{"id":580,"date":"2010-03-09T09:25:00","date_gmt":"2010-03-09T09:25:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/ink.verticalplus.co.uk\/archive\/?p=580"},"modified":"2012-03-31T13:17:13","modified_gmt":"2012-03-31T13:17:13","slug":"chris-tracy-remembers-an-unlooked-for-gift","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/chris-tracy-remembers-an-unlooked-for-gift\/","title":{"rendered":"Chris Tracy remembers an unlooked-for gift"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span style=\"font-size: x-small;\"><span style=\"font-family: Courier New,Courier,mono; font-weight: bold;\">Pheasant<\/span><br style=\"font-family: Courier New,Courier,mono;\" \/><br style=\"font-family: Courier New,Courier,mono;\" \/><span style=\"font-family: Courier New,Courier,mono;\">Often we\u2019d find one dead in the road.<\/span><br style=\"font-family: Courier New,Courier,mono;\" \/><span style=\"font-family: Courier New,Courier,mono;\">Almost perfect. Maybe a small red smudge<\/span><br style=\"font-family: Courier New,Courier,mono;\" \/><span style=\"font-family: Courier New,Courier,mono;\">on the breast or wing, like a thumb-print.<\/span><br style=\"font-family: Courier New,Courier,mono;\" \/><span style=\"font-family: Courier New,Courier,mono;\">The head would flop as dad scooped it up<\/span><br style=\"font-family: Courier New,Courier,mono;\" \/><span style=\"font-family: Courier New,Courier,mono;\">like a rugby ball and stowed it in the boot;<\/span><br style=\"font-family: Courier New,Courier,mono;\" \/><span style=\"font-family: Courier New,Courier,mono;\">an unlooked-for gift.<\/span><br style=\"font-family: Courier New,Courier,mono;\" \/><span style=\"font-family: Courier New,Courier,mono;\">\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Later, keeping out<\/span><br style=\"font-family: Courier New,Courier,mono;\" \/><span style=\"font-family: Courier New,Courier,mono;\">of the kitchen, I\u2019d be given the tail<\/span><br style=\"font-family: Courier New,Courier,mono;\" \/><span style=\"font-family: Courier New,Courier,mono;\">feathers and a foot to play with. You\u2019d pull<\/span><br style=\"font-family: Courier New,Courier,mono;\" \/><span style=\"font-family: Courier New,Courier,mono;\">on the tendon and watch as the claws<\/span><br style=\"font-family: Courier New,Courier,mono;\" \/><span style=\"font-family: Courier New,Courier,mono;\">tensed and relaxed, like a dragon\u2019s \u2013 <\/span><br style=\"font-family: Courier New,Courier,mono;\" \/><span style=\"font-family: Courier New,Courier,mono;\">or the grabber on a seaside slot machine.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span><br style=\"font-family: Courier New,Courier,mono;\" \/><span style=\"font-family: Courier New,Courier,mono;\">\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span><br style=\"font-family: Courier New,Courier,mono;\" \/><br style=\"font-family: Courier New,Courier,mono;\" \/><br style=\"font-family: Courier New,Courier,mono;\" \/><br style=\"font-family: Courier New,Courier,mono;\" \/><span style=\"font-family: Courier New,Courier,mono;\"><span style=\"font-weight: bold;\">*<\/span> Having failed as a scrapyard worker, a handyman and a trainee teacher, <span style=\"font-weight: bold;\">Chris Tracy<\/span> is hoping for better luck as a poet.\u00a0 He lives in Norwich.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>PheasantOften we\u2019d find one dead in the road.Almost perfect. Maybe a small red smudgeon the breast or wing, like a thumb-print.The head would flop as dad scooped it uplike a rugby ball and stowed it in the boot;an unlooked-for gift.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Later, keeping outof the kitchen, I\u2019d be given the tailfeathers and a foot [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-580","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-prose-poetry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/580","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=580"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/580\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1934,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/580\/revisions\/1934"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=580"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=580"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=580"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}