PRAYER FOR AN URCHIN

Spinning and swirling all long the lane the spent leaves, drift into mounds and clog the Undergrowth, thickly crammed among the holly bushes in the hedge. Gone are the nuts which peppered the pavement, chased by squirrels and squirrelled away by Jays. Now the morning air is chilly and soon the frost will come, silvering the dead leaves and Giving them a new beauty in death.

Among the leaves, unnoticed, hopefully, a hedgehog sleeps. Prickly holly protecting her from Intruders, her prickles stuck about with leaves warm as newspaper in a tramps vest. Frost, ice, snow, these she will never see or feel and yet they are her mortal enemies, she sleeps. Barely a breath, nothing to show she lives at all while storms rage and great trees fall. Covered at last by snow, buried alive.

 Long winter, but please not too long. Sun points a finger at the leafy mound a little longer Every day and the air is warmer. First a faint rustle, then a definite heaving from beneath the Mould, she has returned from near death to hungry life, hungry for the sweet smells and Warmth of Spring and for a juicy something or a crunchy morsel found among the new grass. Or in my cold frame, full of small lettuces and large slugs!

Such a dear little urchin, so much in need of luck or friends or both. Winter is not her only Deadly foe. Fast cars, thoughtless men with brush cutters careless of her day time roosting Place. Every time she sleeps she faces death, each time she wakes a miracle is performed. Welcome the warm summer nights crunchy black beetles and the joy of small red wriggly Worms after a summer shower.

Keep her safe,from all the harm that may befall he. Perhaps my garden Gods will Watch over her where they hold sway. We have them so little space to live their lives, and She is a wild thing not subject to our silly laws, she keeps to the dark time and the dark Places. Her kind were here long before our cruel tribe. She needs only little space and a little Understanding, and if you please, some where safe to sleep.