Today's poem is by Ross White

Unwelcome
       

The skunk sprayed at the window screen,
& I cursed him. This was in the New Hampshire
summer, when warm air settles into the dim house

at dusk & spends the night coiling
slow like a python around your sleep,
and I cursed him. His stink drifted in like steam

before midnight, as we prepared for bed,
it was carried to us by the rumbling circular fan,
and I cursed him. Then I slept a couple of hours

on the living room couch, & I woke
with a second spray thickening in my throat
and I cursed him again while I coughed & coughed.

The coughing made me think of my father, & I cursed him.
I remembered the time I was sitting on the roof
and my father yelled in heaving rasps for me to get down

so he could tell me something, & that something
was that I was no longer welcome in his house,
and I cursed him. The skunk was no longer

welcome around our house, & he wasn't welcome
in it, & I cursed him. The world is big enough
for all that wildness, my father said, & the skunk

skittered away when I turned the porch light on,
and I cursed him. I hated the pitiful ways
he found to protect himself, & I cursed him.

I could see the potbelly, the white streak in his hair,
and I wondered if I would be like him
when I was older, radiating the astringent smell

of defeat, & I cursed him. He said his new wife
would leave if I didn't, & I cursed him.
I opened my mouth to spew every vile word

I knew & I didn't care how loud or
who heard or in what direction I was cursing.
I cursed him. I just lifted my tail & sprayed.

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Copyright © 2023 Ross White All rights reserved
from The Southern Review
Reprinted by Verse Daily® with permission