super ***** boot a once in a lifetime Luvin Spoonful of one humungous Kiss.
from -- juiced another beetle browed, civil chap, decent dude,
genteel guy, eclectic edified egghead, a Foster Child with preference for Pearl Jam Goo Goo Dolls, who goes by the pseudonym
of Arctic Monkey Beastie Boy.
Feb 25, 2018
Feb 25, 2018 at 7:32 PM UTC
I have a mouseolem,
Somewhere in my walls;
I set traps with favored cheese,
Peanut butter really teases,
These are my preferred baits.
Some days they just can't wait
To navigate my drawers.
Eat bristles from my BBQ brush,
Crumbs on counters and on floors.
They're good at reproducing,
It's what they're wired for.
They're good with their escape,
Both mouse and my bait;
And that concerns me.
Is their rate of copulation
Proportionate to a brighter breed?
Twice the traps have disappeared
With all the treats in tact;
I was sorely feeling stumped,
Yet sure I wouldn't be out-trumped.
I'm on top of it.
They won't win.
It's a survival struggle we're caught in.
If we snap the minion mice,
We'll surely ****** the rat.
And every cat will arch it's back,
The traps are set,
No going back.
Sep 20, 2017
Sep 20, 2017 at 3:01 PM UTC
I'm on the train again.
Stopped at Manchester Airport
I am presented with an excellent opportunity to check out a flight attendant standing by the doors.
Her uniform is block red.
Of mice and men, it's the boys
Who ogle, cats soon to be fed.
And I did always think there was something sinister about cats
Their sly eyes and how they yawn
How they pretend to sleep long past dawn but have been slinking and thinking and stinking and
Hunting
The blood of mice
and men reward their pet's **** with a stroke of their ego by their ego.
"It's human nature" to hunt for rich, red reward you say
"It's part of being a man"
I'll say human nature can,
No, should, change,
And I avert my gaze with shame.
Sep 10, 2017
Sep 10, 2017 at 5:07 AM UTC
Gave my daughter, age one
who could draw better than walk
a pad of Post-its, the tiny ones.
She crayon scribbled
peeled each one
to hide in corners
behind books
under the toothpaste tube
inside shoes.
A year later, moving out
cleaning up
I find behind
the clothes dryer
a nest woven with
gatherings of moss
dryer lint
lined by her Post-its
stolen by mice
who appreciate
fresh art.
Jun 18, 2017
Jun 18, 2017 at 12:10 PM UTC
I told the little darlings, as we went upon the lawn
"There are some things to know, if we are, to get along
Don't play in the woodpile, don't climb over the fence
Don't say you don't understand, or pretend that you are dense
Say, thank you, when given luncheon biscuits and tea
Keep your manners about you, just take a que from me
Oh, most importantly, I'll not say it twice
Touch not the cat, children, he's really not that nice."
They didn't listen.....
To a Tiger, children, are like....mice
Mar 29, 2017
Mar 29, 2017 at 10:24 PM UTC
As mad as a cat chasing rats that never leave the walls-
day in and day out-
spent following the scritch-scratch
of their god forsaken paws,
just out of reach.
That would drive any creature livid,
and I’m as mad as that.
Madder even,
I daresay.
Nov 25, 2016
Nov 25, 2016 at 9:10 PM UTC
The battle lines, are drawn, between the bold, and the strong
Armies so align, war, and battles going wrong
Fleeing in the shadows, trembling, so meek
Safety and protection, exactly, what they seek
When in troubled times, a simple roll of the dice
Fighting with the fools, or running, with the mice?
Oct 27, 2016
Oct 27, 2016 at 2:31 PM UTC