islands Archives

The Lightkeeper’s Ghost, Eilean Mòr - by Gillian Dawson

{ Poem }

He sings full beam –clear to the Ocean of Storms and shoalsof stars from undersongs, shiveringconstellations – lythe, saithe and sandeel.In the small hours inner reflections turnwith the mirrored lens, gannets splinter,glance off waves of prismatic glass.His psalmody voices sway and swell,the guillemot’s tremulous hi riri o, his tongue is silvered, shattered surf,coruscating puirt à […]

Humanity - by Julian Colton

{ Poem }

You can tire of island lifeSalt Sea Sky Open space. A crowded streetSprayed name on red brick wallIs a visual treatAnd people People People.

The Island - by David Burnett

{ Poem }

There are so many, and each oneIts own. But why this, and this still?Was there a sign? Perhaps justThe ancient, utter silence, a hawkHanging upon emptiness aloneBetween the cyclopean cliffs.Leaving the quay, the rusty steamer,The narrow, huddled, whitewashed street,We scrambled upward to the sky.Upon the crest a monasteryHewn from salt, and in the hills beyondA […]

Islander - by W. N. Herbert

{ Poem }

A few treeless meadows awaited your text
amid the overtones of Rackwick where next
to scriptory herds, you sermonised to shoals
how poetry’s an archipelago of souls:

Hoy Sound - by Heather H. Yeung

{ Poem }

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A nighean a’ chùil ruaidh òir - by Somhairle MacGill-Eain
Sorley MacLean

{ Poem }

A nighean a’ chùil ruaidh òir, fada bhuat, a luaidh, mo thòir; a nighean a’ chùil ruaidh òir, gur fada bhuatsa mo bhròn. Mi nochd air linne Ratharsair, ‘s mo làmh air an stiùir, a’ ghaoth gu neo-airstealach a’ crathadh an t-siùil, mo chridhe gu balbh, cràiteach an dèidh do chiùil, an là an-diugh ‘s […]