Poem of the week by Stella Sutherland

Stella Sutherland is a Shetland poet, living on the isle of Bressay where she was born in 1924. Here she celebrates long midsummer days and longer-lasting love; the poem is included in a new pamphlet from Handsel Co-operative Press, Joy o Creation: Favourite Poems Old & New in Shetland Dialect and English.

Sang

To L.J.S

A day stown oot o a year,

a boat on a simmer tide -

wis, wi da isle ta wirsels,

saand an sea, da wide

lift ta wirsels, we kent

what luck, what life meant.

Wir year wears on ta hairst,

bit mind's an hert's een

(salistin on da gaet)

see, as it were dastreen,

da plover alang da saand:

yon isle, yon simmer laand.

You can borrow Joy o Creation from the Scottish Poetry Library, which also lends by post. Tel: [phone], e-mail [email protected] of visit www.spl.org.uk