Countryside's revenge

Nights are drawing in. It's almost 7.30 and yet it's still dark outside. Frost covers roads, hedges and lawn.
An absence of birds-no trilling of thrush,
only the blackbird and crow now dominate the landscape
picking at the soil like death picking up souls. An absence of
mice, hedgehogs and squirrels now, only the
new dominance of foxes prowling through the
streets like tiny conquerors, new invaders
from the countryside, undeterred by human-presence,
despising our familiarity.
Cats tread warily around this triumphant rival, providing
merely food for thought.