Urban Animals – Garbage Barons

Urban Animals series.

Garbage Barons

Busy digging in wet leaves, or padding down alleys, the bandit raccoons discomfort us. Their small hands so quick, so nimble. Their disdain and avarice, equal and unhidden. They are too much like us. City raccoons are garbage barons, lazy and clever. They are anarchists, devising dissent in huddled groups on neighbourhood lawns and leaving garbage cans overturned. They are the gangs of teenagers that watch as you pass, sullen and suspicious. They are the homeless tent-city in the heart of concrete and glass.  Grubby and independent and bold, they crack our illusion of success.. Our imaginary reign crumbles in the rainy night, their reflecting eyes gleaming from the bushes.



Urban Animals – Corvid Commute

I’ve started a series of micro-fiction stories, titled Urban Animals. Here is the first.

Corvid Commute

Each night over Vancouver the crows commute east. A long line of black wings, loosely grouped into a corvid highway. A nightly diaspora from the city to the suburbs. Where do they come to roost? I imagine, high on Burnaby Mountain, their homes are nestled in dark coniferous enclaves. After a long day in concrete and car exhaust, they breathe with relief the cooler mountain air, damp with wet pine and rich umami soil.