Toad in the Hole

Yesterday the house started to shake and there was a terrific thumping coming from the front. I opened our front door to find Matt, my landlady's boyfriend, surrounded by plants and bags of fresh dirt digging and rattling about in the flower (or rather weed as it has been up until now) bed.

The thumping mystery explained I gave him a cold drink and he explained that he had to take out the big cinder blocks that are in the bed to make way for dirt - after all how many plants can grow primarily on cinder blocks (lichen takes a while!!). He then told me that every time he took out a cinder block he would find a toad living in it. We both agreed this is a bit bizarre. When I saw him later on that night at the bar, he told Dazza and I that one of neighbours claims that the abundance of toads means that someone who lives in the house must be a witch. That means either our next door neighbour who is a Tulane grad student or Dazza or myself.

We do have second sight that runs in our family but "witch" that's bizarre. I do seem to attract toads - see my post from Miami (although I mistakenly called it a frog..). Maybe I need a voodoo consultation.

My favourite poet also had a thing for toads:

Toad

Stop looking like a purse. How could a purse
squeeze under the rickety door and sit,
full of satisfaction, in a man's house?

You clamber towards me on your four corners —
right hand, left foot, left hand, right foot.

I love you for being a toad,
for crawling like a Japanese wrestler,
and for not being frightened.

I put you in my purse hand, not shutting it,
and set you down outside directly under
every star.

A jewel in your head? Toad,
you've put one in mine,
a tiny radiance in a dark place.

By Norman MacCaig