SQRL
chats in squirrel are limited
to a sort of Roman salute
foreleg extended then folded
open paw on breast as if to say
Look I take you in my open paw
and hold you to my heart
then it gets tricky
the erect position fosters
rhetorical expansiveness
one paw clutches
the purple edge
of a senatorial toga
while the other describes
a democratic arc
enfolding all squirrels
to its furry bosom
Nuts it declaims
Nuts nuts nuts
About this poem
This poem was included in Best Scottish Poems 2015. Best Scottish Poems is an online publication, consisting of 20 poems chosen by a different editor each year, with comments by the editor and poets. It provides a personal overview of a year of Scottish poetry. The editor in 2015 was Ken MacLeod.
Editor’s comment:
In a country sadly lacking in non-human primates, squirrels give us our wee necessary jolt of anthropomorphic absurdity. We’ve all seen the behaviour described, but it’s taken Bonar’s poem to develop and fix the image.
Author’s note:
This poem is based on an actual encounter with a grey squirrel, in Queen’s Park on the Southside of Glasgow, when the squirrel seemed to teach me how to communicate with it through gesture. When I took the lead, the squirrel mirrored my actions until it was standing on its hind legs with its ‘arms’ spread wide. I was both enthralled by this encounter and amused by the squirrel’s pomposity. It was a short step to likening the squirrel to a certain politician who was renowned for his ‘communication skills’ and who was, I suppose, an easy but thoroughly deserving target for satire.
