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Ode to the Links of Kingsbarns

(or tales from the Hackers tour of the North)

Oh we few, we happy hackers

We've played the best and now we're knacker'd

Bewitched by dreams of lustrous links

Of magic moments and high jinks

Oh St Andrews, dour toon, my heart is yours

Home of brave hearts and wind swept gorse

Tees streaming with teams of yanks

Playing out of turn without a "thanks"

What greats have tramped your hallow'd turf

And swung in time to the swell of the surf

Belted their baffy into stiff sea breezes

Holed out putts that would only tease us.

Old Tom Morris, Vardon and Braid

Taylor, Thompson, Trevino have played

That old lady, so windswept and wild

Till they lifted the claret jug and smiled.

But none so fair a links exists

Than Kingsbarns: enthroned atop o' my list

Of coastal classics you are par excellent

By far away the most pre-eminent

From tee to shining sea you sparkle and shimmer

Under mares tail sky your beauty grows never dimmer

An eagle made, a cormorant spied

"Ah Paradise" I sighed.

Oh Osler what did you think? What did you utter?

When stroking that ball with aged putter

Did the very turf rejoice to see

That quite unprecedented three!

Oh seaweed smells from sandy beaches

Incoming tide, Atlantic reaches

Spraying mists and salt into the air

And Splendour, Splendour everywhere.

David " Rabid " Mc Aspey (apologies to Shakespeare, Betjeman and

Wodehouse), September 2006