#ayearinthecairngorms poetry

[sharedstoriescairngorms]

Tree Fungus

by Susie Gunning

What is this.. protrusion from a tree? It grows there, just out of my reach. Sits silently upon the creaking timber.

A horse hoof ready for action, like galloping horses. Forever frozen on this ancient, static host.

The galloping ceases, Mid action. Its rounded smoothness ends in the flat bottom. Ready to connect with the earth below.

Sending vibrations through the grass to the tree roots. It hovers.. Ready to strike.

It sways.. In harmony with the trunk. As the wind gusts, the tiny leaves flutter like butterflies.

Its white bark, Strewn with small, Woolly green lichen. Embracing this strange, symbiotic species.

#sharedstories #ayearinthecairngorms poetry

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Rowan

by Antonia Kearton

I went out.

I went out walking, I walked the hours I reached the rock, scrambling, sky-reaching I walked the sky, the searching sky I swam the forest, the ferny depths Pines blue and green, tall straight and standing. In the blue greenness Stags stand roaring, roar running, By bracken bent breaking, brightening With autumn’s yellow yellowing.

I see you -

Right red upright, curly-toed, bold berried, marching leaves, rank on rank climbing upward, pioneer Cluster-trunk, berry-clump cliff-climbing, witch-warning, warn-witching, bold-berried.

You were what I found

I swim home through the evening, darkening, back to the start There are Rowans by my door.

https://www.antoniakearton.co.uk/

#sharedstories #ayearinthecairngorms poetry

[sharedstoriescairngorms]

Rinasluick

by Douglas Johnston

There are no ghosts at Rinasluick only deer grazing by the rubble from the granite walls.

Piping voices, echo in shrill delight filtered through archival detritus.

A small croft house, one story in height, slated and in good repair. Property of Colonel Farquharson of Invercauld.

Attested by the Revd's Middleton, Campbell & Smith. Of higher authority it seems than those who bide.

There were no deer at the rigs of Rinasluick when bairns ran the boundaries there.

#sharedstories #ayearinthecairngorms #poetry

[sharedstoriescairngorms]

Seasons on the Mountain

by Kerry Dexter

In shadow up the mountain snow lies late in spring

In summer’s turn of season heather colours rise; daylight lingers then

With autumn’s breath a skein of geese unravels against greying sky

Silver brush of snowfall paints winter up the mountain Seasons turn again

#sharedstories #ayearinthecairngorms #poetry

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In High Trees

by Jen Cooper

Every time, you say, these high trees exceed your expectations. Your eye drawn up, and up again, to crescent goldcrest nests. We wait in the quiet moments, feel the air get light before their intermittent bursting out from cover to dart between trees in threes and fours – their sheer lightness – landing on pines whose bark shards dwarf kinglet bird, so plain except that yellow orange crest.

#sharedstories ayearinthecairngorms poetry

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So delighted to see Cairngorms Lyrics appearing on banners across the Park. Two are by Victoria and Catriona, participants at our Aviemore workshops. One is at the Cairngorms National Park Authority’s office in Grantown, and the other at the Coffee Bothy in Laggan. The final one is by Carolyn Robertson, winner of the Park Staff Away Day Cairngorms Lyric competition!

#sharedstories #ayearinthecairngorms #poetry #cairngormslyric

[sharedstoriescairngorms]

I feel free As free as a bee The yerth is silent There is no violence The trees are green Where nobody has been The robins have health While they taste the wealth The smell of the fire Doesn’t dampen my desire To feel the breeze Around my knees

Unknown young poet at Forest Fest, Highland Folk Museum

#sharedstories #ayearinthecairngorms #poetry

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Capercaillie Acrostic

A poem from Thor Ball, age 7, who joined in the Caper and writing activities at the Cairngorms Nature Big Weekend in Carrbridge in May.

#SharedStories #AYearintheCairngorms #capercaillie #poetry

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The Birch

by Katy Turton

The nude, winter birch branches drip Like the freshly washed hair Of a young woman.

As the sun warms The land, green unfurls A veil to cover the naked brown.

Dressed and adorned With leaves of chrysoberyl, peridot and tourmaline, The tree shivers with pleasure in the summer Heat.

But autumn’s chimes Turn gems to yellow scraps Of paper drifting Silent, on the wind.

#shared stories #ayearinthecairngorms #poetry #nature #trees

[sharedstoriescairngorms]

Golden Eagle

Poem by Gillian Shearer

Golden Eagle Photo: Charlie Phillips https://www.charliephillipsimages.co.uk/

A red sun splays across the rise where siskin and lapwing soar,

heather in its purple cloak bows gently in the gloam, stippling the air with its sweet perfume,

across the glen our Lady’s Mantle tilts softly towards the light, as higher and higher, we roam.

There, amidst the reddening sun, we gather our thoughts – listen as the birlin wind ruffles the air,

somewhere, a lonely eagle glides, exciting the moor with its clarion cry, deathly, majestic, a spinning gyre – comes tumbling towards the earth.

#sharedstories ayearinthecairngorms poetry

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An acrostic poem about capercaillie by a young writer at the Cairngorms Nature Big Weekend.

#sharedstories #ayearinthecairngorms #kids #poetry

[sharedstoriescairngorms]

Loch Laggan

by Catherine Faulkner

At beckoning dusk I went Through the bog-swell of rich mud That pulled me to the land. And there, beyond, were Waters smooth as legend Shivered silver by winter, A ghost-plated daguerreotype Etched onto a vanishing place. And somewhere we existed, there, On the horizon line, In the fugitive light, In that symmetry of loss Between two worlds. But our mirror-spell was broken By the arrival of geese on stark wings And mercury-quick you slipped from me And I sank away from the silvered world. Later another traveller might remark upon The plated precision of beauty, Such quiet water, Such stillness.

#sharedstories #ayearinthecairngorms #poetry

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97 mph on the tops

Lying in my tent Listening hard Booming in the background Across the Lairig A symphony of noise Crashing in to the cliffs Waiting for the next crackle of tent fabric Moving and swirling The sound comes down Smashing my tent My toes and feet bearing the brunt The tent and poles squashed flat against the ground and me The noise simmers down The tent springs back The gust has gone Momentarily calm returns Noise building on the other side of the hill Heralding the impending return It’s going to be a long night.

I wrote this after a particularly windy night spent in my tent in the Lairig Ghru.  The recorded wind speed on the tops was 97mph. I was delighted to be out of my normal routine and having a mini adventure, but also delighted to be hiding in the shelter of the Lairig Ghru rather than on my planned camp spot further up the hills.

A poem by Nancy Chambers 

https://www.nancychambersauthor.co.uk/

#sharedstories #ayearinthecairngorms #poetry

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Mither Dee

by Mary Munro

Hotterin an oozin fae the Wells o’ Dee, The river winds lang on her wey tae the Sea. Ower Braeriach’s grim cliff, she loups tae the Glen, Neath craggy, auld faces o’ harsh mountain bens.

Bubblin an chatterin in grey-granite rills, Swalled wi the peat-burns fae shelterin hills. Doon at the Linn, roarin thro’ the scoored gorge, Then spreadin her fingers afore bonny Mar Lodge.

She hoves doon the Valley fae Braemar tae the Sea, Past auld Scots pines an bonny, green lea. Thro’ low-hingin laricks an fir-scented tang, She gaithers her bairns, growin wider an strang.

The hert o’ the Valley, aye lo’ed by her ain, The Dee cuts the land, like a life-bringin vein. Fyles, roarin in spate or flowin sae calm, The soon o’ her waaters aye like a balm.

The fowk o’ the Glen are bit here for a fyle, Bit eternal, auld Dee flows on mile upon mile, Teemin her bounty intae the muckle saat Sea, Like a Mither, aye faithful, this bonny-bit Dee.

#sharedstories #ayearinthecairngorms #poetry #doric

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Monadh

by Ryan J. Dziadowiec

The first time I saw the monadh was as a sleeping eight-year-old I viewed it like an eagle soaring above it in a dream (I’d watched Centurion with my dad, Glenfeshie had filled the screen).

The second time, twenty-year-old male on the rail, looking for work, a wide-lens, panoramic shot panning across summits and skree. The Scotrail wheels screeched to a halt; the monadh beckoned from afar.

The third and fourth and hundredth, too, were all bedroom window sightings. I, a naturalized native, sat on the sill with the siskins and saw the sun on Bynack Mor. I see it still, even with eyes closed.

#sharedstories #ayearinthecairngorms #poetry