The Big Jack I Caught in the Stonepile (by Phil Hall)

The Big Jack I Caught in the Stonepile (by Phil Hall)

Original Text
Phil Hall, An Oak Hunch (London, ON: Brick Books, 2005). This poem is reproduced on the Griffin Prize Web Site (from a volume on the 2006 Canadian Shortlist).
1& put in the cellar to tame
2  ran in blurred circles ’til the farmhouse spun
3when I caught him again to let him go
4  his hindlegs jumping in my fist like the tractor’s gear knob
5he tore a long furrow up the belly of my arm
6  as if I’d been trying to kill myself
7the house slowly stopped spinning
8  & fell on its side--the cellar an open grave
9its soft potatoes handled by cloud-shadow
10boy was my arm ever starting to sing
RPO poem Editors
Ian Lancashire
RPO Edition
2011