Hills alive

(First draft, South Africa, 1985, rewritten in 2022)

I’ve watched the distant hills all day
Ice dawn from the open-topped latrines
where once a brazen bee bayoneted a comrade’s bare backside
To fire dusk, heating sausages from a tin
in a billy boiling water over a breath-blown blaze

Unmoved, yet so alive
Chameleonic
Orange early from the day’s new sun
rising through the Highveld’s haze
Lightening, and brightening
as the orb ascended
shaking loose the hanging dust of dawn

Then the greens came through
Winter notwithstanding
Hues captured in occasional glances
from exercises in the bush
Rehearsals for roles in distant conflict
A constant reassuring presence
during dry runs for deadly danger

As evening drew coldly in
there were layers of brown
Bush jacket over jersey
balaclava pocketed in case of emergency
And the greens steadily darkened
sliding through purples as the sun subsided at our backs
Glowing briefly fiery orange as, behind us, star met cloud on its descent

then gone; in silently deepening blackness
draped in an enveloping blanket of darkness
As we seek shelter behind khaki tent flaps
burrow deep into downy brown sleeping bags
and night’s chill decorates their slopes with dewy diamonds
I wonder -- will those hills be cold tonight?