The Other Country by Carol Ann Duffy

Author:Carol Ann Duffy
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Pan Macmillan UK

Following Francis

Watch me. I start with a low whistle, twist it,

pitch it higher and thinner till the kestrel treads air.

There! I have a genius for this, which I offer

to God. Do they say I am crazy, brother?

Yes, they say that. My own wife said it. Dropping everything

and following that fool! You want to be covered

in birdshit? You make me sick. I left anyway,

hurried to the woods to meet him. Francis. Francis.

We had nothing. Later, I wept in his arms like a boy;

his hands were a woman’s, plucking my tears off, tasting them.

We are animals, he said.

I am more practical. He fumbles with two sticks

hoping for fire; swears, laughs, cups glow-worms

in his palm while I start up a flame. Some nights

we’ve company, local accents in the dusk. He sees

my jealousy flare beneath dark trees. He knows.

I know he knows. When he looks at me, he thinks

I cannot tame this.

This evening, Francis preaches to the birds. If he is crazy,

what does that make me? I close my eyes. Tell my children

we move north tomorrow, away from here where the world

sings through cool grass, water, air, a saint’s voice.

Tell them that what I am doing I do from choice.

He holds a fist to the sky and a hawk swoops down.

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