Sixth Sense

The blackberry bushes sprawl, stripped to the stem.
Nothing left for me. The winged ones spied them first.
A walnut, cracked and wrinkled, winks at me under the tree.
I crane my neck,
A few left for me.
The squirrels yielded a better bounty.
Their focus clear,
Eyes unclouded by virtual image,
Heads unfilled by blather.

Badger’s shrieks pierce the nights,
She’s claimed her set,
Is defending it.
For there’s a pinch to the darkness now,
A forewarning.
Though bright and clement, the great Gaian clock of the seasons is turning.
Heaving.
Rolling.

Dormouse scurries into a wall nook, leaf in mouth.
Robin Redbreast flits back to my table.
The hazelnuts have gone,
The ash leaves are going,
Everything is nesting,
Storing,
Prepping.

Nature doesn’t live in her head, but in her senses.
All six or more of them.
Her guts tell her storms are approaching
Her nose smells winter ahead
The hairs on her green arms prickle as a volcano rumbles in the distance.
Here on the ground of Gaia’s body, all is real.
No screens, no stories, no dubious insurance policies.
Just dirt,
Clean and honest.
Just water,
Transparent.
Just air,
Moving freely.

I’m nature’s child.
Sometimes in my head. Sometimes in my senses.
Sometimes beyond them all.
Other times at their beck and call.
Earth in spirit, or spirit in earth?
As my wood pile grows, and jam jars clutter,
In the garden leeks are thickening,
I have flour, oil and pulses,
A little fuel too.
Don’t worry, I hear you winter.
I hear you.

Yet how cosy we all are up here,
Badger, Robin and I,
Perched upon the rocky shoulders of Magna Mater,
Hunkering down on her Cambrian bones,
While the world below heaves and groans.
Yes how warm you feel Gaia,
And how bare the cupboards of civilisation,
How cold.