by Ed Schad
Tony the Tiger began to groan free
of his box, pacing, padding, rushing
down to disrupt the morning table.
Great though he was, his flakes also great,
he increased, deepened, outstretched
his cartoon lines out of the world of toys
to stride into blood and hair and skin,
leaving the cardboard a scratch-and-sniff
of musk and urine, a den of distant deep.
Pungent, dimensional, Tony multiplied,
spawned bright versions of himself,
beasts nimbly climbing walls, roaming
wallpaper jungles, leaving hunting
stains on every unreflective tablecloth.
Around the house, yellow eyes shining out,
from every pattern, tigers roaring everywhere.