Nativity poem by George Mackay Brown

George Mackay Brown was a 20th Century Scottish poet who lived in the Orkney Islands. He could make the myth and lore of the Orkneys suddenly gritty and real with one line or image. Here he does that with the birth of Christ. I love the filling-in of the Nativity story, the attentiveness to this unremarkable moment in the lives of the Roman soldier and the innkeeper, and the immense irony of the last line. A 'byre" is a cow shed. The shepherds the innkeeper grumbles at are not drunk, but have gotten word from angels that a savior is born. So they are just excited.

The Lodging

The stones of the desert town
Flush; and, a star-filled wave,
Night steeples down.

From a pub door here and there
A random ribald song
Leaks on the air.

The Roman in a strange land
Broods, wearily leaning
His lance in the sand.

The innkeeper over the fire
Counting his haul, hears not
The cry from the byre;

But rummaging in the till
Grumbles at the drunken shepherds
Dancing on the hill;

And wonders, pale and grudging,
If the strange pair below
Will pay their lodging.
                       -George Mackay Brown