Rengård

On the map there’s a small annular ring, 
not much bigger than a full stop — 
a rengård or stone circle for reindeer, 
like a bullring in Spain but no cheering crowd, 
just the gods of the Kalevala herding reindeer 
with the help of the northern lights. 
In summer their internal clocks run wild. 
In winter the suprachiasmatic nucleus 
imposes a rhythm — without cues of light, 
they get on with their day which is really night —  
searching out lichen under the snow —
but when the fridge door is frozen they’re herded 
to the valleys below. The rengård I passed 
had a force of its own, a sense of how 
we impose ourselves on others; 
those circles, those annular rings, 
they help the herders 
to enforce their will on the world. 
When I passed the rengård at Tjåktja 
I thought of an abandoned cyclotron, 
light travelling in circles. Derelict now, 
just a pile of stones and a white hole in the centre, 
colder than all the surrounding cold. 

Laurence O’Dwyer | Photosynthesis
Contents | Mudlark No. 79 (2024)