#142 ‘We are
here’
They arrive in
masks, with hoses and sprays.
No music;
overalls, sunglasses, gloves, caps,
their van
plastered with warnings of attack.
They move in
compact pairs swiftly, silently
through houses
using a master key, then the school,
updating fire
extinguishers, sterilizing every corner
rodents might
slink to, nose into, squeeze through.
They leave like
palace guards before a revolution.
It is as if they
were never here, their deathly legacy
necessarily
invisible. Mice, wasps, rats, spiders,
frogs and snakes
are left stunned by a shade creeping
out from
windows, walls and floors at them, something
that smells of
masks, rubber boots, gloves and fear.
At home after,
wary, we announce, we are here.
Oh, yes, I remember the invasion!
ReplyDeleteI remember fumigation in offices, and in places I worked that had vaults, and how I dreaded it. A tight poem. Form fits the subject so well.
ReplyDelete