Arden Poem by Richard Blanch

Horns in the forest.
A slug beneath a stone.
Four grasping hands that thought themselves alone:
Alert- listen – breast to breast.

Distant shouts and feet on fallen leaves
A blackbird’s head poised – a thrush lifts its beak from a snail well-shelled.
The hands pause, lift and falter; parted lips and breath tight-held;
A frozen moment ended by the pressure of a firm dark eye that in the silence grieves.

Sighs beat again the unresisting air;
A scream in the forest
But, writhing breast to breast
The lotus eaters love. No care

Troubles them as mossy roots dive into their patch of earth
And trees reach still into the sky.
The birdsong wells across the two that living lie
And self-deceiving flesh rejoices in a living death.

Shots in the forest.
Slug crushed under stone.
Red twisted hands reach out in their last gesture- then it’s done
And dying life twists once in pain and slumbers breast to breast.