Crumpled on a ***** door mat,
left by the cats -
the owl is just a loose bag
of feathers now - empty talons curled,
and one fierce eye turned
over its shoulder.

"What soft flesh enticed you to the ground?"

Lifting the mat, I remember
waking at night to the trilling call – a silvery vein
wrapped in the dark energy of hunger.

“All things die and too soon...” I say aloud,
my own eye sinking into that inky well. The
vacant perch leaning over my shoulder.

"What is to become of my flesh, my soul?"

"It's the waking that counts," I think, "and the meeting."
For a moment I wake again - grateful for the living.

Tom Spencer © 2017