KATHY FIGUEROA

Eulogy For A Bat (April, 2010)

A wisp of dusk, personified

Or should I say, 'animalified'

It grieves me, Bat

That you have died

A blight wracked your tiny body

Slight and brown

Stopped your flight

And struck you down

I wondered why

Not long ago

When the ground

Was cloaked with snow

As I looked outside

Late at night

I saw you swoop by

The electric light

"What could it possibly

Find to eat, now?"

Was on my mind

How could a bug

It hope to find

When all was frozen

White and still

I know now, Bat

That you were ill

In the shelter where

You were housed

To winters chill

You were roused

Then, in search of food

You left the safety

Of your home

Because of a plague called

'White Nose Syndrome'

This pestilential disease

Caused you to awaken

..Then starve.. then freeze..

So, sadly, your life was taken

You had great worth

In the grand scheme of things

As you flew over this earth

With fragile wings

Humans with no sense

Often like to say

That they are at the top

Of the food chain

Forgetting that black flies

And mosquitoes

Require warm blood to drain

And that, in this land

It's not unknown

For a person

To die of exposure

When lost in

The woods, alone

Should the word 'exposure'

Need to be explained

It can mean that the person died

Because too much blood was drained

So a bat is an answer

To a prayer for respite

And a defense

From the attack, from the bite

Of a blood hungry (possibly

West Nile Disease carrying) parasite

Though some folks

Might express fear if their path

With this creature, connects

It's good to remember that

In spring and summer

A bat can devour

From half to its entire

Body weight in insects

This critter should never be hurt

Or, by human hand, rendered dead

A bat should always be

Left alone, instead

So it can flourish and thrive

Because a bat is worth

Far more than gold, alive

One thing I know that could

Soon become very clear

Is that people

Will surely miss a bat

If bugs proliferate

And bats are no longer here

So Little Brown Bat

Myotis Lucifugus

Your good work

I, hereby, commend

And let it be known that

To humans and, indeed, to all

Warm blooded creatures

You were a friend

* This poem was published in The Bancroft Times newspaper on April 27, 2010.