Miriam Nash was born in 1985 in Inverness and spent her early years on the island of Erraid, off Mull, where Robert Louis Stevenson’s family once worked as lighthouse engineers.
Lighthouses and the RLS connection form one of the themes from her new collection, All the Prayers in the House (Bloodaxe Books, £9.95). Here is a sample from it.
SONG OF THE MAINLAND
I’ll sing you a song of the mainland
Where the lights are always shining
Where the wind stays off the whiskey
And the bread is factory-rising.
~
We’ll go no more to the islands
We’ll go no more to the sea
For the lighthouses are empty
There’s nothing there for me.
~
And when we get to the mainland
We’ll give our shoes a shining
And run for the bars and dance halls
Till the sun is church-spire rising.
~
We’ll think no more of the islands
We’ll yearn no more for sea
For the lighthouses are empty
And have no need of me.
~
I’ll sing you a song from the mainland
With the lights above me shining
The wind still burns like whiskey
Yes, the bread is factory-rising.
~
O send me news from the islands
What’s churning, out at sea?
The lighthouses are empty
But do they think of me?
~
I’ll sing you a song of the islands
As the streetlights dull their shining
Of the darkest stretch of darkness
And its one light, tower-rising.
~
O take me back to the islands
O take me back to sea
For the mainland’s bright and gleaming
But what is here for me?
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