Dispossession

“See yon bit fairm on the brae-heid
Stracht’s a cock’s caimb?
Craw-wheeled biggins, cauld as leid,
Reid, in the sun’s flame?
Wir fowk aince vrocht yon lan,
Kent ilkie stick an steen,
Dour, dub-dyked parks,
Tod-haunted wid,
Like the back o’ their haun.”

Blawn strae, the bairns’ heids
Face the fairm, sae near, sae far.
Thinkin’t a gey queer mither-spik
That delves in princeless fairy-tales:
Swaps glamourie fur glaur.
Last link, o’ the harness, brukken.

A chiel bedd there, fierce in his faith,
Fechtin a losin fecht, wi the Reaper, daith.
A stinch man, steeped in Holy writ,
Wha thrashed his loon,
For mockin the Lord’s script.
Cried, “Doon the road, ye orra jaad!”
Fin he catched a servin’ lass wi a pleuman lad
Coorse, for a man like yon, in his heicht o’ prime
 Tae be gart leave, turn ower his wife, an wife
 Tae a halfin loon, an a graceless grieve.
Cut doon, afore his time.

It’s ill, tae think deep o’ the deid.
Ghaist claes are hungry thochts
That wid devour ye whyles,
Comin unseen, unsocht.

Lang, in the corbie wid, I daurna staun’,
The win’ plays tricks wi wirds,
Risin chill frae the grun...

“Aa ma tyauve, an care
Gaen ower, till a stranger’s haun.
Ye thankless, thankless, stock:
Gin I kent then, fit I ken noo —
It wis as fur nocht.”

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