God alone knows what’s stuck in their throat
Although even He is looking elsewhere:
It’s as if one of their dishevelled number had swallowed
A car on its attendant gravel and coughed it back up
As the tyres slip and the ancient engine protests.

They nose aimlessly amongst the thin grass
And scatter of rocks on a hillside that ought to be
Too steep: somehow, they remain rooted there
Like elderly ladies, pleasantly befuddled.
From this distance they are misshapen dots
That float, detached, from the tired eye.
They look up at nothing and bend their heads
Back down against the driving rain.