I Don’t Buy My Children Toy Guns

I teach them to sidestep baby grass, 
stroke the velvet ears of uncut tulips, 
leave plump lilacs untouched on sun-stretched 
branches. Together, we veer from the bouncing arcs 
of squirrels, scatter organic oats for sparrows 
and starlings alike, rehearse the anthems 
of mourning doves and black-capped chickadees.
 
But celery sticks sprout into swords, 
wily fingers craft ziti into slippery pistols, 
an unwrapped tampon becomes a grenade. 
My son comes to breakfast with four cardboard 
toilet paper rolls taped end to end and zaps his brother 
dead. Their screams of joy smother 
the maple warmth of steaming waffles. 
 
The catbird mimics my children’s battle cries
and the cardinal at the freshly filled feeder 
is a splotch of blood seeping from a wound. 
April wind peels pink blisters from the cherry tree. 
A worm struggles against a robin’s razor beak.
Nature must have laughed when I believed
I could trellis my children to gentleness.