Fox Playing in Early Twilight


He was suddenly here

gnawing on a green apple, trying

to get his teeth into its skin

the apple rolled away from him

and bounced through the grass

and he jumped over it,

seeking to control it

like a cat chasing a ball of thread,

leaping through the air.


He stepped toward us

giving up and letting the apple

nestle in the grass in the light of grey dusk.

This cagey hunter

like a child was amusing himself

stirring the dust,

snapping at the sticks of the crickets.


We were caught in his play.

Walking the Dead


Since the 10th century

the people have brought the dead

from Tory Island

in the humming procession

to the spirit place.


They wrapped and carried them

through the pillared gate

up the hill

toward the mound

where you could see

the land around

and the long line walking the dead.


They carried them as those around

would later be carried

and they laid them under great slabs

in the resting beds of their ancestors.


In a warm misty morning,

warm enough to open the earth,

I stand in the circle of tombstones

looking at ewes and lambs

slowly grazing among the gravestones.

© Copyright, 2015, Laurence Hutchman.
All Rights Reserved.