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Slate

Edwin Morgan

There is no beginning. We saw Lewis
laid down, when there was not much but thunder
and volcanic fires; watched long seas plunder
faults; laughed as Staffa cooled. Drumlins blue as
bruises were grated off like nutmegs; bens,
and a great glen, gave a rough back we like
to think the ages must streak, surely strike,
seldom stroke, but raised and shaken, with tens
of thousands of rains, blizzards, sea-poundings
shouldered off into night and memory.
Memory of men! That was to come. Great
in their empty hunger these surroundings
threw walls to the sky, the sorry glory
of a rainbow. Their heels kicked flint, chalk, slate.


Edwin Morgan

From Sonnets from Scotland (Mariscat Press, 1984).
Also published in Collected Poems (Carcanet, 1990).

 

Reproduced by permission of the publisher, Carcanet Press.

Tags:

geology sonnets stone traces Western Isles
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Edwin Morgan1920 - 2010

Morgan was Glasgow's first Poet Laureate 1999-2002, and the first to hold the post of Scots Makar, created by the Scottish Executive in 2004 to recognise the achievement of Scottish poets throughout the centuries.
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