No Eden Here

No Eden here, for there’s no snake; There’s just a thief who likes to take The labors of all our hard work. My blood is boiling, half berserk Near stripped of reason, one thing’s clear: I’m settling the score this year. You stole my beans; you spoiled my beets. The woods are full of things to eat! But no, you just keep coming back, And so I went on the attack. At first I built a gleaming fence; A week went by, no incidents, And so I thought I had success Only to find, to my distress, The telltale signs, so clearly seen: The heads chewed off my precious beans! So, cursing, fuming, full of ire, I wrapped the fence with smaller wire. Ha! That should do it, that should quash Your tendencies towards yellow squash. And then the fence, electrified So I could zap your little hide Repel you with a lethal charge So you would not so rudely barge Upon my carrots and my beans, Just disappear, ne’er to be seen. And still you managed your way in! My patience? Well, it’s far past thin. And so I wrapped beneath the deck; I even trapped you there, and heck, Some poisonous, foul-smelling bait I hoped would end you when you ate, But somehow you just hunkered down And stayed there underneath the ground Till sure, I thought, you must be dead, And trust me, dear, no tear was shed. And then again! You thief! You fraud! The carrot tops have all been gnawed! And lo, at night, in dark and gloom You’ve broken free from earthly tomb And tunneled clean beneath the wall That holds back chaos from the Fall. My little Eden ravaged, raped, And somehow you again escaped To burrow back beneath the deck, But not before you, vicious, wrecked Cucumbers hanging from the vine, So succulent, so plump, so fine! And so more wire upon the ground With heavy rocks to weight it down. Too great a length for you to span, Or so I thought; that was the plan. But morning comes, and Crikey! Ugh! For it appears you nearly dug Your way to freedom in my plot. A flash, a momentary thought: This garden’s doomed, it’s all for naught Perhaps I should, perhaps I ought To simply burn it to the ground, And once the flames have smoldered down Collect your brutish, charred remains, But then I shook off thoughts insane And pondered how you might be pent By spilling bags of dry cement Among the gravel and the mesh To thwart your nasty rodent flesh From gaining access sight unseen And ravaging my precious beans. So horrified was I to find The workings of your evil mind; You tunneled under concrete pad And left me miserable and sad. The rage ensues, blood turns to boil, The images of gun’s recoil; I dream of ways to make you die: To drown, to poison, why, oh, why Are you obsessed with garden fruits? Why don’t you find other pursuits And leave my little plot alone; This is a mystery, ‘tis not known. This year, believe me when I say I’m going to end this Groundhog Day.