Brunswick Book of Peace

Don't annihilate


Don't annihilate en masse
the cratures that bother you:
mice, rats, Japanese beetles, squash bugs, weeds;
coyotes, mosquitoes, vespids, aphids.

If you must kill them,
kill them one by one.

Remove the mouse from the trap;
feel sorry about its broken neck, its
popped-out eyes. Take a moment for its
kids, who will die at
home, waiting for Mom.
Drop it in the compost,
fling it into the woods or bury it at sea,
in the toilet.

Swat a mosquito.
Drop Japanese beetles one by one
into a coffee can of detergent water.
Let those who escape buzz, startling, past your ear.
There will be enough raspberries left,
enough hazelnuts, for you.

Do not annihilate en masse.
Then you know you are killing
and whom you are killing.
Then you feel you are killing.
And when you are sick of killing,

You can stop.


Robin Lynn Scott