Stickleback

Does anybody else remember doing this as a child?

Stickleback

The stickleback had survived chilly
Spring and well into warm, moist Summer.

His three spines keeping him safe
From even the glutton sabre toothed pike.

A chance in a million caught Him
In my childish net. He didn’t know statistics.

Thrashing and flopping to the gleeful
Chortles and chuckles of us little boys

He was slithered into my jam jar and
Marched triumphantly home in murky purgatory.

Slow death on the kitchen windowsill
Overtook him, cooking in the hot summer sun.