A Bitter Mouse Trap

If you're sensitive, or faint of heart,

avoid this story before I start.

For this is a grisly tale of survival

that, if you can stand the savage, has no rival.

It begins in a damp, underground basement.

There's a live mouse trap that is an encasement.

(You've got an idea where this is leading,

so now is your chance to refrain from reading.)

Are you still with me? Then let me begin.

I checked the trap, and saw a mouse within.

It ate poison pellets. In a matter of time,

that little mouse would die for his trespassing crime.

In twenty-four hours, he would be dead,

and then I would do a task which I dread.

I'd carry the trap into the woods,

open the lid, and dump out the goods.

(By the way - if you didn't stop reading at first,

you might reconsider. Or, prepare for the worst.)

The time had come. I peered into the gap.

Another fool mouse had entered the trap!

Now, this drama had happened once before.

It ended in cannibalistic gore.

So through the thin gap I dropped more pellets in,

to prevent this dim mouse from eating dead kin.

Yet again, I waited another full day

before dumping the earthly remains away.

One more peek through the gap. Nothing moved.

At last, the contents could be removed.

I revisited the woods, far from my house.

When I lifted the lid, out ran one tough mouse!

I couldn't believe what I just saw.

I looked in the trap, and dropped my jaw.

On that first trapped mouse, the second mouse did dine.

All that was left was a stomach and a spine.

No feet. No tail. No ribs, no rump, no bull!

Why, that rodent had even consumed the skull!

The poison pellets? They were all gone.

What doesn't kill you will make you strong.

(If for distress you think you will sue -

you can't say that I didn't warn you.)

The moral of the story is this advice -

Get a cat, or get far away from the mice.