Squirrel Resurrection

By Jonathan Andrew Pérez

Photographs from Bigstock. Photo montage by William Shunn.

Oakland squirrel on the street—RIP:

its language was like Coleridge’s albatross

that spoke through the neck of a Hanged Man

or an Emperor, a phrase dashed on a Tarot Card.

Redemption—the body of the squirrel enshrined

like a statue surfaced on the frozen-divine glossed

concrete street lake, swept by sweepers in a dusky city park,

there, first letter last initial, an unnamed splotch of soul

gone by the end of season’s yellow washing.

shortlink: dogb.us/squirrel

Jonathan Andrew Pérez, Esq., is a Piltdown Review Featured Poet for April 2019. He has published poetry online and in print in Prelude, The Write Launch, Meniscus Literary Journal, Rigorous Literary Journal, The Florida Review’s Latino/Latinx publication, Panoply Magazine, The Raw Art Review, Junto Magazine, Watermelanin, Cold Mountain Review’s Justice Issue, Yes, Mud Season Review, Meat for Tea: The Valley Review, The Westchester Review, Metafore Magazine, and Silver Needle Press. He has poems forthcoming in The River Heron Review, The Tulane Review, Abstract: Contemporary Expressions, The Esthetic Apostle, The Tiny Journal, Pamplemousse, and Swimming with Elephants. He was a finalist for the Still Journal Poetry prize. Jonathan was selected by The Virginia Quarterly Review 2018 for a workshop with Jericho Brown and Cave Canem, respectively. He is a 2019 Pushcart Prize in Poetry Nominee. He has a day job as an Assistant District Attorney as a prosecutor. His popular Instagram-poet handle is hillicon_justice, and he tweets @hilliconjustice.

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