Alexander Baird
Year's End
The nibbling year of the Rat has almost won
Its caucus race from oysters to persimmons
In this region famed for both. The first month’s clawprints,
Stars pressed in the snow, with a comet’s streak between,
Will soon appear again as the Rat year passes.
Now the cat-calls of kites idling black against blue,
With, from the pines, the high hag-cackle of the shrike,
Speed him, and the panicky roar of the Ox
Kneedeep in mud, who will inherit the new year
But sees the Tiger not fourteen months away.
Though we infest time with our images, hanging
A paper mask on the death’s head, bone must last
Like the Ox and Rat beyond the new year’s cards
And the Tiger is always a tiger even on paper.
Page(s) 24-25
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