Rabbit

As children we thought as one.  We shared values without the language to articulate them and certainly without the insight to question from where they came.

Playing chase was as instinctive to us as breathing.  Everyone wanted to be the chased, not the chaser.  The chaser could fail, he or she had all to risk but the chased could practise skill and cunning stimulated by fear.

Running then, through tracks in long grass, we understood and were in tune with the nature of our childish gait, with the nature of our chaser's need for speed, the mistakes that might be made as plimsolled foot followed plimsolled foot. 

If sufficient time could be gained it was short work to duck or pretend to fall, grab a handful of long grass from either side of the narrow track, and tie a rabbit trap; high enough to catch a rabbit - high enough to catch a foot - if the knot was tight enough. 

Sweating in the summer sun that gave sweetness to the meadow, down would come the chaser, howling outrage, ' 'snot fair!'  It was seldom fair if you were on the receiving end of it but it always seemed entirely reasonable to experience the burst of jubilant triumph that haled  you a hero among your peers when your trap succeeded. 

It seldom did succeed though and there was no-one more surprised than the hero when it did; who, in my case, was always left wondering if it was really possible to catch a rabbit that way, and what on earth was I to do with it if it happened.   

Mary Hopkin singing 'Those Were the Days'