If not feeding birds I’ll save a worm

Flatworm

Writhing and curling at the bottom of the dogs’ water bowl

It appeared to be drowning. If not feeding birds

I’ll save a worm; I collect them from roadside tarmac

To spare them the wheels of a car and re-hedge them.

So I scooped it onto dry land expecting thanks.

It deflated, ironing out its tubular profile

To form a ribbon of dark, unfamiliar flesh

And I realised that I had a fatal flatworm.

Eater of earthworms, killer of indigenous aerators,

They coil their length around their cousins

As a lover would wrap limbs in the height of passion,

Then externally digest the object in their embrace

Before sucking up the soup of their workings.

Boot-stamped and ground down, it rebounded.

The blood of immortals pumped through its rubbery length

Until a bleach bath sapped its cannibalistic enthusiasm

And I flushed the shrivelled carcass into the Victorian drains

Wondering how many of this unseen enemy remained,

Stripping the earth of its underground gardeners

And the occasional slug.