Pirrins And Magnus (7 English Poems Of Surveillance, Cats, Blueberries) Poem by Sheena Blackhall

1.Ever Watchful

The city surveillance cameras never sleep
Like the God of my fathers, they are ever watchful
Their screens, like the multifaceted eyes of a fly
Miss nothing

The shoplifter, the car jacker
The mugger, hoodie and vandal
The brawl that’s brews outside a downtown pub
Boozers, bruisers and bouncers
A heavy mix

In the city’s surveillance centre
The human overseers have honed in on the doorway
Of a shop, where a girl is currently losing her virginity

Oblivious to the back up tape, someone will replay at leisure
Again, again, again


2.How Late it Was

How late it was, how late!
When they opened the Pandora’s Box
Of Caledonia, and out popped
Cone Gatherers, a Pest Maiden,
Scar Culture, Filth,
Some dead souls.

Such things get under your skin
Like sounds in a dumb house

Shutters are closed on the witch wood
Where nightmares brew like poison
In a wasp factory

How late it was, how late!


3.Old Crock
An old crock muddles her words,
Sour breathed, through greasy teeth
Her veins are thick as rhubarb stalks

A rainbow shimmers over the dunghill
Of her mind, produces an arch smile

She speaks to the windows, the street,
The passing shop. They are her silent audience

Her stars at night are bright as coffin nails
Days propel her towards the grassy mound
Of moles and the feathery roots of flowers and trees


4.There is Another Xmas

There is another Xmas
Where broken homes and street
Are piled in cairns of rubble
Where death and horror meet

There is another Xmas
No tills ring in the cheer
Where vultures perch on cradles
And every town’s a bier

There is another Xmas
Where war, disease or flood
Ravage the population
Stain earth with children’s blood

There is no Xmas Angel
To feed the dispossessed
To pour out milk and honey
To share the turkey breast

No Wise Men to bring comfort
With blessings all around
Just aid that comes belated
To corpses on the ground


5.Blaeberry

Scots blaeberry,
Norwegian blåbær.
French myrtille
North America bleuet
Medicine in a sphere
Of midnight purple

Abbess Heldegard of Bingen
Hieronymus Bock, the German herbalist;
Treated bladder & liver ills
With this most versatile of fruits
Peat bred, blue blood drops
Of wizard juice

Across the Middles Ages,
Blaeberry, fruit of the heather,
Cured dysentery, hemorrhoids, scurvy

Nibbled by deer and the quick red squirrel
Watered by mist
And the soft Highland rains of Scotland
Its leaves helped diabetes,
Infected eyes and burns

It is a scatter of jet beads
At the emerald roots of ferns
The scraggy roots of heath

It was efficacious
When cunning women,
Shamen, were our chemists


6.The Ungrateful Cat

My cat Rascal scratched and pounced
Until I punched his nose. He bounced
But learned, to bite the hand that feeds
May give ungrateful cats nosebleeds


7.Highland Cow

The cello slits on her nose release a melodious moo.
Her copper pelt is soft as a maidenhair.
Spittle sits in the silky folds of her mouth,
Like seeds of milky dew.

Through the heavy fringe at her eyes
A bovine Boadicea, horned and hairy
She watches me, unblinking,
Turns the rump of her rudder
Snorts and leaves, ponderous as a liner
Slipping out of a narrow harbour
The brown towe of her tail
Swinging medallions of dung.