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Ann Gray

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Full Cry

From nowhere, the wood’s besieged by hounds
and as they hurtle through the trees,

pale, intent, their faces inches from the ground,
I panic, confused by horns, the cries

come here, here boys here,
and I run, drenched, knee deep in leaves,

fight my way through thorns down, down to the river,
to put a distance from this chill, the fading light,

to put a distance from the night where sometimes
I can touch you and sometimes not; it all depends

if you’re alive, if I can see you, if I can hear
the wet sound of your breath as it leaves you.

Sometimes your voice will call me, mostly I’m waiting
in a deathly silence, not a breath of anything

just a pounding on all fours, hugging the mud
and when I wake there’ll be no-one, nothing,

just the faint smell of pine and the raw tears
of brambles on my arms and thighs.

 

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