sally

sally don't like apricots

or chardonnay

she rides her bike

against the traffic

on her way

to hunt the hogs

that root beneath

the oaks for acorns

she refuses to accept

the doomed savanna,

the conspiracy

of sudden oak death,

suburban sprawl,

and feral piggy appetite

instead, she hides

behind the chaparral

with a winchester,

waiting for the pigs

to trot out from the thicket

where they've spent the night

fornicating and scratching fleas.

sally kneels and unslings the rifle

chambers a single shot

slows her breath and heart

smells the cyanothus

and coyote bush, the dry leaves

crushed beneath her.

the sparrows in the manzanita

break their hush and resume

their boasting. sally smiles.

she's ready. and now

the pigs are snuffling

and peering from the trees

to see what lies between them

and the oaks out in the valley

in single file they head out

and sally sights down

on a wooly boar

and pulls the trigger

the steel jacketed copper round

zips through the boar's skull

and he drops to the ground

brain dead but still twitching

the rest of the small herd

scatters and races back into

the cover of the thicket

as sally walks over to the kill.

she unsheathes her knife

and cuts the boar's throat

his blood slowly drains

onto the ground, steaming

in the cold morning air.

sally drags the beast

to her bike trailer. the kind

that people use for towing

children, and straps him

into the seat.

on the road back into

the mid-century

modern subdivision

where she lives with mitch

an unemployed executive chef,

the drivers coming up behind her

honk until they see the pig

strapped in the trailer

and the rifle slung across her back

below her purple hair.

mitch can grind the hog

and craft his cranberry ginger

wild boar sausages;

sally won't, she don't cook

she stalks and slays them

mitch can flay and grind 'em

fill his coolers for the

saturday farmer's market

make his thousand bucks

from sally's hunt

while she stays home

and cleans her gun

washes down her trailer

fills her pipe with cherry blend

and sips a glass of coffee

cuz sally don't like apricots

or chardonnay