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Immortality It’s said the old of Largs and Ayr Believe the sea has no bottom. Fish fly in liquid air And the dead never come When they’re invited. Mere Wisdom is one of those fish, Evading the nets of belief, queer Crab traps of ideology, It feeds on the bottom not there. Somehow walks on air and wish. What would we lose, lost most, If time had no end for Ayr’s sad eyes? Respect for life? For mice and men? No difference between shit and flies. What would sing the angelic host? Have they eaten? And having eaten Shat. Did they do that? Or are both Holes sealed with wax, hot and pungent Frankincense. Do they breathe an oath To pleasant boast, ignore the beaten? Somehow I wonder what wisdom Would wear if we forget the ends we fear. If naked truth should show our Hearts to be of hate, courage less care, What have we gained if death is undone? Yet in a mystery more hidden than Underwear and glass eyes, our having been, Now, shouts with the obvious But it is seldom heard, more rarely seen. Ordinary ones open a common tuna can! Immortality? The cheapest trinket Sold to pilgrims, with no production costs, Nor taxes on. Better than a piece of cross Taken when dark skies boiled with that loss. When all the time we always had it. |
Additional Notes:
Largs and Ayr are small towns in Ayrshire, just south of Glasgow, Scotland, on the coast. Ayr was also the home of Robbie Burns the poet of "mice and men", one of the most beloved poets of all times and in a sense an immortal. This is not an easy poem to understand but with a little work you can figure it out. The most difficult line to understand is "Ordinary ones open a common tuna can!". To understand it all you really need to do is pay attention to the words "ordinary" and "common". And then, perhaps, the obvious that is right in front of you will be seen. The simplist understand is the correct one. I did enjoy the image of the tuna can though to tie back to the fish.
Unrelated to the meaning of the poem or its understanding is that my ancestors came from Ayrshire.
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