Bitter Night in the Country
- Bitter Night in the Country
Requisite dog bark. Far off.No response.
Unless the sound of someonehammering a plank into place counts as dialogue.
Late night fence-mendingor a crime of passion, could go either way.
But for now it’s dogs and choresand breath in clouds,
and geese grieving overhead,a lost tribe beating their wings
through unpunctuated blackness.Crying exhaustion, hunger, fear,
they circle slowly to touch downon the lightless earth they’ve longed for
where they’ll settle in the meadowand contentedly foul it for us all. [End Page 127]
Hayden Saunier is a writer, actress, and teaching artist living in the Philadelphia area. She is the winner of the 2013 Gell Poetry Prize, 2011 Pablo Neruda Poetry Prize given by Nimrod International Journal, and the 2011 Rattle Poetry Prize. She is a Bucks County, Pennsylvania, poet laureate.
