Thursday, July 07, 2005

Animals

Tankas

Song of the Wood:

Vole does his best to
dig quietly beneath the
browning, fallen leaves,
but tiny claws on rock makes
the tell-tale noise, a rasping.

The owl hears these
things and decides, flickering
wings in autumn's breast,
rustling leaves rise an inch
and just as quickly fall back.

Fox smiles into
his tail as the hounds pass by,
his burrow secure,
his vixen and the wee kits
behind him, the horse fading.

Kalahari:

Badger can climb up
the tree's wasted old carcass,
smelling another's
kill high in the limbs alone,
a drop of blood on the sand.

The leopard returns
to find poachers in his feed,
ground things up high,
badgers hissing in answer
to his own raised-hair growl.

Badger can't climb down,
but he's tough enough to fall,
stolen meat heavy
in his belly, his teeth red,
leopard's anger comes too late.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Wow, Firehawk. These are special. I found myself reading them again and again.

Patrick M. Tracy said...

Doc,

Thanks, kiddo.

Ken,

I was in the middle of writing a lot of heavy stuff, and I wanted to go in a different direction. The oriental forms tend to take me in the direction of nature and less morbid thoughts. Again, thanks for coming around, and thanks for introducing me to the Tanka form.

Across Inconstant Breath

Would that this skin this frail armor atop the husk of slow departure -  Would that it held against the teeth  of night's maw a...