Poems from Francis Kerr Young
In My Ain Backyaird

a Shakespearean sonnet

Ah’ve steamed the wide Atlantic in the great
Queen Mary. Ah’ve met rich an’ famous an’
nobility tae - bit my thochts o’ late
have dwelt in strange, strange places, in a land
where shadows gang alang its distant shore:
Ah’ve sailed through the eye o’ a hurricane
an’ felt bitin’ blizzards in Labrador . . .
Bit my dochter’s daith wis my greatest pain.
Pairt o’ my life has been wondrous indeed;
my loves, my hopes, my dreams. Some did cam’ true
as my mind richt noo oan memories feed:
Like that time lang syne when the moon turned blue.
Aye, I still can mind seein’ a blue moon
when Ah was bit nine in my ain hame toon.