Intrusion

Seagulls sound like Bartok.
Lying awake all night
Beside the loch
I hear them crying, crying
I am, I am, I am,
All ignorant of time
Except as appetite,
Clamouring on two notes,
Filling the summer night
With self-assertion:
I am, I am, I am.

By this deserted shore
Somebody built a house.
It stands forsaken.
Decrepit furniture
Rots to dust in the byre.
Nettles grow undeterred.
The roe deer of the wood
Hide among birch and bracken
And graze up to the door.
As if someone had spoken
Or would speak,
As if the shaken leaves
Mirrored in windows still unbroken
Exposed quick movement
Of someone stepping back,
Always one seems to wait
For something waiting.
Nobody comes, ever.
All ignorant of time
The nesting herons,
The porpoise and the seal
Pursue their simple slaughter.
The ribs of an old boat
Whiten in shallow water.
I die, therefore I am.

Night music. Bartok.
Images of the town,
The loneliness of cities
When the crowds go down
Into the depths of sleep
In darkened houses,
When from lit factories
Metallic noises
Tell of night passing,
Not as one chooses.

This night flows with the tide.
Body and mind go still,
Drifting apart,
Moored shadows. Time
Has a timeless sound,
All the surrounding world
Crying and crying
I am, I am, I am
With alien voices.