Black Marauders

We've been on this trip
before, but somehow it is all
the beguiling pleasures involved
in raising clever and rambunctious
puppies we envisage, rarely do we
recall the frustration, the irritation
and endless patience required
to transform wild little creatures
into calmly sensible maturity
becoming life's companions.
While we chuckle at their
hilarious escapades, wince at
their interminable accidents,
marvel that such small animals
rampaging through a house are
capable of clattering floorboards
like a brace of bull elephants, we
watch, fascinated as they rise to
bipedalism, raising paws like
trained athletes to box, then
wrestle with one another, fiercely
baring teeth in mock conflict, those
black siblings, each the very 
essence of mischief incarnate,
together a brace of devil's spawn.