Farm Track by Emma McKervey #6

Farm Track

It was the indignance of pheasant, whose call was

shrill with the catch of barely constrained hysteria,

that drew the gaze to the russet sward

of low lying meadow.  He was stalking the far

corner of blackthorn hedge, barely seen for

the red fescue and maroon of docken seed head.

And the rich, bloody shades of the sunken pitch

were an anomaly against the pale stubble of bordering fields.

The whole was watched over with the blank windowed eye

of the farmhouse on the rise, dourly starring

with Presbyterian gloom, whose staunchness

was taunted by the clown fish flash of goldfinches –

mastering the joy of darting by

the doorstepped sprawl of a degenerate looking cat.