By Gabriel Hartley
On a moment in Avebury, 7 December 2011
Shattered by sudden pheasant calls
exact precision of December sun
sunk just below the evening earthen line
my body scattered as newborn shards
into earth and sky and barrow
in electrical shock of simultaneity
standing stones echo this host of pheasant shouts
resounding feathery annunciation
of setting Venus and Jupiter sky
Pan ascending
horn-split hemispheres of visual space
embracing Swallowhead Springs—
“Wait,” he promised, “for the transformative shift
the cut of day to night
spirit alight in this baptismal song of recognition”—
and at that pheasant inversion
inside opened onto outside
outside in
as promised
and from the newly-birthed moonlit night
I dropped deep into the dark barrow’s
stony embrace
anew
Fiskars, 29 December 2021
