T. Clear
Quarantine Happy Hour: The Death Count
One ant
suffered a sweet lime demise
in a Margarita backwash;
traced a pheromone trail
to arrive at the ideal
time for drowning.
How many more to follow?
On planet earth
the ratio of human to ant
is one to a million.
A single ant on my table
equals legions more
mapping the shortest route
to food and water.
My poison tricks, my borax traps
may trim the onslaught,
but I fear I’ll lose, cocooned
and not nearly so nimble.
I, who know nothing of war.
For whom life remains
angel-tufted, sugared.
—Submitted on 07/15/2020
T. Clear‘s work has appeared in Cascadia Review, Poetry Northwest, Scoundrel Time, The Moth, The Rise Up Review, and other journals, as well as in the anthology, Take a Stand: Art Against Hate (Raven Chronicles Press, 2020), and other anthologies. She is a lifelong Seattle resident.
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