March 1: A Poem, Sharon Olds, "41, Alone, No Gerbil"

Tonight, I'm giving you a poem from my favorite poet, Sharon Olds.  I was going to post her poem, "The Pope's Penis," in honor of the upcoming papal conclave.  My wife told me not to.  Instead, I give you another of my favorites from Olds.

Saint Marty wishes you a happy P.O.E.T.S. Day.

41, Alone, No Gerbil

In the strange quiet, I realize
there's no one else in the house. No bucktooth
mouth pulls at a stainless-steel teat, no
hairy mammal runs on a treadmill--
Charlie is dead, the last of our children's half-children.
When our daughter found him lying in the shavings, trans-
mogrified backwards from a living body
into a bolt of rodent bread
she turned her back on early motherhood
and went on single, with nothing. Crackers,
Fluffy, Pretzel, Biscuit, Charlie,
buried on the old farm we bought
where she could know nature. Well, now she knows it
and it sucks. Creatures she loved, mobile and
needy, have gone down stiff and indifferent,
she will not adopt again thought she cannot
have children yet, her body is like
a blueprint for a woman's body,
so now everything stops, for a while,
now I must wait many years
to hear in this house again the faint
powerful call of a young animal.

The pope, and all his body parts, leaves