I.

Mice run through mazes as electrodes

record their brain waves,

peaks growing sharper as they memorize

dead ends. But the same patterns dance across

the screen when the mice are curled

in their nests, sleeping. Could this

be proof that mice run mazes in their dreams?

In what dreams I can remember, I’m lost

on the way to places I should know

how to find: the hospital where a friend

lies dying, the courthouse

on the day I am someone’s only witness,

the row of library books that will prove

I didn’t plagiarize to get where I am, wherever

that is. In the early dawn hours,

do mice ever dream their maze has turned

into a coiled snake? Do they hear

the same rattle that warns me of all that could

go wrong, or feel the fangs of all that does?



II.

When asked to add, subtract, divide,

or multiply, Clever Hans’ hoof would tap out

the answer, even if the audience

threw in a square root or two. His owner said

he really could do math. The scientists claimed

his owner was a fraud. Everyone was wrong.

Hans stole solutions from human heads, pawing

until he saw a muscle tightening, an eyebrow twitching

in anticipation. There aren’t enough horses in my life

to tell me how much is enough. Add up the times

I pushed too hard. Subtract the times I gave up too soon.

Multiply the things I didn’t notice by the times I didn’t

bother. Divide by two people. The answer

will always be less than one. How many hoof-taps

would I need to make the calculations that matter?



III.

Give her twigs of varying lengths

and the crow will pick the one

that will reach the food in a test tube.

Do it again and she’ll reach her dinner in half

the time. Give her a bucket of worms

that must be lifted, the choice

of straight wire or curved, and she’ll use the curve

to snag the handle. Give her a mate who fl ies off

with the curved wire and she will bend the straight one

into a better tool than the grad students provided.

I wish I’d consulted a crow

before I bought a couch that didn’t

fi t through my door, broke a screwdriver

when I couldn’t remember “righty tighty, lefty loosey,”

and lost my security deposit for borrowing one

too many bolts from the fi re escape,

all to avoid asking a man for help.



IV.

When a hawk circles, the prairie dog

on lookout duty gives a squeak, and the others

stop nibbling grass and wait. When a hawk dives,

a different squeak sends them darting down their holes.

Each squeak recorded on a sonogram draws

a portrait of a danger, a plan for action: coyote

who likes to stalk, coyote who likes to give chase,

cardboard that looks like coyote, human in green

carrying gun, human in yellow with a big stick.

Humans are the universal symbol for run, run far.

No voice in the burrows of my brain tells me

when a man on a street is just a man, or something

that will mean my death. No one tells me how

to scream, where to run. Later at the station, I don’t

have the words for his height, the shape of his face, the color

of his clothes. The police don’t want to know

the sound my elbow made when it broke his nose.



V.

Alex the grey parrot must ask for a treat,

a toy, a break from the business of proving

a bird knows what he is saying.

The team of scientists watch him

call an orange block orange, a green

circle round. The woman owned

by Alex shows him an “S”

and he says “Suh. Want a nut.”

Pressed for time, she shows

a “B”: “Buh. Want a nut!”

A “K”: “Kuh. WANT A NUT!

Nuh, uh, tuh.” Spelling before

being taught what spelling is

earns him an entire bag of pecans.

How many times have I said “I don’t

mind” when I meant “Stop that, now”?

Why does “I love you” always sound

like “I’m happy for you both”?

What would it take to teach me

to say, want, to say, take,

deserve?