With its hen staring at nothing and its wobbling line of ducks, today’s main poem is understandably one of Norman MacCaig’s most popular, though as the last verse hints there is a metaphysical twist to his enjoyment of nature.

The tiny second poem may act as a philosophical postscript. Curiously, both poems were written in the heart of winter. They can be found in the splendid compendium, The Poems of Norman MacCaig, edited by his son Ewen (Polygon, £25, hardback). 

SUMMER FARM

Straw like tame lightnings lie about the grass
And hang zigzag on hedges. Green as glass
The water in the horse-trough shines.
Nine ducks go wobbling by in two straight lines.

A hen stares at nothing with one eye,
Then picks it up. Out of an empty sky
A swallow falls and, flickering through
The barn, dives up again into the dizzy blue.

I lie, not thinking, in the cool, soft grass,
Afraid of where a thought might take me – as
This grasshopper with plated face
Unfolds his legs and finds himself in space.

Self under self, a pile of selves I stand
Threaded on time, and with metaphysic hand
Lift the farm like a lid and see
Farm within farm, and in the centre, me.
January 1953

OLD POET

The alder tree
shrivelled by the salt wind
has lived so long
it has carried and sheltered
its own weight 
of nests.
January 1965