Harvest Time

The Harvest Black, starless late September sky, the moon a golden scythe mowing down the old, harvest time. They had forgotten to close windows and chill will settle in old lungs, spitting blood. Church bells toll. The old priest is still on holiday; the new one is clumsy, hasn’t had a bath and a shave for days; an unspoken murmur of discontent. The cleric sweats; there is a smell of brandy, one of the church’s rejects? But they do take care of their own. This isn’t swine flu, nothing to report, just old people dying as they must.