MISTRESS MOUSE GETS A HEARING AIDE
All the little mouse children kept squeaking and squalling,
Yet Mistress Mouse could hear no squables.
All the sticks and stones kept falling and malling,
Yet Mistress Mouse only saw baubles.
All new kernels and grains kept falling out and rolling off,
Yet Mistress Mouse could hear no mishaps to feedings.
All the clumps kept falling from tunnel’s old trough,
Yet Mistress Mouse could hear no squishing impedings.
Oh, such sadness, such badness, such impending last days,
Yet Mistress Mouse could hear no warnings or scuttlings.
Oh, such a dear little family running for help in the maize,
Yet Mistress Mouse could hear no bumpings or dottlings.
Mistress Mouse, out by the pondside, never knew of this demise,
Never knew of the caving and the smashing of her little prides,
Mistress Mouse, out by the pondside, still wearing her hat of sighs,
Pulled down over ears to shut out sad hearts that was bride’s.
Mistress Mouse still pulled flaps over ears against groaning sorrows
Long since fallen from mind to heart to soul in between seasons
Mistress Mouse so long wore long flaps she never borrows
Any tones from her home in the nowness of her reasons.
Mistress Mouse at last turned from mirroring pondside.
Mistress Mouse at last saw tumbled downs and broken babies.
Mistress Mouse at last ran and reached and bumped head hearthside.
Mistress Mouse at last lost earflaps and heard not welcome maybes.
Mistress Mouse now sits at night under the limb of the whipporwill,
Cupping her ears with all paws to double the telling to borrow.
Mistress Mouse now rolls in night blooms under the nightingale,
Stretching her ears to hear not yesteryear but hopes of tomorrow.
granbee 