this third

This is for dVerse’s quadrille prompt: “Let’s embrace”. A quadrille has exactly 44 words, and the prompt requires that it includes the word Embrace.
Embrace made me think of one of my favourite poems, Judith Wright’s Woman to Man, which is about conception and has the line “the third that lay in our embrace”.  We studied this poem at school, and I loved it then, but more so now as an adult and a mother.

 

For H:

 

This third that lay in our embrace
now runs ahead in laughing grace.
I’m in her face, you’re in her eyes,
we’re in every cell – our joy, our cries.
And when we’re gone, she’ll hold our trace,
this third that lay in our embrace.

 

now is my autumn…

It’s my birthday tomorrow… so I ordered some more green-apple hair colour as a present to myself – I’m not greying at the temples, I’m greening. Now I just need to find my reading glasses so I can read the instructions… 

Now is my autumn, and I’m discontent,
when I contemplate the money I’ve spent
on all these little jars of stuff,
perhaps it’s time to say ‘enough’!
“Intensive replumping” on my face?
I’ve plumped in every other place!

Obliquity II : turn the upper cheek

From summer downunder, for Eugi’s weekly prompt “winter”.  So great to have these prompts back! Thanks Eugi!

Mother earth,
your buttocks are scorchy!
It is time to turn us
away from the fire.

For my northern hemisphere friends – hang in there, the Earth will be turning her upper cheeks to the sun soon, and you’re welcome to it.  (And if you’re thinking winter is when you’re further from the sun, you might want to read Obliquity.)

grim eaters

Death comes in darkness from below,
with claws and teeth,
snuffling and sneaking,
slipping under the wire,

a henhouse full of roosters

For dVerse’s Haibun Monday: Eagle. Our local apex raptors are wedge-tailed eagles, they stand up to 1.2m tall, have a wingspan more than 2m, and have been known to take lambs and small ‘roos.

My neighbour has the worst luck. Everyone out here keeps chickens, and everyone loses the odd one. But her chooks seem to have a life expectancy of under a week. She’s lost them to foxes (well, haven’t we all?) and to a neighbour’s dog, and the goshawks, and coxy… One time she got some fertile eggs, and hatched them in an incubator. From ten eggs, she got eight roosters. One of the two hens was killed by a fox, so she put the rest of the birds in my coop until she reinforced hers. My Muscovy drake killed the last hen, so I gave her back her roosters.

hawk

This is for Frank’s Haikai challenge #176: Hawk, and also in response to Dwight’s “The King”.  

 Hunger rides the wind,
watching for the flicker of
small life far below.