U Ellington Park

Ellington Park

Morning. Two women walk three dogs. Sometimes
it's three and four. A ball is thrown.
One grips a stick between its teeth. The women
stop and talk. 'Hullo', they say, 'Hullo'.

The dogs abscond to canine lives, sniff round the trees.
Their rear legs shoot up mounds of fallen leaves. All,
dogs and women, warmed in different ways against the autumn
winds.

Why women? Some deep myth suggests
domestic hearths tended by waiting wives.
The men are husbands, sons and fathers fighting
modern wars. They are not here, but there:
out fishing on the sea, maybe, dodging its waves and
chilling in the icy wind, or in the fields with
frozen fingers cutting cabbages and sprouts.

Of course, it isn't so. They're hanging round
at home, or still asleep, knowing the effort
of another day is hardly worth the recompense.
Autumn has swept into the house and turned their faces
yellow, workless and womanless and dogless.

Suddenly, five parrots start across the sky!