GRUINARD ISLAND
- Feb 14
- 1 min read
By Caroline Anne Pollard
The sky has stolen the sea—thief of its
hue. The sea is bacterium blue. The sky
turns bitter as sloes.
A gaunt tree stands with Wyllie’s spire—
its poverty of leaves grieves.
Coarse gorse and the bilberry stain of
heather. Weather: force-six gales.
Black-headed gulls sing as sirens, their
wings fluttering like lost sails.
Contagious swarms of midges cloud
like black pollen of spores. The island
weeps a brown burn. This seizure of
seawater cannot heal this raw wound.
The molten aurum of a sunset coats the
recurring tide. Flecks of gold filigree
hide the salt crests of waves.
This landscape becomes pure
alchemy—like the alchemy of disease,
that transmutes spirit to matter, the
soul to cells.
An empty boat is tethered to the island
by its mooring rope,
tug-tugging on its umbilical cord to hell.
Like engineered destinies—the spell of
these architects of fate, who dare wear
mock angel feet, in the playgrounds of
where gods meet.