LITTLE OWL
From the wintry ash
A little owl bewitches
The silent hollows with a mournful dread.
Fine mists are spread
On hedges and on ditches
Bewildering the eye, the hand, the head.
Still, as I walk attentive to disasters,
This guardian of quiet and lone acres
Alerts my wits to what it is that masters
The soul on any pilgrimage – the dead.
Only my feet make certain what there is
And clay sticks, so softening the fall
As I go home through such a wilderness
Where death swims and emptinesses call.