Scotland’s National Poet Kathleen Jamie pens new poem to mark the passing of Queen Elizabeth II.
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SCOTLAND’S Makar Kathleen Jamie has written a new poem to pay tribute to Queen Elizabeth II after she passed away at Balmoral last week.
The role of the Makar (National Poet) of Scotland is to produce work relating to significant national events and promote poetry across the country.
The poem, entitled Lochnagar is Jamie's fourth work of poetry since her appointment to the role in 2021.
Of the poem, Kathleen said: “A Makar’s role is to bring poetry into the heart of our national life.
"With an extraordinary national event as we are having now, I felt that it was incumbent on me to make a poem for the occasion. I chose to do this in an old-fashioned form to represent the virtues that many people found in the Queen, of constancy and tradition.
"The poem speaks to the landscape. In this, I find I can have something in common with the Queen: a love of the Scottish landscape. So, when I was thinking about how to make the poem, my imagination went to that part of the Scottish landscape that she loved so well.”
Lochnagar
The alder boughs hang heavy,
Red weighs the rowan-trees
That line the well-loved path which climbs
To Lochnagar from Dee
And knows at last the open hill,
Those ancient wind-honed heights
Where deer stand shy and sky-lined,
Then vanish from living sight,
Where grief is ice, and history
Is distant roiling skies,
Where weather chases weather
Across the lands she strived
To serve, and served supremely well,
Till the call came from afar:
Back to the country kept in her heart,
the Dee, and Lochnagar.
