The early morn.
Two foxes sprinting
fluid and fast.
Coursing the street
their game of tag
washes its banks.
4am. I’m up early to catch a plane, walking to the local train station. In my peripheral vision I spot a red blur. Two foxes with more energy than me fly past.
(06.10.23)
© Ben Quant 2023
Photo by Wen Zhu on Unsplash
Wildlife
Poem 190 – Outside These Walls
Unmanicured, my garden dances,
a field of sunlike dandelions,
swaying to a salsa beat.
No doubt my neighbour thinks it’s wild.
It is. This is nature’s rhythm.
It’s raw, untamed, and improvised. Wild-life.
Inside, I ache. Fettered, I wish
to join them but it’s too late and so,
instead, I watch the sparrows flit
between their stalks in freedom songs.
I’m a lazy gardener, and so need little encouragement to join #NoMowMay, in fact I’ve strayed into #NoMowJune (sadly the alliteration isn’t as good…) It turns out that being lazy is good for our barren garden, now it’s full of life.
(07.06.23)
© Ben Quant 2023
Poem 130 – The Wood
Walking beneath the canopy above,
I stop and listen. Slowly I begin,
To hear it breathe, the branches rise and fall,
And in its breeze, translucent leaves make play.
A bee drones past ignoring my intrusion,
Whilst down below the moles dig on unseen
Their earthy mounds the only indication,
Of their lightless subterranean dreams.
A flap and avian caw as something falls,
And ricochets, until the undergrowth,
Receives it with its eager spiky arms,
Concealing it within a dense embrace.
The trees begin to stir, swaying in slow,
Rhythm to a beat that sounds unheard.
Even the elders join their patient dance,
Their ancient limbs cracking as they flex.
A cole tit reassures his youngsters whilst,
He flits around the local bounds, with loud,
Beeping that finds an answering call,
Cried proudly, deep within their concealed nest.
Somewhere a stream trickles its way across,
The wood, its flow, the artery that serves,
To nourish this green creature I stand within,
Alive and other, beyond our frame of reference.
Exploring woodland in Hertford the other day, I stopped alone for a moment, and realised I was anything but…
(30.05.22)
© Ben Quant 2022
Ode for the Day 