Leaving Bass Rock gannet colony
After skypointing to show
it’s ready
after one last dive, shorting the sea
(the crack, the pressured current fizzing)
after one last moment of great aloneness: a fleck
in oceans
after the last fish in its gut –
the fin and skin and bone of it – tears apart
it takes a final flight, blowing
Bass Rock into the feathery pieces we call
aura or
atoms we called
father or
Adam
©Lynn Davidson
This poem was was published in New Writing Scotland 35. Bass Rock is a rock/island in the Firth of Forth. It’s a huge gannet colony and has a long and interesting history of human habitation too.
Lynn Davidson writes poetry, fiction and essays. Her latest poetry collection Islander will be published by Shearsman Books and Victoria University Press in 2019. Lynn currently lives in Edinburgh.