Yorkies

Let's workshop this poem about animal abuse that invites readers to reflect on the pleasure derived from power over the vulnerable

Yorkies

Through cage bars these rodents watch me/
suck marrow from chicken bones. How many/ 
must be overtaken by that clenching urge/
to torment such pathetics—swooned//

by the thought of lowering them, cages/ 
rock-weighted, yapping into the sea./
Yet so many do only what they can—/
just enough to keep on with their lives:// 

jab-jab jabbing at them with fork,/
with butter knife, steak knife—face/ 
redder with each thrust thwarted/ 
by bars, by slippings of the jab;//

feeding them a few grapes or raisins,/
pepper sauce and vodka—dry kibble/
merely sniffed before being dumped/ 
in the woods for the sake of the wife;//

running them, mere leash weights,/ 
through brambles—so insistent upon/ 
continuous top speed that the leashes,/
their loop handles, strip finger creases;//

screeching the SUV to a rocking halt/ 
a few sweet houses down—those rats,/
fake-forgotten, having been bumper-tied/
while packing for the family outing;//

crush-rubbing the little one’s face,/
black bangs over its pathetic eyes,/
too hard too quick into the tile/
of urine and shit—oscillation blur;//

hammer-throwing that same little one/
over the house—the leash windup/ 
drawn-out for centrifugal torture/
in the heart-pounding secret of night.

*“Yorkies” appeared in Horror, Sleaze, Trash (2015) and also (as “Yorkshire Terriers”) in The Los Angeles Review of Los Angeles 16 (2021)

Photo: Shay Sowden (flickr.com/photos/gigaboss/)