That groundhog is cute,
I say. He’s covered in bugs,
you say. No that’s layers

of fur, I say. They’ve got two. And look how he holds up his cute little paws — those tiny front paws — like a toddler in prayer. He’s nibbling a nut, just look at those teeth, his gold chicklet teeth and that slack-bottomed jaw. Watch him whittle his food. Get a load of that nose as it twitches and stills, watch his wobble turn stone at first sign of threat. He’s so cute! I go on. Get a load of that bod, that pudge full of pudding, that folds like dough. It can twist all around to that itch on his back, to that two-coated stubbed silver fur on his back – see that weak-whispered chin of his going to town? He’s the cutest, I say. But you say, so unmoved,

Your pudge pudding boy
just ate bugs off his back. That itch –?
that nut –? Both were bugs.