This is a poem from a cycle of poems about the death of my sister. She was just two year… two years younger than myself. And she had had trouble with asthma and complications thereof for quite some time. And finally one morning, she just got up and fell dead. And this is a poem about her and a recollection of something that she and I had done together many years before that. And it's just called The Mouse.

I remember one evening-we were small-
Playing outdoors, we found a mouse,
A dusty little gray one, lying
By the side steps. Afraid he might be dead,
We carried him all around the house
On a piece of tinfoil, crying.

Ridiculous children; we could bawl
Our eyes out about nothing. Still,
How much violence had we seen?
They teach you- quick- you have to be well-bred
In all events. We can't all win.
Don't whine to get your will.

We live with some things, after all,
Bitterer than dying, cold as hate:
The old insatiable loves,
That vague desire that keeps watch overhead,
Polite, wakeful as a cat,
To tease us with our lives;

That pats at you, wants to see you crawl
Some, then picks you back alive;
That needs you just a little hurt.
The mind goes blank, then the eyes. Weak with dread,
In shock, the breath comes short;
We go about our lives.

And then the little animal
Plays out; the dulled heart year by year
Turns from its own needs, forgets its grief.
Asthmatic, timid, twenty-five, unwed-
The day we left you by your grave,
I wouldn't spare one tear.