"At pet stores in Detroit, you can buy



frozen rats



for seventy-five cents apiece, to feed



your pet boa constrictor"



back home in Grosse Pointe,



or in Grosse Pointe Park,







while the free nation of rats



in Detroit emerges



from alleys behind pet shops, from cellars



and junked cars, and gathers



to flow at twilight



like a river the color of pavement,







and crawls over bedrooms and groceries



and through broken



school windows to eat the crayon



from drawings of rats—



and no one in Detroit understands



how rats are delicious in Dearborn.







If only we could communicate, if only



the boa constrictors of Southfield



would slither down I-94,



turn north on the Lodge Expressway,



and head for Eighth Street, to eat



out for a change. Instead, tomorrow,







a man from Birmingham enters



a pet shop in Detroit



to buy a frozen German shepherd



for six dollars and fifty cents



to feed his pet cheetah,



guarding the compound at home.







Oh, they arrive all day, in their



locked cars, buying



schoolyards, bridges, buses,



churches, and Ethnic Festivals;



they buy a frozen Texaco station



for eighty-four dollars and fifty cents







to feed to an imported London taxi



in Huntington Woods;



they buy Tiger Stadium,



frozen, to feed to the Little League



in Grosse Ile. They bring everything



home, frozen solid







as pig iron, to the six-car garages



of Harper Woods, Grosse Pointe Woods,



Farmington, Grosse Pointe



Farms, Troy, and Grosse Arbor—



and they ingest



everything, and fall asleep, and lie







coiled in the sun, while the city



thaws in the stomach and slides



to the small intestine, where enzymes



break down molecules of protein



to amino acids, which enter



the cold bloodstream.





