"Iona Lambs"
Ruth Tittensor
Bewildered Yowe
On rough, high rock, head uplifted
Calling to the unresponsive cool air
Calling, crying, screeching to her baby
Only four months since birth on this saintly island.
Bereft Yowe
Searching, scanning this lamb-void land
With other yowes all calling, crying, screeching.
Their lambs are gone, all gone, all penned
In subdued, bewildered, stone-quiet helplessness.
Ready Lorry. Red Lorry stands at harbour slip,
Red, hollow, empty, cold, unwelcoming.
Awaiting its unknowing, now-orphaned cargo,
Three slits along the side for one last look at island home.
“The men are very good you know, they do their job well”.
Lambs to lorry at harbour, by ferry, on sea,
To trailer, by road, on sea again, by road again
To Stirling Market, to far abbatoir –
Call it Slaughterhouse;
Or to ‘finish’ in someone else’s field . . .
Far from the sweet, floriferous machair
Of your quiet, saintly birthplace,
I thank you for your short, unselfish life
So we can eat and thrive. Thank you.
Thank yowe too for your plump lamb.
In dark the crying stopped, in light began again.
But soon it will be tupping time, and
Another lamb or lambs,
An outdoor production line of two centuries
So we can eat and thrive.
“Their short lives were very, very good”
On heathery bogs and tasty, flowery machair
And rocky grasslands of this religious place.
But “It’s all downhill, steep downhill, from here”
To our tables . . .
Isle of Iona
August, Every August |
|
Please click on the images below to view large:
PHOTOS: Andrew Tittensor, Ayrshire Rivers Trust,
Richard Marriott, Ruth Tittensor, Susan Anderson |
