Landscape without Reiver
Put in Carlisle and Langholm and fill with solid
egg tempura. Leave out the dull spool of firth.
Put in lines drawn in the sand-fells. Leave out
bastle-houses built of logs and salt, safe-for-now
steads.
Put in pointillist sheep and sprig of gorse,
leave out another country’s national flower.
Put in farm-labourers like in Bruegel’s famous
The Harvesters, leave out problem clans:
Armstrongs, and Laidlaws, and Scotts.
Put in
vanishing lines, disappear through a peep-hole
to Scotland. Crop at the edges, and hang
in frame of makeshift gilt. Leave out to dry.
First published in ASH
Put in Carlisle and Langholm and fill with solid
egg tempura. Leave out the dull spool of firth.
Put in lines drawn in the sand-fells. Leave out
bastle-houses built of logs and salt, safe-for-now
steads.
Put in pointillist sheep and sprig of gorse,
leave out another country’s national flower.
Put in farm-labourers like in Bruegel’s famous
The Harvesters, leave out problem clans:
Armstrongs, and Laidlaws, and Scotts.
Put in
vanishing lines, disappear through a peep-hole
to Scotland. Crop at the edges, and hang
in frame of makeshift gilt. Leave out to dry.
First published in ASH