That day by the lake
when you wouldn’t stop and
I made you and you stalked
off into the bracken and I sat
on the rock looking up
at the crag wondering why
do I always take it why
am I still here and then
saw a bird circling
as a crow circles its carrion –
but more slowly, wings spread wide
and the feathers fanned out against the sun
and it seemed larger and darker
with more history than a common scavenger
and then I knew I was watching an omen,
riding the thermal, effortless,
croaking a harsh truth.

Kathleen is a poet and biographer living in the north of England.  She has a couple of pamphlets published by Redbeck Press, a full collection with Templar Poetry, and is now working towards her second collection which features poems written while travelling among the First Nation people of British Columbia.