ICELAND

ICELAND

ICELAND

At night I hear, faintly, the up-gush
of muddy geysers; the distant \'pop\'
of a finger expertly flicked
from inside the cheek, and the creak
of summer icebergs, drifting
a centimetre a week.

Blocking a draughty window,
there it is again, an article on
Icelandic farmers who, in bleak
winters must chip off the frozen
beards of their cattle to prevent them
from hurting each other.

And by day there is no escape either.
There is Old Icelandic to master
and sagas to digest in chilly bedrooms,
like The Voyage of Snedda, who
fathered a child in every village
in the country and could eat a whole
musk-ox without ruining his appetite.