Now is Come a Darker Day

I have hope to live, and am prepared to die.
(William Shakespeare, Measure for Measure)

Our fur aflame with reckless blaze
Of sunset; yet, unseeing, gaze
These kittens; we who combed our ears
Atop these hills, ere hazy fears
Had clouded minds. Where is our will
To run? To dig? Yet lingers still
A hope, if we can only give
The rabbits' great injunction: "Live!"

This poem was my entry for the January 2004 Furtopia Poetry Contest. Anyone who knows the meaning of the word "tharn" ought to be able to grasp the underlying idea, although there is of course more to the poem than that.