Poems

By Dave Goulder The upper echelons of Rosehall Society in 1977 were dominated by military retirees here to ply the fishing in Sutherland's rivers, and to this observer they seemed to bear a remarkable similarity to the wading birds of the area. A broadsheet of the verse was

By Dave Goulder
 A fierce winter;
 the coldest for many years.
 Here in the village
 the air hurts.
 It is minus 27C.
 Wrens are crammed into an old hamster box
 Under the eaves
 of the lean-to.
 They are shuffling constantly.
 In the morning
 taking out the ashes, I find
 eleven

By Dave Goulder
 A ragged flag
 on a rock or wreck, anything
 that pierces the surf
 from below
 allowing a hold for flat
 flappy feet
 to grip. Wet wings in
 a watery wind stretch
 and dry a little.
 Gaze around to take
 in the view of others, absorbed in the

By Dave Goulder Dear Sir,
 Please help.
 The enclosed photograph
 is of my hybrid MZ/BMX/water power off-roader.
 Light to handle, economic, comfortable, spirited 
 medium heavy-loader, BUT
 It will not start. I warm the water to stimulate the flow
 the vapour fogs my eyes
 but no; the brute is

By Dave Goulder
 At the river you can smell this autumn afternoon.
 Colours cloak the banks with trees, 
 grasses, ferns and fading bracken strewn
 around a brace of bright blobs–
 one red, one yellow and each staring into the sky
 at an object moving up, then sideways
 dropping down to

By Dave Goulder

 Ten of them, squat
 at the road edge, wide-eyed
 to the approaching car,
 each behind the other, reflecting
 headlights.
 Rural cats-eyes marking
 the long single track,
 Loubcroy to Elphin, carving
 high moorland
 recently ploughed, planted.
 Dwarf pines, inches high,
 good hunting for a while,
 half an owl