Hope is a Sewer Rat (Caitlin Seida)

Landscapes thrill me. Like this one above, driving through Montana last week. It’s all of it. The clouds. The snow-capped mountains. The open fields. All of that opens my imagination. It casts a spell of wonder.

Landscapes of other kinds also thrill me. Like the one below, written by Caitlin Seida (shared by Shawna Lemay). It’s the invitation to know Hope’s bad-assed side. The teeth and claws. The chewy determination. All of that, too, opens my imagination and casts a spell of remembering.

For inspiration.

Hope Is Not a Bird, Emily, It’s a Sewer Rat

by Caitlin Seida

Hope is not the thing with feathers
That comes home to roost
When you need it most.

Hope is an ugly thing
With teeth and claws and
Patchy fur that’s seen some shit.

It’s what thrives in the discards
And survives in the ugliest parts of our world,
Able to find a way to go on
When nothing else can even find a way in.

It’s the gritty, nasty little carrier of such
diseases as
optimism, persistence,
Perseverance and joy,
Transmissible as it drags its tail across
your path
and 
bites you in the ass.

Hope is not some delicate, beautiful bird,
Emily.
It’s a lowly little sewer rat
That snorts pesticides like they were
Lines of coke and still
Shows up on time to work the next day
Looking no worse for wear.