HUGH MACDIARMID.

One of my favorite poets is Hugh MacDiarmid, a Scotsman of violently clashing ideas (both a staunch Communist and a rabid Scots Nationalist) and undeniable poetic genius that shines through the artificial but convincing Lallans dialect in which he chose to write his earliest (and best) poems. Herewith "The Eemis Stane" ('the unsteady stone'), from Sangschaw (1925); how(e)-dumb-deid is 'depth, darkest point,' hairst is 'harvest,' lift 'sky,' yowdendrift 'blizzard,' fug 'moss,' hazelraw 'lichen,' and yirdit 'buried'—the rest shouldn't be too difficult. Listen to it.

I' the how-dumb-deid o' the cauld hairst nicht
The warl' like an eemis stane
Wags i' the lift;
An' my eerie memories fa'
Like a yowdendrift.

Like a yowdendrift so's I couldna read
The words cut oot i' the stane
Had the fug o' fame
An' history's hazelraw
No' yirdit thaim.

Poetry update: I won't make this a separate entry, but there's a wonderful poem called "Mordred" by John Ashbery (who gets better every year -- I never used to like him much) in the Sept. 26 NYRB (you have to pay to get the poem, but the table of contents may help locate it for people who have the issue); it includes lines like "I was preternaturally wise/ but it was spring, there was no one to care or do./ It was spring and the sprinklers were on" and "But I do, I said. Then, well, it's like a clearing/ in the darkness that you can't see. Darkness is meant for all of us./ We grow used to it," but I'm really citing it for the last line, the new motto of the Hats page: "Oh yes well it is important to have a hat."

Posted by languagehat at October 7, 2002 10:53 PM