05/03/2009

DARTMOOR DROUGHT by Lloyd Fletcher

The road’s dry throat
coughs up dust,
coats the sheep stalled
on the baked verges,
heads hung low
against drystone wall
for a cool wisp of shade
that isn’t there.

A sun-baked adder asks
to be re-buried; a jackdaw cracks the air
with what has happened here.

And the sun squats on the landscape
like a boiled curse
refusing to be moved.

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