Dead Animals

The fridge is currently empty of ghosts:

there are no expired pets whose bodies

are waiting to be treated

with more care and consideration

than you give the chunked lamb, the spiralized cow,

the slivered salmon, the whole chicken

(minus head, feathers, feet, certain organs).

There are no cats, no small dogs,

sealed in zip-top bags in preparation

for you to take them to be burned:

moved from freezer to fire to quiet

boxes on the shelf, added to your collection

of old friends, of dust getting dustier.

The fridge is empty of those ghosts

and yet something is rattling inside—

perhaps a gerbil is loose

in the lettuce bin and asking to come out;

perhaps it has eaten all your purple kale

and the kohlrabi tucked like river

stones under a wash of greener veg.

Perhaps, this evening, when you open the door

and reach for the packet of leaking beef

the gerbil will creep forward,

real and alive and gnashing

a fat cabbage worm it wrested

from your locally grown cauliflower.

Maybe it will have blood in its teeth.