The strains of Danny Boy

play shrill outside my window,

my mind fills with unbidden images

of sunlit glades and rocky, fissured shores,

the sounds of battle cries, thoughts of long-lost loves.

 

It must be in my blood,

this land my eyes have not yet seen

for whene’er I hear the bagpipes played

– a sound some cannot bear –

my heart is stirred and set afire.

 

I must needs travel one day hence

to survey those sweet heathered moors,

the deep dark lochs, the fertile glens,

the forests filled with fairy folk,

the haunted towered castles from antiquity.

 

My familial roots lie in this Celtic land

of fidelity, acceptance, inclusion,

morality, modesty, humour.

I’ve inherited their inner fire

that stirs when anyone is wronged.

 

Oh Caledonia,

the pipes, the pipes are calling me,

from glen to glen, and down the mountain side.

I bid you bide, ‘til I arrive

upon the ebbing tide.