Claws tearing at the stinking mattress

A source of sustenance or rodent madness?

The urge to cause chaos, to scare, to shock

Water dripping down a filthy pipe blocked

Rats, rats the symbol of filth?

Rats, rats, won’t cure you they’ll kill

Running in packs, working hard to destroy

Everything that crosses their slimy paths

Vermin of the first degree, representing evil

To you and me, disease, decay, rotting trash

Music to their ears seeing garbage amass

Rats, rats, where are they from?

Rats, rats, we just want them gone

The man from Hamelin seemed to know

From where they came and made them go

Worse than snakes, even the viper 

That’s why they hired the eerie Pied Piper

The Urban Poet 2019