Petra Rose
Dear Reader,
The poem today was written after I had visited a wild life park near where I live. Of course it is lovely to go and spend the day looking at the animals especially if you have small children with you, but I do wonder about the rights of these animals. Do lions and tigers, pandas, merekats, camels, and so on really enjoy being caged up all day with no wild places to hunt or go? I suspect not and, if offered the choice, would love to be back in their natural habitats. As circuses are now closing, especially if they had performing animals, perhaps in a few years time these wild life parks will be no more. I would be glad if this were the case.
*
From Dorothy Wordsworth, October 12th, 1800 in Westmorland
'We pulled apples after dinner, a large basket full. We walked before tea by Bainriggs to observe the many-coloured foliage. The oaks dark green with some yellow leaves, the birches generally still green, some near the water yellowish, the sycamore crimson-tufted, the mountain ash a deep orange, the common ash lemon colour, but many ashes still fresh in their summer green.'
From Gilbert White, October 13th, 1787 in Hampshire
'We saw several redwings among the bushes on the north side of the common. There were swallows about the village at the same time: so that summer and winter birds of passage were seen on the same day.'
*
Camel
The woman stares at me
into my rheumy eyes, my sad face
sees a dusty, dirty animal,
mud sticking to my coat
my miserable tail hanging loose
my hooves cracked, hump matted.
But I want her to know that this is not me.
I come from a land of warmth
of sun, of sand,
my Arab owner loved me
understood me
he stroked my coat.
He rode on my back
Kelim rugs hugging my haunches
water in large panniers
strung to my side.
We rode to oases, To Petra Rose,
he was my friend.
I weep for the want of him.
The woman walks away
but something glistens on her cheek.
With best wishes, Patricia
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