He cuddles in the armpit of the sliding door.
Until he soars back and forth, and slams against
the glass, demanding elsewhere. The escapism
in him seems teenager—so I call him young,
although he could be thirty, or so. Pack animal,
but he’s an outsider among my shelves
of used paperbacks and prefabricated wood.
Some Native American tribes say bats symbolize
rebirth. I think he knew he wasn’t getting out of this
alive, how I imagine it feels to look up at a tsunami
wave, or a snowstorm from a mountain’s peak.
Chinese culture says bats bring luck.
Christians and Hindus, darkness. The health
department, rabies. The officer chuffing
as I cried a little, for the creature in a plastic tub,
over our sprawling, heliocentric humanness:
taking space and lives.
Ma’am it’s necessary testing and public code.
The bat, a silenced echo,
an echolocation genius, a mosquito goblin;
a mysterious, nocturnal unknown,
a tiny, endangered fang in the gum line of the universe,
chipped off the cave of our suburban dwelling.
The bat—who we could not, lest we risk foaming at the mouth,
set free—could mean a negative energy resides in our home,
at least, according to a website that sells amethyst stones
and bundles of sage. I believe, all these gimmicks, metaphors,
superstitions, and lore, blindly miss the mark. Just glitter
in guano; and the innocent are sacrificed without meaning.