Robert Eastwood

A Note To the Young Woman Who Took
the Dead Squirrel Off the Street

The street has one of those electric signs
that telepathically read your speed & warn you
SLOW DOWN––I sometimes expect it will say
NOW DAMN YOU––Today I kept under 25mph
& in a stretch between the house with a Jeep
with no wheels & the castle––a gentrification
in three stories with lion couchants beside the driveway––
I swerved past a dead squirrel on the center line––a red squirrel, its
tufted tail upright––almost beautiful.
I missed seeing the rest, careful, as I was under 25mph––
too fast to take in a vulture’s view. You appeared
dressed in black––I saw you in my rear-view mirror.
You ventured out & picked up the carrion, holding it
with two hands like an offering, not the disdain
of index & thumb––You carried it to the curb
but then I lost you because of a stop sign
& I had to turn toward home––
I had a time-warp moment like Vonnegut describes
Billy Pilgrim having in his famous slaughterhouse
book––I was a boy again who watched his dog
Blackie dart out into the street just when a bus
turned the corner & approached & came by
& I saw his body give the bus a slight hiccup-bounce
as the rear double wheels ran over him & I heard
once more a sound I won’t try to describe
but will never forget––My friend Joe’s mom
Mrs. Beyea from across the street ran out to Blackie
before I could––while faces stared out of the bus’s
rear window––but nothing stopped the bus––
& Mrs. Beyea raised her righteous hand with its
middle finger straight as a spear at the bus
as it went on down the street––as if nothing
had happened of importance, like the ploughman
in Breugal’s painting––I loved Mrs. Beyea
when she lifted poor Blackie––bloody & smashed
& held him out to me––I thank you young lady
in black for sparing me a middle finger when I
looked back, thinking nothing but too bad.

Robert Eastwood lives in San Ramon, California. His work appeared most recently in  Cimarron Review and Poet Lore. He has three books: Snare (Broadstone Press, 2016), Romer (Etruscan Press, 2018). His third, Locus/Loci, published in November, 2019 (Main Street Rag).