The Bandit Watches Me

He sits there now, staring down on me
This wild thing, that's stuck up in my tree.
While passing through the room, by chance did eye,
a Bandit on my deck's rail,... munching rye.
The bread,... I'd placed there for a local crow,
who, over the years, I had come to know.


I rushed the door, and flinged my arms, at it,
while yelling at him, "Go on now...just get ! ".
I never did intend, to scare him so...
as he ran back and forth,....to and fro.
Then in his fright he launched himself mid-air
and grabbed a branch, by luck, and tethered there.

Between the gusting wind, and his shear weight,
I held my breath, and prayed for his dear fate.
I cussed myself for being at the cause,
this creature hanging on to life, ...by paws.
Then suddenly, a crazy thought appears...
" He has no thumbs ! ",...now thickening my fears.

Thank Mother Nature and Woodland Faeries,
that Raccoons know well; how to work with trees.
He scampers now, onto a broader limb,
relieves my riddened guilt....the death of him.

But now;... as he sits there and looks at me
with one eye gone, and ears all tattery,

The truth of guilt; now faced, with what I've done,
sinks to my soul, just like a setting sun.


I've made you run away and lose your food...
the crows have gathered up their heckling brood.

And this...I've done to you, my harmless friend,
based all on, what...you maybe did intend.

I'm sorry now...
did not...
mean to offend.

The Bard at Large May 2006 Linda MacDonald-Lewis