For the last few years some friends have invited us to Burns Night and to bring a poem. I came across some words of a friend of friend of mime who was speaking to a women’s group and said “poetry is not an inspiration we have enough pressure around us without adding to that”. That poetry was more distillation of noise which made me think about pauses.

So I thought I’d try something more aligned with that rather than my usual style but aas seems usual hope still creeps in at the end.

Exhalation for Burns Night

Tonight we raise the glass, not in grandeur,

but in gratitude for breath itself.

The poet’s gift is not the torrent of words

but the pause after

that quiet reckoning

when the room shimmers in a moments silence

Robert knew it,

The yeast of life fermenting knows it,

The plough of soil turned to the light knows it

The mouse in winters nest knows it

Tonight we stand in that same field,

For a moment distilled from noise….

steeped in the grace of a pause.

Perhaps even a holy pause reflected in the whisky’s surface,

a quiet tremor in the chest as the warm Spirit flows into our soul.

An inhalation that silences the world’s chatter,

And breathes back a quiet hope that things will change for the better.