My Great Wooly Mammoth
by Rob Cook
She overflows
like a fur-black pond
across half the kitchen
table, and claws at me
with her unclipped
caterwauling:
Food!
Brushing!
Food!
Brushing!
I obey. I always obey
with my hand that remembers
more than any
mouse’s fear.
Her teeth, which never stop
chewing and demanding,
chewing and demanding,
forget each pellet that becomes
part of her bounding heft.
She gazes at nothing
while she grows
big and slow as a rug.
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