PORTRAITS OF THE ARTIST (E)

               I

When first I found Africa
Missionaries dared The Dark Continent:
Livingstone, Moffat, Mackay.

Hence I saw slavery;
Africa, a vast stank
The Americas drained.

Powerless I discovered
Cultured tribes
Thirled to the Boer's want.

Here be great beasts
Lazing lions, gangling giraffes
Locust hordes of gnus.

In jungled hills, next
In gentle grandeur
Mountain gorillas stravaiged.

Recently I came on
Brasses from Benin
Bold in their figuration.

"There is all Africa,"
Sir Thomas Browne affirms
“And her prodigies in us”.

              II

Perhaps no great adventures, but we went
Upon the "Claymore" to the Western Isles;
In the old escort timidly we bent
To Applecross for clouded haunting miles.
We stumbled the Five Sisters of Kintail
And saw Skye mountains crag the sunset's glow;
And through your leadership I did not fail
The sgurrs and stucs that loom above Glencoe.

Exploring ethics and philosophy,
Discussing truths of Christianity
And girls we rambled on without an end
Finding that it was good to have a friend.

Till as my Best Man finally you sent your
Old friend upon a more exciting venture.


             III

The Laird's face
Is altogether too big for me;
The mask wobbles on my brow.

The peasant mask
Is broad on my cheeks
Tight on my cranium.

The shepherd's tender smile
Fits my lips
Seldom.

My lines do not yet
Fit the gnarled visage
Of the tramp.

But the poet's mask
Most comfortably
Conforms to me.

Preposterous
For a priest
To hide within a mask.

Thus I attempt to explore
The space
Between the mask and face.