I wrote this poem with A. in mind, a seventy -year-old Norwegian who has joined us at Haggätorp. He has a big Zuzuki motorbike and was a commando when younger. He is giving up his flat in Heläs. Excuse the mess, he said on a visit there to pick up more books and stuff to take to Haggätorp. We talked about Celtic Christianity, motorbikes, and then he mentioned his firearms. While putting on a Sissel Kyrkjebo CD (because it had a Paul McCartney song, Here, There and Everywhere), A. called me through to the other room. There he was at the unlocked safe in the cupboard holding a rifle. Hard to equate the life of the monks with this other side of him, the killer streak, but that's all past, he says.
Just like his old life -the business suit, the company, and the Japanese knife. When he showed me the photograph of his wife - still beautiful at 55, I really began to like him a lot. She died in a car-crash. I asked him if he believed in the afterlife. He did.
Sissel's pure voice came through from the other room, in a duet with Neil Sedaka - Breaking Up is Hard to Do.


I learned about Harry MacFie from A.
Harry was a Scottish writer who lived in the Yukon Territory for a while,
then came back to Sweden, to Uddevalla.

This is the joy of travelling - finding connections, finding your own clan.

LETTING GO



You show me your knives
the guns that you're going to sell
letting go of the hunter's life.

Work with your hands in the morning,
use your head at night!

Good advice!

Photograph of your beautiful wife.
Died in a car crash - fog and ice.

Somewhere in the beyond
she is waiting with smiling eyes

peaceful and wise.