the death of the field mouse
came in a field of sorts
a back yard in the city
overgrown, strewn with the withering
detritus of the fall

there, dragging the limp
ribbon of a leg
impossibly thin, skin
covering delicate vasculature
and bones, flattened from the crush
of spring-loaded steel,
only thinly missing delivering
a death in the house

there he was shivering
the thin, tremulous ears
transparent, the black
unreadable dots of his eyes
with tiniest of catch lights
catching the grey morning

there he shuffled slowly
under the filigreed shroud of the leaves
unseeing the fall of the brick