Algy settled himself on a bed of last season’s wild iris leaves, beside the burn which runs round the sand dunes to the beach, but he found it hard to concentrate on his reading. The constant trickling sounds of the burn were so soothing (audio post below) …
On Christmas morning Algy got up early to wish everyone peace and joy on Christmas Day. To his special friends around the world he says Happy Christmas! Hyvää joulua! Boldog karácsonyt! Joyeux Noël! Feliz Navidad! Happy Krismas! Feliz Natal! Счастливого Рождества! Buon Natale! Veselé vánoce! Gleðileg jól! May your days be merry and bright! XXX
The wild west wind was relentless. Algy had a wee bit of bother trying to maintain his sangfroid …
The wind changed, and the rain cleared to bring a beautiful, calm October day. Algy flew into a cherry tree, and spent a peaceful morning watching the breeze ripple through the autumn leaves in gentle rhythms of colour and light.
O hushed October morning mild,
Thy leaves have ripened to the fall;
Tomorrow’s wind, if it be wild,
Should waste them all.
The crows above the forest call;
Tomorrow they may form and go.
O hushed October morning mild,
Begin the hours of this day slow.
Make the day seem to us less brief.
[From the poem October by Robert Frost.]
The West Highland rain kept falling, but Algy followed Keats’ advice and opened wide his mind’s cage door. Up into the clouds he soared, and roamed happily around the October sky on the bowsprit of a sky yacht with sails the colour of autumn leaves.
Reclining quietly by the edge of the loch at the end of a busy day, Algy could hear faint snatches of the loch monster’s song, as it roamed the watery depths. It sounded very much like the song of the Loch Ness monster:
Hovoplodok – doplodovok – plovodokot – doplodokosh?
Splgraw fok fok splgrafhatchgabrlgabrl fok splfok!
[Perhaps you may not hear the monster singing in Algy’s loch, but you can read the full text and listen to an audio recording of The Loch Ness Monster’s Song performed by the poet Edwin Morgan himself.]
The hill was on fire again, for the third time this Spring, but this time it was burning ferociously. Algy kept watch through the night, while the firefighters beat their way stoically across the other side of the steep ridge.
The fire was so fierce,
So red, so gray, so yellow
That, along with the land,
It burned part of the sky
Which stayed black in that corner
For years
[From A Small Story about the Sky by Alberto Ríos.]
The sky cleared as darkness fell. Algy took flight in the cold night air, and marvelled at the universe.
[As Algy discovered, you may have to watch and wait to see a shooting star …]
The Adventures of Algy 