Lesley Benzie is Aberdonian but calls Glasgow home. An editor at Mxogyny Magazine recently said of her (see article at, https://www.mxogyny.com/sections/2023-8-14)

“There’s something of a modern day Robert Burns to Lesley – many of her poems are fiercely political, rich in social commentary, and written in Scots”.

Lesley qualifies this statement with “but I’m blessed with a quarter of the number of children and have indulged in much less philandering”. Writing in both Doric Scots and English, she has 2 poetry collections, Sewn Up and Fessen/Reared reissued August 2023 (Seahorse Publications).

Previously she has been Runner-up in the McCash Scots Poetry Competition 2020. In 2021 she was shortlisted in the Main and Scots categories of the Wigtown Poetry Prize. She is a contributor to 3 collaborative collections, Wanderlust Women:Three Poets 2021 and Wanderlust Women: Extra Baggage 2023 (Seahorse Publications) and Norlan Lichts 2022 (Rymour Books) which was nominated for Book of the year in the Scots Language Awards, in which she is also nominated as the Writer of the Year.

She is the Scots translator for the graphic novel Black Oot Here: Dreams O Us by Francesca Sobande & layla-roxanne hill & Chris Manson. instagram.com/lesleybenzie/ 

Fessen in the Vernacular

At times, life can be 
a North Sea wave, brakkin ower me
caul an hard, like a fist 
ah’m nae quick enough tae sidestep. 

Like lost loves, it taks ma breath awa
an ah’m soaked through,
unable tae cling
tae the perts o me
nae shaped
bi the hershness.

At ithers ah’m a driech island landscape
shot through wi the strength o slate grey, 
dense volcanic rock. 
The dark violet sky circlin owerheid.

Theday, ah took ye past
the Fittie Bar, ma da’s favourite,
far ma faimily congregated tae bid him his last.
There is ane o them wide blue skies 
turnin the sea a deep bluegreen
like his een.

Ye mock ma accent that shifts 
back an forth
fae Glasgow, ma spiritual hame 
an back tae Aiberdeen
like the wee waves lappin at oor taes.

Despite the charged sea life smell,
jist the same the salt smerts oor kisses. 
An ah’m grateful for it aa
an that ancient ability
tae think 
wi ma hairt. 
 

The Hauntit Hoose

         ‘Thair’s a hauntit hoose  
         doon by,
         next tae the burn.’
         A’ve heard it said
         too mony times tae coont.
         An yit, a mannie bides thair,
         unfashed by ony spirits
         as he turns the soil.
         A hail him, ‘Here, sir!
         Huv ye goat ony ghosts
         livin wae ye?
         Breengin aboot
         while ye dae yer dishes
         or hing up yer washin?’
         He shrugs his shooders,
         smirk twinkillin.
          ‘Huv a keek at a map,
         wee man,  
         and then ye’ll see fur yersel.’
         Ma faither’s auld OS
         — pink cover, weel-worn –
         unfaulds erratically.
         But A find the spoat,
         wae the hoose
         next tae the burn.
         ‘Taigh an Spioraid’, it reads.
         A luik again.
         ‘Taigh an Spioraid’.
         Still, it says the same.

         Awrite, but that disnae mean onyhin!
         Or sae A tell masel, but then,
         A see it—
         richt next tae the hoose,
         runnin anent,
         impossible tae miss:
         ‘Bogle Burn’.

         Och!
         That seals it,
         dintit no?

         A’ve heard masel say it
         too mony times tae coont:
         ‘Thair’s a hauntit hoose
         doon by,
         next tae the burn.’

Ross Crawford

Keeks Mc is a Glaswegian poet writing in colourful descriptive Scots. Juggling life, work, parenthood and a strong social conscience, Keeks' work expresses raw emotion and humour in her reflections of daily life, society and nature. New to writing, having only started in 2021, she has enjoyed the success of her work appearing in a wide variety of publications within the UK and internationally. She recently released a full-length collection, "Contermacious Temerity" through Dreich Publications.

A Great Breetish Simmer

The hale faimily sets oot
wi wan thing in mind
Simmer dafferie
Schuil is oot
an paurents an weans
pack a zillion things thay dinnae need
an nane thay actually dae
an heid aff tae a hame fae hame
Fu o howp
Wi'in meenits
the weans are knockin lumps oot ilk ither in the back
cryin "are we nearly thare yet?"
or threatenin tae spew
Thare's aye roadwurks
An whan ye get thare
thare's a race tae the same shaps ye uise at hame
fur yer uisual messages
altho ye'll likely no eat tham
since ye'll survive oan chain pub fuid
an crisps
The weans scarper doon tae the saunds
wi howp in thair wee een
ainly tae fin the tid's in
the sea is wawly
an whitivver little strand thare is
is kivvered in some swarm o deid clunkertonies
The wather, which locals threap wis glorious til theday
is chilpy, gowsterie an gray
makkin a mockery o aa the haliday-makkers
in thair breekums an vests
"makkin the maist o it" 
arguin an scoffin ice cream an candy floss
afore some fish an chips
than gettin a warm fur the rest o the evenin
in a walcomin pub

I work and research as an ethnologist, curator, and educator in the Highlands, where I have lived since I was a teenager. I started writing poetry at home in Easter Ross in December 2020. Like many folk, I found myself needing a way to examine and express so many of the uncanny experiences of that pandemic time. Since then I have been fortunate to have had numerous poems published in journals, anthologies and exhibitions, in print and online, In 2022, I was Co-winner, with my wonderful co-author, Sinéad McClure, of Dreich’s ‘Classic Chapbook Competition’, awarded for our pamphlet 'The songs I sing are sisters'. My first full collection will be published by Drunk Muse Press in early 2024. Both opportunities are gifts from the generosity of folk in this deeply democratic community of poetry that I find myself part of. 

I’m Irish in Origin, but the Scots spoken here in the northern counties of the Highlands, and in Orkney and Shetland where I have lived and worked as a researcher, fills my ears and my imagination, and I find I introduce it along with Scottish Gaelic and the Irish my parents spoke, into so many of my poems.  Recently I’ve started composing whole poems in Scots – in the variety of dialects spilled into my ears by friends. It’s a very wee and humble contribution towards continuing to live and share forward this vital, vivid language of people and place, countering the narratives of marginalisation that have so often been wrongly associated with Scotland’s languages. See https://linktr.ee/caitjomac 

SHALDER

Cáit O’Neill McCullagh

Shalder spree this ebb
dintie shank dancer
every step a loosome meeracle
yer hoodie mirk a cannie guise
fer at the breist o ye is sic licht
beckon mah baleen-bleak been tae bliss
tae the ballat o yer beaky pecks
let me be aye happit in wonder at ye
in this tear of sleet-sun-blaw
as yun moon lifts from her bed of ware
wade yer waltz wi these sook-slappit waves
flit the watter then mak yer charge
braw peerie sea laeg-paddler
mah peedie Palaearctic oster kapper

mah peedie Palaearctic oster kapper
braw peerie sea laeg-paddler
flit the watter then mak yer charge
wade yer waltz wi these sook-slappit waves
as yun moon lifts from her bed of ware
in this tear of sleet-sun-blaw
let me be aye happit in wonder at ye
tae the ballat o your beaky pecks
beckon mah baleen-bleak been tae bliss
fer at the breist o ye is sic licht
yer hoodie mirk a cannie guise
every step a loosome meeracle
dintie shank dancer

shalder spree this ebb

Published in Poetry Scotland No. 103

Anne is originally from Africa but grew up in a wee village in the North West Highlands called Ullapool. She wrote poems and songs as a youngster and has rekindled her love of writing in the last 4 years. Anne has had 2 poems published and performs poems at witchy events. Her poems are often spiritual, intense, and sad. She has never written in Scots so this was a fun challenge.

Wytch Elm O Beauly

Yon wytch elm
O Beauly
Stood fir Ower
800 year
Till her beughs
Could tak nae mair
And she fell
Bringing
Dread and Fear

The fowk
Aroon Strathglass
Gret fir
Yon auld elm
Fur
They Kent
It had
Opinit
A gateway
Tae yon faerie realm

They feart
Yon faerie fowk
Fir they
Were mischeevous cookies
They'd tak
A steek
O wytch elm
And skelp
Yon baaare
Bahookie!