The Avenue

They found a man in the shrub that shields our lane — one fat white hand not tucked in the pit — and cordoned off a patch. We had nothing to explain it but The Post. And now the ground’s restrewn with tins and crisp bags; sleet jiggles the ivy; the blackbirds bob from floor to bole as each dull dusk settles in. And coming back at night we get on too, quickening to the safety lights, through shadows of  gates that thrust across the grit.