NORMAN MacCaig combines his usual acute observation with a touch of characteristic whimsy in this bird portrait from his superb posthumous volume of Poems, edited by his son Ewen and published by Polygon.
The piece is dated October 1972.
RINGED PLOVER BY A WATER'S EDGE
They sprint eight feet and -
stop. Like that. They
sprintayard (like that) and
stop.
They have no acceleration
and no brakes.
Top speed's their only one.
They're alive - put life
through a burning-glass, they're
its focus - but they share
the world of delicate clockwork.
In spasmodic
Indian file
they parallel the parallel ripples.
When they stop
they, suddenly,
are gravel.
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