THE HAGGIS HUNT by Ian Thomson

Close by a big fire, our host fried ham and eggs
“Is that your Ayrshire bacon?” “Naw, heatin’ ma legs!”
We ate then we left the pub for the car park
Where our guide, half-wit Hamish loomed out of the dark
With his good wife, Mad Morag - no beauty (in truth
Some called her Juanita - she’d only one tooth).

Assault with intent
To kill this mind
Ransacked memories
Obliterated dreams
Till nothing is left
But a void

Lulled into
A transient state
Then lurking
Waiting to attack

Still the voices
That cry out for help
Till there is
No conscience thought

Meaningless scraps
Are left in the dust
To be swept away
Through the canyon
That was once
A mind

i gather my sticks and stones
beat around the bush
facing East, then West
bow three times

scrape my knees on the doorstep of persuasion
the attic filled with cobwebbed intrusions of domesticity
but nothing seems out of place,
my basement leaks with water under the foundation
and the walls shout with time cracking through the lifted iris
you purr like a selfish house cat, smug and twitching his whiskers
with pensive appetite,

I didn't know I was waiting.
With no idea I was looking for anything
I quietly put my heart away
not missing it or its needs.
I closed the door happily.
Life continued pleasently for me.
Satisfied and content
I did not see these as lies.
The day I let you in I was
swept away.
On a wild tide of swirling
illogical emotions;
I was dragged from the saftey of shore.
Cast adrift in a turbulent storm
of pent up desires

lonesome tough
low
gritty growls
laconic as a bad ass movie star
arrogant

slinky

women stare
all over him
he's got it down
cold
a one man rat pack
on the make
'til the call of the road
takes over his soul

something he often regrets
but the lonesome tough
don't do duets

A sparrow lands
upon a sycamore branch
with fluttering of wings

The tree moves
with the slightest
unseen effort

sparrow jets away
returning landing
on another branch

The leaves follow
the progression of light
with ease

The universe has choreographed
The two contrasting movements
Into a dance

am I the attentive audience?

Five miles down a switch back gravel road
running along a Blue Ridge mountain back
hemlocks,laurels and white oak trees
provide shade for Oconee bells and ferns

Down below, a muted murmur
of a small river not too far
as crickets tell the temperature
and ruffed grouse dully drum

Dim path descends as in a cave
of gray stalactites and emerald ceiling
with soft mossy carpet
a silent passage

That night in your old car,
the bench seat ideal
for our closeness,
the summer warm,
humid enough to beat
the air conditioner
into a whine
of futility and sweat
I asked you
what you wanted to do
in life.

I didn't understand
your hesitation,
that painful look of
desperation,
the thick defeat
that came between us
when I asked.

"Lone Mortality"

arrogant dark Rooks cawing

from their shadowy haven

come to me unbidden

black-cloaked in shiny silken death

I pick up the trail of blood

carried fresh on the

intermittent nocturnal breeze

for one brief moment I am

powerless beneath fevered shadows

I am prone and pinned

To secret prophecies..
.
intolerable and unforgiving!

you came undone
when you done me wrong
your tongue hard with words
that shaped your face
with lack of grace

twisted, snarling angry dog
never to lie down near the Master,
head to heel and heel to heart
crushing wild
the red rose its thorns
growing on your head
into circles of home-bound grass