So I wrote my ballad poem and I'm pleased with how it turned out! I found Anne Carson's voice in her long poem The Glass Essay to be a useful sound in the back of my mind whilst writing it. Sometimes it seems so bizarre how the writing process / inspiration happens. My poem is nothing like Anne Carson's in any way but somehow hearing her 'voice' in the form of this poem stimulated my voice and helped unlock my poem for me.  

A couple of years ago on retreat at Moniack Mhor I read Anne Carson's translation of Antigone and thoroughly enjoyed it but apart from that I had never been drawn to her work. Yet recently when I started reading The Glass Essay I was completely absorbed by it, the voice in it caught me and drew me into its multiple parts. The voice is refreshing and yet familiar, her diction straightforward. A few years back I would have struggled to be engaged by this poem with its 'talky' rhythm and image-lite stanzas compared to my preferences then. 

The last month or so I've been plagued by physical ailments, and I can't concentrate on poems when I'm in pain, so I've done no writing since my ballad. Thankfully I'm feeling much better. 

I'm currently reading through a book of Scottish ballads and seeing which ones I'm drawn to and will perhaps become part of my project. 

So I'm working on a four-part poem based on Scots Border Ballad 'Mill O' Tifty's Annie', also known as 'Andrew Lammie'.

This is my third reworking of an old Scottish ballad. It looks like the ballads will be an ongoing slow project!

It's a murder ballad and it is about a young woman, Annie, who falls in love with a laird's servant (trumpeter) Andrew Lammie. Her parents, who want her to marry a man of high birth, complain to the laird and he sends Andrew away. Before he goes, Andrew promises Annie he will come back for her and marry her. Annie has a premonition that she will die before he returns. She is then beaten by her father and mother, her brother breaks her back and she dies. When Andrew returns and finds her dead, he commits suicide.

Change a few details and you could read this story, sadly many times over, in contemporary news.
For now, at quite an early stage in my working of the poem, my parts are crudely split into:
Annie falling in love; her experience of love-sickness; locked-up and beaten by her parents; murder by her brother. All of this will be set against the backdrop of Loch Eck (a loch I travel past regularly on my way to work).

Here is a version of the ballad sung beautifully by Jean Redpath. Kate Rusby also does a version which I'd love to hear.

I was delighted to receive my contributor copy of The Caught Habits of Language - an anthology of poems in celebration of W.S. Graham edited by Rachael Boast, Andy Ching and Nathan Hamilton. It is such a beautifully produced book with many great poems inside plus many previously unpublished poems by W.S. Graham. A real privilege to be part of this. The book will be launched at StAnza on Saturday 10th March, but you can pre-order a copy of the book at a discounted price from Donut Press here.


I've been battling over the last couple of months with a poem based on an old Gaelic song - The Jealous Wife - you can hear it sung here - . The song itself originates from a traditional ballad theme based on Child Ballad 10. For some reason I can't get into the heart of the poem yet, so I've had to accept that and sit it aside.

I've written a four-part poem about Freud's couch which was wonderfully fun to write - I watched a short programme about Freud's couch for my course and immediately felt the stirrings of a poem which I repressed because I wanted to work on my ballad. But after a few days the urge to write about Freud's couch overtook me so I gave in and had a ball with it.


I've been moving between reading Brigit Pegeen Kelly and Transtromer, I feel I'm subconsciously inhabiting Kelly's poems - she creates such all enclosed, tangible worlds - they are wonderful places to be.
As I've sat my ballad project aside for now I'm moving between writing and working on smaller nature poems, not sure there is a bigger theme there which bothers me a little. I love nothing more than to be in the middle of a bigger theme that I can really explore and draw out many poems from.

Perhaps I'll find my way back into my ballads through these smaller poems.

I'm excited to be working on a new series of poems based on old Scottish ballads. It's an idea I've been toying with for a while but just didn't have the time to throw myself into.
Now is the time and after much reading and absorbing (finally finished my close reading of the Golden Bough) I'm in writing mode.

There's something about working on a project / theme over several poems that very much attracts me - I can really get absorbed in as opposed to writing occasional poems here and there.
I hope to be working on this intensely over the next couple of months.

Thanks to the wonderful Scottish Book Trust I'm going to Moniack Mhor for a writer's retreat at the end of March with this year's intake of New Scottish Writer Awardees. It's 14 miles outside Inverness and sounds/looks amazing. It will be wonderful to have a week in the Scottish highlands away from all responsibilities just to write.

However before then I have a quick jaunt to London for the official launch of Madame Ecosse which will be at the London Review Bookshop on Friday 17th March. Also hoping to plan over the next few months reading/launches in Glasgow and Edinburgh.