BY ISOBEL DIXON
That Coyote Moment
The fox trots through King’s Cross, a midnight concourse visitor –
flash in the drab. It knows the times and trains, it seems,
jumps smoothly down to open tracks
and heads out on the snaking steel –
to Stevenage, Letchworth, who knows where.
Remember that coyote in the movies once
– a taxi driver and assassin stalled
by the shine in its eyes, the slope of its back,
grey spirit, desert breath on tar. In between the wheels, they slip
and sniff, pad softly on our hammered routes. Welcome, interloper, here.
For Jonny
Messenger
Russet and frost
roadside fox
surprised
to be sidelined so fast.
Stop press
on the early news
he was delivering
tip-toeing across tar –
Abuja, Tripoli,
Hurricane Irene,
and the sky’s
new supernova –
Now his ankles
are delicately crossed
but he’s sidelong
on the grass.
Mercurial reversal
the still-fine feathers
of his bushy tail
ruffled by wind
but his grin’s
the giveaway
a Janus mask.
His ear is snicked
a young buck’s mark.
He is beautiful.
Whose job is it to bury
a dead fox? you ask.
Isobel Dixon will be appearing at the 2015 Franschhoek Literary Festival.
AERODROME 