Dead bunny season

Dead bunny season Every cycle ride, I find baby softness bleeding out on the tarmac: dead rabbits like toddlers’ lost comforters, only limper, more fragile. Stilled, their eyes are glass, spilling grassy skies. Loss fast-revs

Dead bunny season

Every cycle ride, I find baby softness
bleeding out on the tarmac:
dead rabbits like toddlers’ lost comforters,
only limper, more fragile.

Stilled, their eyes are glass,
spilling grassy skies. Loss fast-revs
through me, mixing with revulsion
as flies buzz to wet intestines.

I stare, fascinated by dried blood
and the lure of peace: dazed
by something I have to label beauty
or else face up to my ugliness in gazing.

On the cruel season’s road, bunnies
are the lost creatures. Not me
or my sons, both alive and laughing,
grown beyond first dangers. And yet,

my age outpedals hopes of new motherhood.
Cycling through the season of speeding cars
and flown wishes, a pain buried deep
inside me bleeds out.

Sarah James/Leavesley

Sarah James/Leavesley is an award-winning poet, fiction writer, journalist and photographer, with poetry featured in the Guardian, Financial Times, The Forward Book of Poetry 2016, on the BBC, regional buses and in the Blackpool Illuminations. Author of seven poetry titles, two novellas and a touring poetry-play, she runs V. Press poetry and flash fiction imprint.

Website: www.sarah-james.co.uk.

One thought on “Dead bunny season

Comments are closed.