The Mudcat Café TM
Thread #161327   Message #3832626
Posted By: Felipa
14-Jan-17 - 04:51 PM
Thread Name: Lost Songs of St Kilda
Subject: RE: The Prisoner of St Kilda (poem)
"Scottish poet and translator Edwin George Morgan (27 April 1920 – 17 August 2010) wrote this poem 'Lady Grange on St Kilda', from Sonnets from Scotland (1984):

They say I'm mad, but who would not be mad
on Hirta, when the winter raves along
the bay and howls through my stone hut, so strong
they thought I was and so I am, so bad
they thought I was and beat me black and blue
and banished me, my mouth of bloody teeth
and banished me to live and cry beneath
the shriek of sea-birds, and eight children too
we had, my lord, though I know what you are,
sleekit Jacobite, showed you up, you bitch,
and screamed outside your close at Niddry's Wynd,
until you set your men on me, and far
I went from every friend and solace, which
was cruel, out of mind, out of my mind. "

http://www.transceltic.com/scottish/remarkable-story-of-imprisoned-lady-of-st-kilda