A Scottish Six-Pack of Sonnets
by John Kendall Hawkins
Paint me a cavernous waste shore
Cast in the unstilled Cyclades,
Paint me the bold anfractuous rocks
Faced by the snarled and yelping seas.
- T.S. Eliot, "Sweeney Erect"
.
The Outer Hebrides
We're descending into the mad gales of Lewis,
and I'm terrified of the plane's sideways approach --
cross winds out of the big mouths of bickering gods --
I'd pray, but can't, so seek succor in the odds,
a tactic not supported by the trembling coach,
but then we land, and the gods stop dissing through us.
Welcome to the Hebrides! I'm here for twelve weeks
of recovery, relief, and to do some writing,
coming from Austraya, another far-flung place.
Stornoway was found and settled by the Viking race,
and I find its quaint isolation inviting;
I look forward to narrative editorial tweaks.
I didn't bring my Lonely Planet guide this time,
as I wanted to be surprised by this new clime.
Habost: The Cottage
In my stone cottage digs I heat by peat,
after a morning bagging fresh cuts in the bogs.
I'm stocked up on coffee and wine, staples for slogs,
fuel and reward for my new pig beat --
twice per day up and down the croft in the red quad,
through sleet and rain and raging blows of wind,
I bring feed to the swine, mud up to my mind,
sloshing, freezing, angry at reinvented God.
On TV one night the old classic "M"
sees Peter Lorre before a kangaroo court
full of the sid vicious pathological sort.
It's an old classic Janus film gem.
Fat Rosie was goaded up and taken away,
and became a delicious dinner on Sunday.
In Stornoway for a Beer
Twice a week I bussed into Stornoway
to shop and to escape the drudge and cold
of my new lifestyle with the pigs and peat.
I'd bring a book, or writing pad, and take a seat
at the Crown Inn, where a cute Gaelic-speaking scold
guaranteed my trips to town would be a mainstay.
Too often Enya was in the airwaves. I'd drift
into her ethereal Celtic fantasy swoon
and got no writing done; the Gaelic girl once smiled,
but it was at some glad 'lad' behind me, riled
at 'God' knows what, but I had to leave soon,
right around the time Gaelic went off-shift.
It was a lonely trip back to Habost:
I missed how she walked, walked away the most.
On the Road to Edinburgh
The ferry across to Ullapool was rough-edged,
and I am always queasy on the open sea,
and wished I'd had some dramamine with me.
My head swirled and my full stomach felt dredged.
From Ullapool to Inverness by car's a trip,
crossing the Highlands thinking of Dylan, of Yeats --
eye out for the Lake Isle; "the bee-loud glade" waits
like some lost chord heard only by the honeyed hip.
Edinburgh Castle conjures up war and freedom --
Mel Gibson's kilt up and sweet bum out in the breeze;
angry Scotty; angus burgers at Mickey D's
as tasty-tough as Ganoderma lucidum.
The flat I stayed at had a graveyard down below:
I would spend hours watching the old flowers grow.
In Sherwood Forest Lost and Found
At the mindfulness conference smack dab in the woods,
where Hood and Little John once came to loggerheads,
wits, sages, and burn-outs joined other walking deads
to celebrate their resilience. And what foods!
Some old hippy went on, at taxpayer expense,
about priest-rape, evils of the norm, and we clapped --
haunted, lit up jack-o-lanterns, our empathy tapped
for hours on end. And the smorgasbord was immense.
I don't know. I have been to enough of these things
to know they do no lasting harm and may inspire
some tard to sift through child trauma for his lost fire,
a two-faced hero from Fellowship of the Rings.
I'm harsh. What did I expect -- Titicut Follies?
Instead, we got "He Ain't Heavy" by The Hollies.
The Return to Oz
Back in Habost, I packed my bags and memories --
death-row pigs I'd come to know (and eat), and the girl
from Stornoway, sweet and sour to the eyes of this churl,
overflown, let's say, with bonny effemmaries.
Didn't get much writing done. I was false, it's true,
to my desires, at cross purposes with my needs,
got sh*t-faced too often, disavowed all my creeds,
froze my ass off, but, by Christ, found ways to get through.
At a happy church group meeting before I left
locals displayed the Gladness of being alive
and welcomed me, this gloomy stranger, to the hive.
Then, I flew out of Stornoway, lost, feeling effed.
I returned to Oz, a rehabbed flying monkey,
like some astral projecting, late sixties' junkie.
(Article changed on Dec 19, 2021 at 1:37 AM EST)
