Jim Carruth

This poem, by Jim Carruth is entitled Bereavement Counselling from Murdoch of Blackbyres.


Listen, back in ‘74
I shot a crow with such force
its body cannoned into its partner,
dropped the pair from the sky.
The living shared the fall
and hard landing
of one too close.

If that winded bird
had not shaken the dust off itself,
escaped from the corpse’s shackle,
raised its torn wings,
lifted itself into painful flight,
I’d have finished it off as well –
coupled them in death.

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