SHEILA Templeton finds echoes of the Welsh master poet in her own rural upbringing in Aberdeenshire.

Her poem is included in her new collection, Tender is the North (Red Squirrel Press, £4).

FOR R S THOMAS

I hear your bold blackbird, that slow singer,

alone at my desk, yet walking with you

through your valleys and hills, that shining

stream bubbling notes of your music

your pure Welsh music. And I am walking

behind my father, born in your time, but

seeded in his own north land, ploughing,

proud to stride behind his pair o horse;

high cheek-boned, hair rain-flattened

the colour of wet barley, speaking the secret

words to his beasts, turning his park

into a sea of order, yes, with your stiff clods

glinting in the wind, gulls and peesie-weeps

skirling encouragement; above him

only a dark yearning sky.

Another enduring ordinary man,

born to till and toil, to win his wars

to wrestle with his burning under those stars.