SKIP AND RIPPLE

                                                        
                    Skip and Ripple are our backyard squirrels,
                    Up every morning for whoever hurls
                    Them peanuts out across the dewy lawn,
                    Most typically before the crack of dawn,
                    And just before our doggy girls race out
                    To see what all their scuffling is about:
                    But now the noisy yard guys are intruding
                    On the pure rapture of my lyric brooding,
                    Their mowers and leaf-blowers in uproar  
                    With sounds that even barking dogs deplore—
                    So what is this poor sonneteer to do
                    Diverted from a subject to pursue
                    Intended to attain a higher plane
                    Of consciousness, not this one—driven insane?

*