Nina Bogin
The Lost Hare
Every day a different weather,
weeks without seeing moon or sun,
and a hare I’ve been trying to track down
these twelve years gone, ever since
I glimpsed it, deep in thought,
in the high grass of the marsh;
I saw the ash-grey tips of its ears.
Seeing me, it disappeared
into blackthorn and wild rose,
leaving its burrows unattended,
the entryways clogging with cobwebs.
In the meantime
my hair has gone grey,
my hands thick-veined, and the lines
of my thwarted quest cross my face
from every direction.
My long-haired daughters have grown,
left for other cities. We tend the fire,
keep the rooms clean, lay the table for two.
And beyond the black door
the sky fills up with stars
shedding their slow light
on the innumerable paths
through the marsh-grass
to the hollow
where the lost hare sleeps
bedded down in the thoughts
and dreams I hoarded there.
From The Lost Hare by Nina Bogin |
