AS official winter begins, here from Kathleen Jamie is a reminder of spring birdsong from her new collection, which offers her visionary response to her native Scotland throughout the seasons of last year, “a year of tremendous energy.” (Extracted from The Bonniest Companie, published by Picador, at £9.99. Copyright © Kathleen Jamie, 2015.)
MERLE
Thon blackbird in the briar
by the outfield dyke
doesn’t know he’s born
doesn’t know he’s praise and part
of this Sabbath forenoon
north-Atlantic style.
From his yellow beak his song descends
to the year’s first celandines;
his throat patters. With a yellow claw
he scarts his left lug.
Soon the haar will burn off
revealing the Rum Cuillin
happed in March snow, and the waters of the Minch
but for now the blackie’s
the centre of the world’s eye
- till there! He’s flown.
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