Woodchucks

Sam Pink once wrote a poem about putting a tiny witch hat on a woodchuck. This is what happened when I followed that idea to its illogical conclusion.

There comes a time in every morally ambiguous forest

when the local woodchucks rise from their hibernation holes

with a hunger that cannot be satisfied

by acorns, bark, or existential dread.

They want hats.

Pointy ones.

With brims wide enough to block out the sun

and shame.

They do not want baseball caps.

They are not jocks.

They are familiars-in-waiting.

Failed familiars, maybe—

cursed to resemble woodland rodents

but with the souls of retired mystics

and a bone-deep need to accessorize with purpose.

You ask why witches hats.

Because a fedora is for liars.

Because a beanie is for baristas.

Because a cowboy hat would make them look Republican.

But a witches hat?

That’s a manifesto.

It says, I hex, therefore I am.

It says, My whiskers tremble with arcane fury.

It says, I watched your dreams dissolve under a waning moon and I did not flinch.

Also, it makes them feel tall.

No one respects a short prophet.

And the “fucking” in “fucking witches hats”?

That’s not just emphasis.

That’s a woodchuck slamming its tiny paw on a spellbook yelling,

“Give me velvet and drama, or I swear I will gnaw through the astral plane.”

They want enchantment.

They want power.

They want to steal time and chew it slowly,

like a root vegetable made of secrets.

In short,

woodchucks need fucking witches hats

because the forest isn’t safe anymore.

Because everyone’s pretending they’re fine.

Because if you’re going to be mistaken for a whimsical footnote

in someone else’s fable,

you should at least look like you could curse a man’s bloodline

and make it rhyme.