Foxes

I heard them last night.

Drunk on lukewarm darkness
And the perfume of jasmine
They crashed through the garden,
Tumbling through the gap in the fence
(That you said you would mend)
And fell upon the irises
Tearing their leaves into strips.
They rolled, shrieking, through the campanulas
Reducing their white linen cloches to a muddy pulp
And snapped almost every raspberry cane.
They dug up the cherry tree,
Trampled all over the strawberry plants
Tore the fibre optic filaments from the bottlebrush
And fouled the petunias.

I chased them.

They scattered before the torchlight,
Sparks of ferrous oxide that disappeared
Between the cars with a sensuous slink.


© GB 2008