Michael Renshaw

Sweltering in my screened porch,
faded black T-shirt soaked, front and back.
Fan spins but doesn’t cool me.
I think of ICE in city streets
and wild life in my country garden
as I ponder predators and prey.

Out among my ancient oak trees
cries of hungry baby red-tailed hawks
huddled together in a rugged tree-top nest
impatient, they squeal to be fed.
Mother’s raspy screech replies
Kee-eeeee-arr! Kee-eeeee-arr! Kee-eeeee-arr!
I’m coming! I’m coming! I’m coming!

And prey, that hear, pray too!
Quivering gray squirrels leap
from birch to hickory to sweetgum
racing to nests where helpless babies lie.
Red and brown cardinals emit sharp, metallic cheeps
warning defenseless fledglings to silence
while nestled in their thick holly bushes.

A tiny mother mole races for safety in her tunnels
as she senses motion of wings that sweep down.
She tries to dig deeper, but too late!
She’s food now.
And down in her nest, like orphans in city streets,
little pups whimper, twist, seek a nipple
that will never come home again,
and too young to forage, slowly, they die.

From the safe comfort of my porch, I ponder
impoverished children in war-shattered cities,
American children starving in ghastly ghettos,
all running and playing in trash-strewn streets.
Meanwhile, caregivers struggle to feed them
while ICE-hearted predators swoop down
to imprison, enslave, even kill them.
And do those children, like mole pups, starve too?

Michael Renshaw lives in North Carolina among fields and forests where he discovers poetry stirring and waiting to be nurtured. He spent a lifetime evolving with computers that continuously grew smaller and far more powerful. When they shrank beyond nanodots, he elected to retire and just write words which he could still see.

This poem appears in Uprooted: Poems of Resistance, Witness, and Survival (The Chaos Section Poetry Project, Fall 2026). We’re sharing each poem from the collection individually over the coming weeks. You can read the full book or download the free PDF here.