

"Re-examine all that you
have been told, dismiss that
which insults your soul."
Walt Whitman
WELCOME TO
MY WORLD
Sheila Templeton writes in both Scots and English. She has won the McCash Scots Language Poetry Competition twice, also the Robert McLellan Poetry Competition, as well as many other poetry prizes. Her work is published in many magazines, newspapers and anthologies. From 2010 to 2011, she was the Makar of the Federation of Writers Scotland and she is an engaging popular performer of her own work. She currently lives in Glasgow. Gaitherin is her fourth poetry collection.

Poem of the Month
Ripening
In green rodden time
I wanted tae be you.
Scarted my knee
on reuch scabbit bark,
stappit my pockets
wi hard berries, prayin
you'd run oot o supplies
an need mine.
You made planes wi balsa
an gaudy coloured tissue,
wheeched a shairp propeller
makkin contact wi the wind.
I held the hint o the twine,
seely tae chitter, ice-tangled
fyle you ignored me.
Aenoo, rodden branches
hing hunnerwechted, dairk
ripened, riddy for pickin.
Saft crame flesh, nae use
for the games we played
lang syne.
An I'm ower thrang
tae help flee your plane.
Thrang rubbin bricht berries
atween my finger-eyns,
slowly staining my lips
tae silk in the munelicht
waitin for you tae land.
