It is a rotten morning. The
core of hazels in the damp wood, wet
and drowned, lose identity and turn to gutless shapes. Cloyed
the muddy clay traps the dampness in its dips
and depressions, clings to the shoes and
slows the pittance of steps towards the caked
tree where the mud mutters below the uneven branch, the
bark is crusted over, and the one bird calls out once
too often, level with the woodman’s pile. Turning
aside the dropped stone splashes in the well and then he follows.