On Poisoning

The ants have come to our kitchen,

and so we must poison them.

We go to dinner as their workers bring

our slow-blooded gifts to the colony.

Walking in the last light, you point out

a neighbor’s blackened oak, its branches

spread skyward, offering of silence

from silence. Our eye leaps across rooftops,

the interstate, Mobilchem’s burning Gulf—

so outruns the promise of new bodies,

warming shadow and warm breath

on the ethylene tide.