Brittle

Written by Julian Beach

That unstirring January morning
in Nicholl’s Covert
we found proof
of the night hunter’s
grisly work

blushing umbra
diluted crimson
circled unfolded wings
perfect symmetry
crucified, frozen
in snowbound flight.

Departed the strutting
crowing potentate
emerald, amber, scarlet
regalia now faded
to a cipher, caged
in brittle ossuary

his heart still
as a pebble
ours, quickened
by the implacable
the random
the savage

and the queasy
inner ferment
that our own
lustre may fade
in a single gasp
and our flight
be just as fleeting.

8 thoughts on “Brittle”

  2. Thought you might like this on much the same theme

    Best
    David Pollard

    Road Kill

    After the sudden jolt and cry
    only the silence in the swallowed throat
    and backward buckle into a huddle
    and ruffle of air that for a moment
    simulates a shudder of life.

    Here by the side of passing
    fresh as murder,
    it fell sudden and small
    within the twisted knuckle of its weight
    too tender now to load itself with life.
    Too soon and quick the runnels of its fear
    were squandered at the edge of daybreak
    ending in the gully of its loss.

    Brush with a finger’s delicate modalities
    the hair against its grain’s quick nerve
    torn lace as radical as loss of touch
    the tendril’s pressure can no longer
    quiver back from.

    Those were the shoulders harsh declivities of pain,
    the glance of naked bone ceramic clean in the new air
    that blows it the caress it cannot know
    into the now bare body’s myriad branches
    and their bloodless tones.

    Alert within the twist of danger
    and the skin’s quiver against the air
    now locked back into patience
    like the dark stupor
    frail as dew beads
    and familiar as forgotten loss.

    Dark blood now hangs about
    the eyes quite blind of their uniqueness,
    ice to the skies appealing
    or the road’s dangers.

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