Nest of Thistles (Samuel French Morse Poetry Prize)

When did I forget how to plotter, how to be scunnert, how to look for foozle under the bed? When, afraid of sounding twee, did I stop saying wee? Who snatched away douce and douchty? I lost my spurtle, grew too proud to be wabbit, avoided any kind of big stramash. Even when my Libra soul pendulumed alarmingly, I didn't swither. I quarreled with the Bens, sent the burns into exile. Did they creep slowly off, little gray mice looking for another home (no sleek it rodents this side of the pond)? How proper it all became, no screech of pipes, no eight some reels, no raucous ceilidhs, no cailleachs with their thin white hairs and whisperings, no burach spreading out across the floor. Nuala sees her language as a boat, a coracle to launch in the bulrushes and send off to "some Pharaoh's daughter." I saw mine as something like a wart, a fart, a sneeze. And, oh my lost darlings, I run after you now, wrap treacherous arms round you, dust you off, feed you kippers from Loch Fyne and whisky from Islay, then pin you on the page, as witness.