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Friday, 26 February 2016

Shack

Shack

Charred remains, burnt stick’d tinder from which
the shack was fashioned, hidden
within the hollow, below beech trees, deep
inside the wood, where his body was found
still cradled within his den.
His place now open to the sky, gaping, where the roof once was,
a door, a corrugated iron sheet, tattered tarpaulin, old palings
rope-shackled, and wire that formed his rural refuge.

His suburban semi only miles away, his wife
and children waiting, unable
to understand what eccentric whim
drove him to live this way, abandon
comfort and company, to bury himself
in muddy abode, freezing
in the depth of winter, half-starving
alone in the back-woods.

Alcohol and cigarettes to numb
the pain, and pass the time,
a camping stove, a naked flame to cook
and warm the fingers, to keep at bay
damp and mould, the essential tools
of staying alive, catching alight, spreading
flames or fumes, smoke or steam becoming
the agency of his unseen death.


Copyright Andy Fawthrop 2016

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