I started reading this one for the title but I love how it veers off into a modern fairy tale, Coscto meatballs and all. (Also how is it only Wednesday, not Thursday?)

 

IT’S WEDNESDAY, NOT THURSDAY
by Kim Dower

Wake up thinking it’s trash day
so I move the cans out to the front
even though it’s pouring. Back in,
make extra strong coffee,
read the story in the paper
about the 400-pound bear they
captured in La Crescenta, he strolled down
the mountain, lured by the scent
of meatballs from Costco,
made several trips sensing the danger
but those of us who’ve had them can agree
those meatballs from Costco are worth
getting pierced by tranquilizer darts.
“Like moving a water bed without a frame,”
claimed the State Fish and Game officials
who loaded him into the truck.
I hope a princess kisses him, he wakes up
human, marries, lives happily ever after
in a home at the edge of a forest
where a bear will stray from the mountain,
raid his garbage, and the ex-bear, father of two,
will keep buckets of chilled meatballs in every room
of his sprawling ranch-style home.