Nova Scotia Fish Hut
Nova Scotia Fish Hut
1Rain and blown sand, and southwest wind
2Have rubbed these shingles crisp and paper-thin.
3Come in:
4Something has stripped these studding-posts and pinned
5Time to the rafters. Where the woodworm ticked
6Shick shick shick shick
7Steady and secretive, his track is plain:
8The fallen bark is dust; the beams are bare.
9Bare as the bare stone of this open shore,
10This building grey as stone. The filtered sun
11Leaks cold and quiet through it. And the rain,
12The wind, the whispering sand, return to finger
13Its creaking wall, and creak its thuttering door.
14Old, as the shore is. But they use the place.
15Wait if you like: someone will come to find
16A handline or a gutting-knife, or stow
17A coiled net in the loft. Or just to smoke
18And loaf; and swap tomorrow in slow talk;
19And knock his pipe out on a killick-rock
20Someone left lying sixty years ago.
RPO poem Editors
Jim Johnstone
RPO Edition
2015
Special Copyright
Poem used with permission of the Charles Bruce Estate.