When We Meet Monsters

I saw a pheasant
at the end of the alley
but never an owl.

I saw a beaver
in the next alley over
but never a fox.

In a dream last night
I watched a chimera play
with the squirrels out back.

They were all chasing
along the telephone wires
above the alley,

two or three squirrels and
a half-squirrel, half-owl hybrid.
In my dream I thought

it is surprising
the chimera—partly owl—
doesn’t eat the squirrels.

But I guess monsters
get behavior encoding
that is mixed up, too.

I can’t stop thinking,
wondering what I would do
if a chimera—

say, fox and something—
came to my alley wanting
to have fun with me.

The squirrels in my dream
looked like they were having fun
with the chimera.

But even dreaming
I thought the chimera soon
would eat all the squirrels.

When we meet monsters
should we play with them? Or run?
Or play carefully?

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .



I suspect
about half
of today’s post
was inspired
by this AP story
I read yesterday:

British plans to allow scientists
to use hybrid animal-human embryos
for stem cell research
won final approval
from lawmakers Wednesday...

[11/10/09 - AP removed the original link,
this links to the same story, different source]