She was, after all, only a rabbit,<\/p>\n
said the moderator,<\/p>\n
trying to keep the peace<\/p>\n
during the particularly rowdy debate<\/p>\n
at the daily All-Squirrel meeting.<\/p>\n
The rabbit had appeared<\/p>\n
seemingly lost, foraging for food<\/p>\n
and was quickly set upon by the squirrel patrol<\/p>\n
for trespassing.<\/p>\n
Amongst whistles and chirps from both sides of the aisle<\/p>\n
(Throwing nuts was of course forbidden)<\/p>\n
There was to be no consensus;<\/p>\n
The rabbit had to go.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
But one squirrel-<\/p>\n
a scrawny loner<\/p>\n
with a mediocre nut collection record,<\/p>\n
used to sitting in the back<\/p>\n
and keeping his squeaks to himself-<\/p>\n
rose to her defense,<\/p>\n
emitting a whistle so piercing<\/p>\n
it suspended the room in stillness.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf we exile this rabbit<\/p>\n
for the sole crime of trying to survive<\/p>\n
How are we better than those<\/p>\n
who threaten us?\u201d<\/p>\n
(Humans, cars, little humans who chase us, pesticides-the list is long.)<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
His whistle,<\/p>\n
floating over the other squirrels like a revelation<\/p>\n
was suddenly replaced by chirps of agreement,<\/p>\n
a few at first, then a flood;<\/p>\n
the room exploded with a new sound<\/p>\n
something between a chirp and a bark and a chuck.<\/p>\n
And suddenly, the squirrels descended upon the rabbit<\/p>\n
This time to embrace her<\/p>\n
And welcome her to the family.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
The lone squirrel,<\/p>\n
having moved away from the joyous fray,<\/p>\n
chirped to himself,<\/p>\n
showing his toothy smile<\/p>\n
And popped a nut in celebration.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
She was, after all, only a rabbit, said the moderator, trying to keep the peace during the particularly rowdy debate at the daily All-Squirrel meeting. The rabbit had appeared seemingly lost, foraging for food and was quickly set upon by the squirrel patrol for trespassing….<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":959,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-90902","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-half-marathon-poem"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/90902","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/959"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=90902"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/90902\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":90935,"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/90902\/revisions\/90935"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=90902"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=90902"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=90902"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}