Poem
I walk at the land’s edge,
turning in my mind
a private predicament.
Today the sea is indigo.
Thirty years an adult –
same mind, same
ridiculous quandaries –
but every time the sea
appears differently: today
a tumultuous dream,
flinging its waves ashore –
Nothing resolved,
I tread back over the moor
– but every time the moor
appears differently: this evening,
tufts of bog-cotton
unbutton themselves in the wind
– and then comes the road
so wearily familiar
the old shining road
that leads everywhere
About this poem
This poem was included in Best Scottish Poems 2009. Best Scottish Poems is an online publication, consisting of 20 poems chosen by a different editor each year, with comments by the editor and poets. It provides a personal overview of a year of Scottish poetry. The editor in 2009 was Andrew Greig.
Editor’s comment:
Apparently casual, as though in quiet, intimate conversation both with the reader and itself, ‘Poem’ wanders by the sea, across the moor, and then emerges somewhere simple, unexpected, inevitable. I love Kathleen Jamie’s characteristic vowel sound patterning here. I love the tact, the directness and the glow that develops after the poem has set. No fuss, no posturing, no self-admiration, just what it is. I’m suddenly reminded of MacCaig’s poetry – the apparent simplicity, the depth.
