Lament to a dead cockerel by Maggie Harris

You posed for our photographs like tourists
Your brother in your wake, heads high
Combs outlined against the ginger lilies

I knelt to centre you within the lens
Red cockscombs on blue St Lucian skies
White whips of wild clouds spinning

Cacti spines cut across your horizon
Flesh fat against the paling fence
Your head, cocked to one side, filling the frame

You escorted us like ushers, up the steps
Past terracotta pots, guava and banana trees
Conch shells cemented into the concrete

In the early mornings you cut into our sleep
With your cacophonous chorus, early risings
With the sun over Rodney Bay

And we linger on the balcony, watching
The yachts on the marina, the hummingbird
Busy in the ivy in the mid-morning sun

Then you again, but this time an angry squawking
You, gripped tight in a fist, disappearing
Through the doors of the restaurant

In the photograph you fill the frame
Head cocked to one side, red cockscomb on blue
St Lucian skies; wild whips of white clouds, spinning.

Maggie Harris www.maggieharris.co.uk