“Ode to the Rabbits of Watership Down”

…Hazel, dozing in his burrow one "chilly, blustery morning in March" some years later, is visited by El-ahrairah, the rabbit-folk hero who invites Hazel to join his own Owsla. Leaving his friends and no-longer-needed body behind, Hazel departs Watership Down with the spirit-guide, "running easily down through the wood, where the first primroses were beginning to bloom." From Watership Down by Richard Adams.

When I see rabbits feeding at dusk,

I think back to Hazel, Fiver,

Bigwig, Blackberry,

Dandelion and Pipkin.

I wonder if their

Descendants fair well

Against their 1000 enemies-

If they remember those that went before.

I cry to think some might

Live now in a place like Efrafa…

Marked and destined to serve a place

Whose center cannot hold.

Better to be free,

Fending for themselves-

Than oppressed and protected

By overseers willing to sacrifice for the status quo.

There is stillness in the night

That speaks to those that will listen,

It is the quiet cool of foreboding-

Lessons we may not learn in time.

Ask many times,

Answer but once.

What constitutes a soul?

To live? To reason? To sacrifice?

Or merely to love your friends and enjoy fresh clover?

There is no spoon.