Saturday Poem

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Gone Are The Days
Norman MacCaig

Impossible to call a lamb a lambkinImage_then_and_now

or say eftsoons or spell you ladye.

My shining armour bleeds when it’s scratched;

I blow the nose that’s part of my visor.
…….

When I go pricking o’er the plain

I say Eightpence please to the sad conductress.

The towering landscape you live in has printed

on its portcullis Bed and breakfast.
…….

I don’t regret it. There are wildernesses

enough in Rose Street or the Grassmarket

where dragons’ breaths are methylated

and social workers trap the unwary.
…….

So don’t expect me, lady with no e,

to look at a lamb and feel lambkin

or give me a down look because I bought

my greaves and cuisses at Marks and Spencers.
…….

Pishtushery’s out. But oh, how my heart swells

to see you perched, perjink, on a bar stool.

And though epics are shrunk to epigrams, let me

buy you a love potion, a gin, a double.

….