The Loch Ness Monster's Song
Sssnnnwhuffffll?
Hnwhuffl hhnnwfl hnfl hfl?
Gdroblboblhobngbl gbl gl g g g g glbgl.
Drublhaflablhaflubhafgabhaflhafl fl fl -
gm grawwwww grf grawf awfgm graw gm.
Hovoplodok - doplodovok - plovodokot - doplodokosh?
Splgraw fok fok splgrafhatchgabrlgabrl fok splfok!
Zgra kra gka fok!
Grof grawff gahf?
Gombl mbl bl -
blm plm,
blm plm,
blm plm,
blp
Commentary
Yes, it’s a poem. No, I won’t be commenting on it. Enjoy!
— Thomas
PS. There’s a Morgan bio at poem #147
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From the Wondering Minstrels mailing list, 1999–2008.
Katherine Woolfitt · 6 February 2001
Hello! Great list you’ve got going here.
I just joined and I was looking over last month’s comments, and saw the comment about the Edwin Morgan poem, “The Loch Ness Monster’s Song”. I first came across this in (the 1991 version of) 100 Poems on the Underground, which has an interesting note about it:
“The author explained in conversation that the lonely monster rises from the loch and looks round for the companions of his youth – prehistoric reptiles – and, finding nobody he knows, he descends again to the depths after a brief swearing session. This was confirmed by a nine-year-old boy in a workshop, who said the monster was ‘looking for a diplodocus’. When asked how he knew that, he said, ‘It says so.’ It does.”
That remark sent me back to the poem, looking for the diplodocus clue, and indeed, there it is. A more subtle poem than perhaps it first appears. (Or maybe that’s just me, with a tendency to skim.)
Best,
Kate Woolfitt
Ivona Puszkarczuk · 18 March 2001
uhh…yeah…sure…
Melting Images · 20 October 2001
Well, imagine that you are the Loch Ness Monster. (Okay, you have to believe in it…) You’re enormous, you’re ancient, and you’re cranky: fed up with all the video surveillance, and the constant clicking cameras, and the sonar…all the investigative intrusion. You’re in the Loch, and you’ve been there forever, so you wonder – what’s all the fuss about? Occasionally you surface to peer at some particularly annoying tourist, but most of the time you’re submerged, and I mean deep, deep down there in the Loch. And you’re speaking your monster language bubblingly through fathoms of cold, lip-numbing water, asking why the hell they can’t leave you alone to patrol the damn Loch in peace. thespiritdancer
R.J.B · 29 September 2004
Hi and welcome fellow earthling to insengard where all people can relax, enjoy peace and quiet AND KILL PEOPLE WITH SWORDS he he ha.
Now I will be your instructor as you travel through the safest and bloodiest place on middle earth. now please keep your hands, arms, legs, heads, the rest of you bodies and personal equipment i.e. swords, aces, bows, crossbows and catapults inside or else the will be used by the orks of MORDOR now enjoy the ride and do not come back.
IF you dare do test yourself go to las vegas where you will be
lineone · 26 March 2005
We studied this for late twentieth century literature this semester at Bangor University and most of the comments, after the reading of this poem, were ‘ummm….ohhhh….huhhh’ and a lot of blank faces.