Hunters

An autumn strewn with broken, chestnut-coloured branches
and the yellow down of shot birds. The hunters
left the forest whole years behind them,
emptied their haversacks upon the kitchen table and were gone.
That evening, they did not return to eat. Why, then,
so much preparation – cartridges, powder, shot,
the tiresome cleaning of the guns, the early start,
in such damp? They returned at midnight.
Now everyone was asleep. Nobody expected them.
The whole house smelt unbearably, even the bedroom,
of the fine meal they had not tasted.
As they undressed, a tiny golden feather
slid silently from the hair on their chest.

_{Γιάννης Ρίτσος, «Κυνηγοί», από τις Ασκήσεις
From Exercises, 1950-1964}