Harvest machines squeeze the lanes, drag the cut maize to store. Maize grows fast and feral, it must be chopped fast, it is the kind of crop that might make a run for it. It should be quiet then, down by the river, the field there is ploughed neat, lies waiting. Butterflies: scraps of bombazine caught on thorny stems. Brown earth, bared, corduroyed. Sky flows blue. In the hedge greens are vivid pips: the purplish sloes, the red hips. Beyond, below, the river, the bigger river has eaten up all the rain. Something slaps the water surface, unseen, unexplained. At the edge, where Dog's swim sets a Mallard drake to wing, one bright thing, turquoise shining, faceted, flies panoramic. Gorged eyes follow the field edge, the fatted twilled grass, the splay pattern seed tops. They find a spider, tucked in, patiently waiting to tuck in. It sits perfectly still for a photograph. Brown deer, paused, cashmere. White bobs of buttock flee against the hedged green: leaves