Procyon Prowling: alliterative verse
Something different: this is not metrical nor rhyming verse. It is in the form of Anglo-Saxon alliterative verse, the most famous example of which is Beowulf. There are four stresses per line, two per halfline, and helluva lot of alliteration.Procyon lotor is the scientific nomenclature for the raccoon, by the way. That name suggests a "proto-canine" and was given long ago, before we knew from DNA studies that raccoons are more closely related to bears than they are to canines.
Procyon Prowling
by Altivo Overo (copyright 2020)
In silence she slinks through the silver-dewed garden,
Wandering walkways, wishing for sustenance.
Her three ring-tailed children thirst in the home den
For this matron of many, a milk-bearing clan queen.
Soon will she show them, in single file leading,
Walking through woodland to where there is food
And water for washing as will be required
To live on their own in lonely repose.
But now has she need of nourishing foodstuff
Herself, before comes here the herald of dawn.
Black eyes like buttons, buried in face mask,
Search not so well for her sight is too poor.
All growing around her too green are the berries,
The sweet roots not ripened nor succulent yet.
Thus takes she her tread to the tall-hanging feeder
For birds it's intended but better than none.
Alas! Though long-reaching and laboring efforts
She makes, it gains nothing. A mumble, a hiss,
And she turns to the trash cans, a top that is loose.
She knows it so well as she nears it again.
Brief clatter. She's in. A complaint from a dog
Afar wills it otherwise but wonder, none comes
To break up her feasting in bones and waste matter
Abandoned and left to best care for her now.
The brood that is waiting will be cared for also
No dearth of dark faces to delve in the night.