Greytown county almanac

Elegy Out of the morning light she appeared, suddenly there On the side of the road, white and clean shorn, she looked Me straight in the eye, and for a chill moment, unhinged me, She scared the living daylights out of me, as I drove by. Just an old ewe, chewing her cud, yellow eyes bold and glassy, defiant, Head held high, strutting her stuff, there on the side of the road. “Cheeky bitch”, I could hear some farmer, this farmer, say Before setting the dogs on her, and for nothing more, for no good reason Other than for escaping from a paddock bare of grass. “It had been a hard winter!” but it was always a hard winter For an old ewe wanting to make milk to feed her lambs, Twins I knew, tucked carefully away somewhere Behind a bush out of a bitter cold spring wind In that paddock bare of grass, of dead and dying lambs and ewes. “Farming here in this green New Zealand land is just a matter of controlled starvation.” What can one say about an old ewe, ...