SKARA BRAE, THE ORKNEY ISLANDS
The sea rolls with a hard hand,
a fist of gravel, two waves
of sand, and streaks its way past
like a soaking-wet dog. A small village
has for thousands of years held on tight
like pebbles. Here they fished, multiplied
and drew figures with a sharp flint
while the cattle stood outside lowing all night.
In low, darkness-filled rooms, wall to wall with the sea,
they found room for rows of plates and inside privies.
From a distance the houses look like pretzels, a bagatelle
that disappeared in the breakers long ago.
But the storm rolls with a hard hand,
a fist of gravel, two waves
of sand, an abandoned village returns
after thousands of years when humans
have lived on the mainland without hearing the sea
rushing through the bones. I am standing knee-deep
in the Stone Age, and friends on the phone complain
that the connection is bad, are you without coverage,
they ask concernedly, while fingering nervously
with the vulnerable web we all love.
And I assure them that precisely here the waves
break through the time barrier with wonder and crashing.
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