171

John sat in the lee of
            The house with a tin of leather
                        Polish and two rags going over
A harness, his back at a
            Tangent to the wall and the
                        Tan hide and brass pins in the
Cradle of his arms and his
            Hair lifting in the slight air
                        And grey light of the pasture,
His hands gripped and body
            Intent, working at the soft tissue
                        And areas that had worn hard,
Like a red carapace.
            Dirt and dust had ingrained
                        And darkened it in some parts.
He sat back and watched crows
            Rove the pasture in the stench
                        Of his cold hands and he held
Them before him like severed
            Ends, numb and stained.
                        The polish smelt good to him.
The harness was laid over
            His knees. He reached for
                        The off cloth and began to buff.
When he had done it was
            As if the hemisphere of light overhead
                        Had ran into it from all points.
It was studded with broken light,
            Come through the cloudbank as if
                        Through a capillary membrane.

170

Papa came in from outside
            And lit the standard lamp
                        And his head beneath it was
An orb shining in a wreath
            Of his hard white hair,
                        And his red neck was a damp
Ridge as he stood beneath the
            Lamp and reached down to
                        The newspaper and traced over
Its surface with his fingers.
            He picked it up and coughed
                        And went to the kitchen and
I could hear his deliberate
            Movements and the crack and hiss
                        As he opened a bottle of beer.
He came back in without looking
            At me and sat and then he said
                        Dewey be quiet when you do go up.
Ma is asleep now.
            And I said okay, and he
                        Looked at me for a second.
His eyes seemed to have
            Dropped into his lower lids
                        As if they were weighted inside,
And his mouth was like a piece
            Of cut meat. I looked back
                        At him and he drank his beer
And then it seemed as if he just
            Stared into the wall and then into
                        The ceiling for a very long time.

169

The other dove traced a linear
            Route from the point of its
                        Origin to the far eave of
The barn, through its open
            Door. At a distance,
                        It was a small, obscure
Projectile, grey crimson in
            The narrow light fallen out
                        Burning of the belly of cloud
Gathered darkly at the skyline.
            John walked wearily back down
                        The incline from the woods,
Kicking a stone and barely
            Lifting his feet and staring
                        Into the dust of the path.
He could hear the soft
            Voices of birds he did not
                        Recognise from the fields,
Like instruments in the wind.
            He began to sing to himself
                        Under his breath, hoarsely
And soundlessly and as if
            Disengaged from his own voice.
                        There was a weak and tired
Smile on his face and as he
            Walked he closed his eyes for
                        Periods and walked blindly.
As he passed through the yard
            The dove was burning in
                        The dark of its pinions.

168

As I was walking down
            Out of the track from the wood
                        I saw a harrier come up
Out of the edge of the trees
            With disjointed strokes of its
                        Bent dark wings like something
Being operated mechanically.
            It flew as if it was falling upwards.
                        It had run up two doves
From the stunted trees
            That clattered as if haywire
                        In double strands together,
Woven up into the air
            Fat and white and blackeyed.
                        The harrier hove in.
It lowered its blond head and
            Its long ragged legs rose,
                        And put its talons forward.
The dove closest seemed to
            Fall apart in the air and its
                        Neck that had seemed free
Was broken before I could
            Know it had been caught, and
                        The harrier folded into a tree
With the bloody carcass pinned
            In its foot.
                        To me it was a pink shape
But as I came up close I
            Could see the harrier draw its
                        Intestine up in its mandible.

167

Silas and Hollis sat in
            The outhouse on Silas' bunk
                        Watching the midafternoon light
Fall an old hoe that
            Rested in the doorway, which was
                        Still half in shadow.
They were drinking from an opaque
            Black bottle, the receptacle
                        Of some hop liquor Hollis
Had bought several days prior
            From a boy on a nearby holding
                        As he passed on his way back
From the fairground.
            Silas was speaking in a monotone
                        About the nature of light.
How it seemed fluid and yet
            Without mass, how it was
                        Malleable and lacking fixity,
How it could touch and yet not
            Be palpable.
                        He conjectured it was an element
Apart from all others; contingent
            On other laws than they,
                        And not bound by providence
To the conditions that dictated
            Their human sight. Hollis drank from
                        The black bottle
And his lit head nodded
            In the formations of dust motes
                        In the thick air before him.

166

In the morning after the rain
            Of the night the air rose
                        In the sudden depression.
As John stood in the
            Aperture of the back door
                        He could feel a wind draw
His shirt out before him
            And see the trees lifting their
                        Confluent limbs into it.
The air tasted of rain, of
            The moss and bracken growing
                        Out of the outside wall
Wet and half crushed
            By the wheelbarrow that was leant
                        Against the wall, wheel down.
He went across the yard
            And to the edge of the trees
                        And lit a cigarette.
The ashes and shortlived
            Cinders of it ran down the wind
                        Following diverse paths into
The wood, each particle
            Threading its own way.
                        Silent and fugitive lights.
The soil was expiring—
            The scrub grass animated in the
                        Draft as if it were lit.
The sky was grey and heavy.
            John threw the last of the cigarette
                        Overarm into the wind.

165

Eliot woke in
            No light and rode along for
                        Some minutes in the half
Stirrup of the remains of his dream
            And he was sleeping
                        And knew he was and passing
From thought to thought
            As from colour to colour
                        As the wall grew chalkwhite
In the last of the dark and
            Rode on, but couldn't stop the
                        Light falling in.
The womb, dark, was shot through
            With white veins, he was
                        Cradled in a white sailboat
With a name, and its wood
            Knocked as it tossed in the wind and
                        The trees blew.
It all played back again and he
            Picked parts and abstracted them
                        Like seedheads from a handful of
Grass and turned them
            In his sight until
                        He had fallen back into sleep.
The water lapped.
            Sometime later that morning it
                        Started to rain and he came
To, sweating, because his head had
            Fallen between the mattress and
                        The wall. It was light outside.

164

The winter before Eliot died
            There were long evenings
                        When the farm would shut
Down early and we would sit
            After dinner in silence and then
                        Everyone went up to bed
Early and the fire would
            Burn down in the grate
                        And I would go up the stairs,
Through the unlit upper hall
            And to my room and sit under
                        The lamp reading my almanac.
The shadow of my head
            Over the pages and I would
                        Have to turn to face it and
Read under it like an icon
            In its bracket on the wall.
                        I heard the house settling
And my pa snoring like
            A rhinoceros and the wind,
                        Each of those early nights.
I would stop reading and
            Stare out beyond my reach
                        Into the unlighted, unhoused
Spaces before me and sometimes
            Hear Eliot through the wall
                        Shift on the frame of his bed,
And I knew that something
            Would happen, but I didn't know then
                        What it was because I was young.