Before the demise

Some bells no longer toll

Set the table,
press the shirt,
to eat you’re able
without the dirt
if we sit, if where we lay
lamps are lit
or light’s still day
and oranges ripen
above our heads
gulls and swallows
don’t compete
while dogs go hunting,
leaving sentient cats
around our feet,
before we fleetly
join the dead.

Dr T.P. Wilkinson writes, teaches History and English, directs theatre and coaches cricket between the cradles of Heine and Saramago. He is also the author of Church Clothes, Land, Mission and the End of Apartheid in South Africa. Read other articles by T.P..