tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1451564884266007400.post1327895470201686979..comments2024-01-20T15:52:52.580-08:00Comments on A poem a day: A surprise in the peninsular – Fleur AdcockUnknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger1125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1451564884266007400.post-38928223954873256692019-02-10T05:08:45.080-08:002019-02-10T05:08:45.080-08:00There are a few typos in this version. The correct...There are a few typos in this version. The correct one is here:<br />A Surprise in the Peninsular Fleur Adcock<br /><br />When I came in that night I found<br />the skin of a dog stretched flat and<br />nailed upon my wall between the <br />two windows. It seemed freshly killed –<br />there was blood at the edges. Not<br />my dog: I have never owned one,<br />I rather dislike them. (Perhaps <br />whoever did it knew that.) It<br />was a light brown dog, with smooth hair;<br />no head, but the tail still remained.<br />On the flat surface of the pelt<br />was branded the outline of the <br />peninsula, singed in thick black <br />strokes into the fur: a coarse map. <br />The position of the town was <br />marked by a bullet-hole; it went <br />right through the wall. I placed my eye <br />to it, and could see the dark trees <br />outside the house, flecked with moonlight.<br />I locked the door then, and sat up <br />all night, drinking small cups of the <br />bitter local coffee. A dog <br />would have been useful, I thought, for <br />protection. But perhaps the one <br />I had been given performed that <br />function; for no one came that night, <br />nor for three more. On the fourth day <br />it was time to leave. The dog-skin <br />still hung on the wall, stiff and dry <br />by now, the flies and the smell gone. <br />Could it, I wondered, have been meant <br />not as a warning, but a gift? <br />And, scarcely shuddering, I drew <br />the nails out and took it with me. <br />Kerris Matthewshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13582618066336886333noreply@blogger.com