Description
Book SynopsisThe Last Woman Born on the Island is an exploration of the past and the present, and a celebration of the landscapes, both physical and emotional, that make up our lives. What are the colours of the language or languages we speak, and how do they infl uence the ways we live? Much of this collection is set in the author’s homeland of Scotland. Some poems contemplate the history and traditions of the Highlands and Islands – from the HMS Iolaire disaster off Lewis in 1919 to the knitting of Eriskay ganseys, from the legend of the White Cow at Callanish stone circle to herring girls at the start of the twentieth century. Others consider Scottish languages and parlances, the country’s wildest and most beautiful landscapes, and the effects of tourism on the culture of the Hebrides. Is there is a diff erence between something lost and something merely forgotten? How do we fi nd what we don’t know we ever had? And what is belonging to a place, let alone to two places? In one long poem, the author stands between her home country and her adopted country of France, letting her feet talk us through the places they have been. Who is the last woman and where is the island?
Table of ContentsThe last woman born on the island 5 After a Reading by Jackie Kay 7 Chickens 9 Eggs 10 Made the Small Way 11 Tracks 13 Room Six 15 Passing It On 16 Lucky Penny 17 Spoon 18 Lismore 19 Heatwave 20 The Lean Years 21 Night Walk, Baile Mòr 23 Fault Lines 24 West Highland 25 Instead of gulls 26 Peace 27 Sheela-na-gig 28 Fly 29 Cod Fishing, Firth of Clyde 30 Ear 31 Landbound 32 Corvids 33 The Dream 34 Angling 36 Collins Gem 37 Bystander 38 Prototype 39 Middle C 40 Hollows 42 Monochrome 44 Tobar na h-Aois 46 Things That Can Be Thrown 47 Forbidden 48 The White Cow 49 Hebridean 50 Gardener 51 Every time I step inside 52 Post Op 53 Eriskay Wives 54 Plea to Boy on a Train 56 First Keys 57 Celia’s Shoes 58 Thirty-Seventh View of Mount Fuji 59 Death Trumpets 60 Twelve 61 Recipes 62 Upper Cut 64 Fourteen 65 Seventeen 67 Urination For Girls 68 Cusp 70 Feet 72 Trefoil 78 Love 79 I would have liked 80 Her Hair 82 A Seat at Cailleach Farm 83 Revisiting the Island 85 Letter Home, 1920 86 Light’s Tricks 88 Notes 91 Acknowledgements 93 Prizes 94
