Granite stream

It was a sanctuary for me;
Broad valley frizzed with trees
Under the gaze of granite hills,
Serene and cool.

The river wide and self-assured,
Yet intricately wrought with rock and
Stepping stones and secret pools.

Water smooth as crystal murmured
Stories as it flowed.
I listened to the narrative unfold,
Tales of storm and rain and rocks
And hills immeasurably old.

Pure air, pure water,
Washing the restless mind:
Contagious purity of earth and sky,
Trickling to the inner depths
Where faith is old and dry.

In the tingling of a moment
the inner scabs and scars all melt away,
The role-plays and pretences cease
And as they do, the compass of emotion creeps
From stress to peace.

I watch my boy collect pebbles,
Fishing pools for giant eggs of pink and grey.
And from the songs he softly sings
I guess he also feels this way.


(c) A Mc N

Castle of the dogs

(c) A Mc N

Castle of the Dogs on the Morven peninsula, Scotland.

By torchlight

By torchlight
the drift of drizzle
Is a fine feathering of magic;
A dusting of cloudflakes,
Fine as flour
And light as liquid snow.

I watch the wind made visible
By twists and turns of droplets,
Shining like planets,
Flocking like tiny birds,
As the torch illuminates
The soft, dark underbelly of the night.


(c) A Mc N

Stars in my hair

I lay on my back on the dark, dew-slicked grass,
and gazed at the gaps between the stars.

But when I raised my binoculars
to the empty spaces
they had filled with a twinkling of lights
swarming like bright bees
in the black circles of vision.

But even in this swarm
lay darknesses between the lights
so I took a telescope to study
the little gaps between
the little stars.

But when I looked,
even the little gaps brimmed with tiny stars and the
fuzzy smudge of galaxies.

The more I stared,
the more the darkness wasn't there,
the velvet black
merely a diminution
of the light
between the brighter stars.

I lay pondering,
and fell asleep with stars in my hair,
feathering my face with light
and my dreams
with wondering.

(c) A Mc N

Fuinary spit buoy by sunset

(c) A Mc N
It was shortly after taking this image that I realised the strange noise
in the water was 3 porpoises lazily passing my kayak.

Neaps and springs

For ten days
I lived a mere stone's skipping from the salted sea.

I slept to it's murmuring,
woke to it's gulls crying,
And watched it's tides rise and fall.

Gently it caught me in it's rhythms.
Waves lullabied my sleep by night and
By day I counted time by tides.

Like a growing self consciousness
I became aware
Of the moon's slow dancing through the days and nights,
Spinning out and in from full to crescent,
Crescent to full,
While the wide waters surged and sighed
Like a slow drum beating.

I began to measure my life by the rise and fall of the ocean's breath.
Highs and lows, neaps and springs
Gave a finer audit of my days than the cruder count of seasons.

Even now, when my cluttered thoughts clamour for attention
And a long tangle of responsibilities
Wraps me in a paralysing web,
Something in me softly sings
'Highs and lows, neaps and springs'.


(c) A McN