The Flower that Breaks Rocks - by
Dainty Alpinist, chinking her roots into fissures / and fractures, like crampons in toeholds. /
mountains
Hello, I am Scotland - by
Who wakes every morning
/ in a brilliant mood as auburn bursts
/ cast filigree nets over foreheads
/ and swingparks and paint themselves
/ on pavements.
The Comfort of the Hills - by
HEART! If you’ve a sorrow
/ Take it to the hills!
/ Lay it where the sunshine
/ …
A Cairn - by
As by barren trackway
/ on a mountain crest
/ with view of scree and corrie,
/ ridge and col,
/ a traveller might pause,
/ take bearings, cast
/ in…
A Man In Assynt (extract) - by
Glaciers, grinding West, gouged out
/ these valleys, rasping the brown sandstone,
/ and left, on the hard rock below –
/ the ruffled…
Ceann Loch Aoineart - by
Còmhlan bheanntan, stòiteachd bheanntan,
/ còrr-lios bheanntan fàsmhor,
/ cruinneachadh mhullaichean, thulaichean, shlèibhtean
/ tighinn sa bheucaich ghàbhaidh.
/
/ Èirigh ghleanntan, choireachan ùdlaidh,
/ laighe sa bhùirich chràcaich;
/ sìneadh chluaineagan, shuaineagan…
Moladh Beinn Dóbhrain (extract) - by
4. Siubhal
/
/ A’ bheinn luiseanach fhailleanach
/ Mheallanach lìontach,
/ Gun choimeas dh’ a fallaing
/ Air thalamh na Crìosdachd:
/
/ ‘S ro-neònach tha mise,…
Summit of Corrie Etchachan - by
But in the climbing ecstasy of thought,
/ Ere consummation, ere the final peak,
/ Come hours like this. Behind, the long defile,
/ The steep…
The Hill Burns - by
So without sediment
/ Run the clear burns of my country,
/ Fiercely pure,
/ Transparent as light
/ Gathered into its own unity,
/ Lucent and without colour;
/ Or green,
/ Like…
on sooth kip - by
frae this heich haugh
/ see yon wee howe
/ whaur caller watters rin,
/ aa skinklin threids…
It’s a Mineral, the Mind - by
Velvet the Himalayan poinsettia in bloom,
/ silver the scabbard of thrusting power,
/ the mind is a clear scent,
/ the pen is a new…
Lost - by
To quote my distant friend Imran MacLeod,
/ ‘A man with no culture has no identity.’
/
/ The last I heard of him was,…