Storm Petrel

Mousa, Shetland

by Martin Malone

Come back in Summer,
be here at nightfall,
put your ear to the
broch and listen as
the twittering mis-
fires of a thousand
tiny engines ig-
nite the wall with tales
of the ocean and
a life on the wing
flitting home to its
solitary egg.
In eight weeks they’re gone:
birds of bad omen,
souls of lost sailors,
Mother Carey’s Chicken.
Come, put your ear to
the broch and listen.