The History of Fog

The History of Fog

The History of Fog

Nothing bothers the man who observes
the weather in Clew Bay,
the squalls, the lacquered haze.
The quick sketch he makes
is of seacliff, rockface, sky so low it touches
the turf-meadow, the white gables.

They live on a faultline.
The people who know the history of fog,
whose tracks remain under the reek
and close to the duach.
Sea-hunters, bog-cutters,
those who lit the beacon for the lost

armada of musket men.
In the country of apparitions
a little gust becomes a gale
commodious enough to lift up
and carry away the Céide Fields
and famine village harboured in the glen.