Other Beings

The Hotel De Aar, in the Great Karoo, South Africa, many years later . . .

Of other beings I have known

Most have been human, so it seems,

But quite a few were cats, one dog—

No, more. but only the one was "mine"—

And Hansie, that Karakul sheep.

All of these had names they went by.

There have been chickens, too, and some

Of them I killed, beheading them

With an axe, laughing as they ran

Headless in circles in the dust

Of that benighted yard. I was

Just a child. Does that absolve me?

I cannot count the spiders that I've

Known, never mind their insect ilk,

Or all of those whose flesh I ate—

"Forget all this, says Earth to the stars," Tom Sleigh writes, having in mind a war;

"old bones that shake when the winds roar."*

*Tom Sleigh, "Before Rain," in House of Fact. House of Ruin (Minneapolis: Graywolf Press, 2018), 68.

Friday, June 12, 2026