Holy Cows

Holy cows chew the cud and patiently wait

in fields until we pass and praise them for being there.

I puzzle over the uncontrolable urge to say 'cows'

when cows, through no particular magic, just appear.

Who began the ritual recognition call?

I feel it was Tony Hancock on some long ago 

interminable sitcom episode,

passing from one dreary Home Counties corner

to another.

The early 1950s (rationing and all) could only be enlivenened

by seeing the most sedentary farm animals by chance.

But why not, blessed among the species be the bovines,

the saintly strength of bulls, the eternally patient cows

that stand madonna serene in the muddy mess 

of Britain's embattled fields?

Let us continue to announce 'cows' when we see them

in a vision through journeyed windows,

and let saying it be our mantra, our one word hope

for better from the place we started from or are going to.

Say 'cows' as a one word prayer for better times,

the farmyard mantra better for British souls

than a hundred chanting llamas

or meditating on the mundanity

of eternal bliss.