Everything about this poem by Norman MacCaig seems to exist in a summer trance, where sounds become colours and smells become sounds, until the two stags make their stage appearance – and suddenly the dateline is December!
The old alder tree of the little January poem is presumably the old poet himself with his nestfuls of songs. Both pieces come from the wonderful volume of MacCaig’s Poems, edited by his son Ewen, and with introduction by Alan Taylor (Polygon, £25).
LOOKING DOWN ON GLEN CANISP
The summer air is thick, is wads
that muffle the hill burn’s voice
and stifle colours
to their cloudier selves - and
bright enough: the little loch
is the one clear pane
in a stained-glass window.
~
The scent of thyme and bog myrtle
is so thick
one listens for it, as though it might be
a drowsy honey-hum In the heavy air.
~
Even the ravens
have sunk into the sandstone cliffs
of Suilven, that are dazed blue
and fuzz into the air around them -
as my mind does, till I hear
a thin far clatter and
look down to where two stags
canter across the ford, splashing up before them antlers of water.
December 1964
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
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