by Yvonne Gray

You edged
through darkness, tracing
the lines of longitude north.

The engine droned
and wing lights pulsed
as you followed the path

of the swallow
the little red–jewelled traveller
which came each year

before the rainy season
skimming the lake, darting
along the willow–lined shore.

Your heart constricted
when you saw the ring
clasped to its fragile leg.

Tsoka, tsoka, bad luck!
the children would shriek
clutching their stones.

Trembling
in the simmerdim
of wind–swept islands

where fishermen
still fear to turn
a boat widdershins

you ring a swallow for yourself
open your hands
and cast it free.

glossary
Simmerdim:  the twilight hours around midnight
in June and July in the Northern Isles (Orcadian / Shetlandic).
Widdershins:  anti–clockwise (Scots).

by Yvonne Gray

You are ancient bones
drawn into the light
from a stone–lined tomb.

You are golden shafts
that beam from the eyrie
above the Rackwick Burn.

You are the eye
that pierces walls and windows
in recurring dreams.

You are byre doors
that clap wide
and swing in the gale.

You are a ship
that tosses on currents of air
breasting the blue in full sail.

You are hooked grapnels
that swing the salmon
from sea to sky.

You are a circling skater
talons welded
to your mirror image.

You are the storm
that blasts on vast wings
across the Cuilags’ tundra.

You are the shadow
whose passing turns
the blue hare to stone.

You are a monument
on the faultline of grey crags
fledged in water and light.

You are the call
that echoes from ancient places
through paths and ways to come.

glossary
Erne:  the local name for the white–tailed sea–eagle
(haliaeetus albicilla) in Orkney and Shetland.

by Valerie Gillies

We discover by chance
how time can flow —
in the broken glass bangle
lost by a tribesgirl
within the ramparts of the fort
twenty centuries ago

Hold it up to the light
and whatever she could see
is still showing through —
the cording of cloud
in white–and–indigo,
the sky of early blue

by Valerie Gillies

Bowers Knowe, we’ll never know now.

In the north side of a natural mound
a group of bronze age cists are found
close together. Within their green bower
stone slabs sheltered them till this hour.
Whoever disturbs and cracks one side
can see soil slip down into the void,
revealing someone who seems to be asleep.
Is she wrapped in a cattle–hide cape ?
Are her knees bent, and her arms flexed
across her breast ? Snugly, she fits
into the valley. A hazel stick,
covered in bark, shows the nick
fresh as it was cut. Seeds of heath grass.
Has her woven cap crumbled to dust ?

We’ll never know now, Bowers Knowe.