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Featured Poem 3/17/08
VILLANELLE OF THE HUNT
A river of fur runs through the land.
Red fox leaps high but he dies down low.
If you’ve never been hunted, you can’t understandhow knifes the bullet and clubs the hand:
grin teeth, break bone, strike head the doe:
a river of fur runs through the land.Great oaks root through our hearts of sand,
red sumac shines from red blood sowed.
If you’ve never been hunted, you can’t understandhow place to hide preserves the band.
Lack that, lack all. This sight behold:
a river of fur runs through the land.So quick they turn, the animal clan,
but bullet knows they can be slowed.
If you’ve never been hunted, you can’t understandhow a stone-cold drop of lead commands
this hot flight desperate, death-bestrode.
A river of fur runs through the land.
If you’ve never been hunted, you can’t understand.
—Margaret Benbow