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Linda Macdonald

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Slainte

This is exactly how it is -
the mountains arranged just so,
lakes, the colour of old blue glass,
sheet upon sheet.

Here, turquoise rivers race
through such pretty towns; their chalets
draped with geraniums, their gift shops
chiming with cuckoo clocks
where figures dance in circle, hourly,
their punctual trains arriving
at swept railway platforms.
It is good, is it not?

The alpine slopes are a garden of wild flowers;
gentian nodding to harebell,
orchid to anemone - where the tourists,
German, Japanese, American,
come and stroll, look and go
occasionally nodding to each other,
and, incidentally, the cows wear bells.

Of the Swiss - they know precisely
how to extend the correct amount of courtesy.
However, I prefer Scotland;
her fine drizzle, steel-grey windswept lochs,
heathers and evening skies
the colour of whisky,
glass upon glass.

(Slainte - Gaelic: Good Health (pronounced Sian-ji-va)
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