For @Boiledbeetle .
My tutor in second yr at Glasgow Uni was Edwin Morgan.
Midge
The evening is perfect, my sisters.
The loch lies silent, the air is still.
The sun’s last rays linger over the water
and there is a faint smirr, almost a smudge
of summer rain. Sisters, I smell supper,
and what is more perfect than supper?
It is emerging from the wood,
in twos and threes, a dozen in all,
making such a chatter and a clatter
as it reaches the rocky shore,
admiring the arrangements of the light.
See the innocents, my sisters,
the clumsy ones, the laughing ones,
the rolled-up sleeves and the flapping shorts,
there is even a kilt (the god of the midges,
you are good to us!) So gather your forces,
leave your tree trunks, forsake the rushes,
fly up from the sour brown mosses
to the seek flesh of face and forearm.
Think of your eggs. What does the egg need?
Blood, and blood. Blood is what the egg needs.
Our men have done their bit, they’ve gone,
it was all they were good for, poor dears. Now
it is up to us. The egg is quietly screaming
for supper, blood, supper, blood, supper!
Attack, my little Draculas, my Amazons!
Look at those flailing arms and stamping feet.
They’re running, swatting, swearing, oh they’re hopeless.
Keep at them, ladies. This is a feast,
this is a midsummer night’s dream.
Soon we shall all lie down filled and rich,
and lay, and lay, and lay, and lay, and lay.