Sometimes the smell of Death

[bardiphouka]

Sometimes the smell of Death
is invigorating

the sudden gurgle then chitter chatter
stutstutstutter roar and roar again and
the bodies fall left right left
left left right again and then

the hulking Harvies and Macks pull up
with sturdy men in flannel shirts and
loveknit toques and dirty Franch gig
the bodies onto the flat beds piling them
up and driving off without
so much as an ave.


When they are gone we stumble out into this
new landscape of destruction and soon have the
stumps parceled out for our games, too young
by far to know the word diminished.