Beyond the wit of scholars

Running rest-day ...

... had a bit of an oriental poetry theme a few months ago; well - bit of a Scottish poetry theme coming up for the next few days ;-)

Amongst my ever-expanding poetry collection, I've got quite a few volumes that aren't strictly poetry, but about poetry - in one way or another!

This pictured volume, is a collection of portraits of Scottish writers (published in 1985), and I really like the picture of Norman MacCaig on the front-cover ... within the book, the picture is accompanied by this MacCaig poem:


By the Graveyard, Luskentyre

From behind the wall death sends out messages
That all mean the same, that are easy to understand.

But who can interpret the blue-green waves
That never stop talking, shouting, wheedling?

Messages everywhere. Scholars, I plead with you,
Where are your dictionaries of the wind, the grasses?

Four larks are singing in a showering sprinkle
Their bright testaments: in a foreign language.

And always the beach is oghamed and cunieformed
By knot and dunlin and country-dancing sandpipers.

There's Donnie's lugsail. He's off to the lobsters.
The mast tilts to the north, the boat sails west.

A dictionary of him? - Can you imagine it? -
A volume thick as the height of the Clisham,

A volume big as the whole of Harris,
A volume beyond the wit of scholars.

---

Norman MacCaig, October 1983