The Fishermen’s Farewell

Their long stares mark them apart; eyes gone
to sea-colours: grey, foam-flecked

and black in the undertow, blue
as the blue banners of the mackerel, whipping west.

On land, they are smoke-walkers, where each stone
is a standing stone, every circle a stone circle.

They would be rumour if they could, in this frozen
landscape like a stopped sea, from the great stone keels

of Callanish to the walls of Dunnottar and Drum.
They would be less even than rumour:

to be ocean-stealers, to never throw a shadow –
to dream the blank horizon and dread the sight of land.

The drink storms through these men, uncompasses
them, till they’re all at sea again.

Their houses, heeled over in the sand:
each ruin now a cairn for kites.

And down by the quay
past empty pots, unmended nets and boats:

this tiny bar, where men sleep upright
in their own element, as seals.