The Foot And Mouth Crisis 2001 Poem by Mark Heathcote

A clue: Memitim 2-down 5-across, Death:
Another farmer holds his breath.
His crossword puzzle is now solved,
as he-sits-by, the open fire resolved.

Firebrats shimmer like melting
sparks through grates, between falling,
slivering, among the black slates.
Like silver ashen - phosphates.

Covering that hearth's entirety,
they too show there's no need for piety
as the future ghosts of the living burn.
His world is an up-turned urn.

Listing, he hears the cries of the last dying ewe.
Whilst angels of death beyond view
descend across each patchwork acre.
He himself screams at his maker.

Prier on prier, prayer-on-prayer
foot and mouth each neighbouring acre
burned black in the gasoline-air
each man alone dies by his ploughshare.

As more firebrats recurred
another flock: another milk herd
burned; like unguided lost souls
stacked kindling in piled coals.