Long Culloden Poems

The Spirits of Culloden. 
This is like a pilgrimage, a try tae come every year,
Gather at the cairn, meet old friends, wipe away a tear.
Standin on that moor, that once with blood was sodden,
Paying respects...

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AN INDEPENDENT SCOTLAND? (Or, Beware The English)
by Damian on June 15, 2014. © Damian Cranney, All rights reserved

An independent Scotland,
That will do just fine,
We no longer have to listen
To the Scots familiar line.

Whatever woe that...

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On These Plains I Lay

White fire and heat, blinding light, blinding bright.
Shot down on these plains,
My soldiers, My warriors,
Fading from my sight.

Battle lost?  Battle won?
Battered men, moaning in the morning sun.
I believe I am...

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Heathen warriors dressed in the plaid
Victims of time and an evil brigade
Pursue their beliefs far into the South
Gaelic words from a Jacobite mouth

Like bairns against many a gun
The highlanders decided to run
Not for home and...

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Tak oor grund from beneath oor hurdies 

Burn oor birches aside the lough, 

Besmirch hard fecht fur freedom, 

Dictating oor days tae come, 

No from the pint o a gun, 

Fae laws an promises ...

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Clan Stewart of Appin,
Clan MacGillvray too,
Fell at Culloden,
In the blood and dew.
They fell two by two, and then ten by ten,
Until twelve hundred dead, not sixty minutes in.
...At Culloden


The highland charge failed,
No victory as in...

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16th April 1746
The day a country ceased to exist
British Army, Hanoverian scum
Defeated our Jacobite's
Scotland is on the run
 
Our Tartans banished, bagpipes no more
To lead our troops, to frighten the foe
Cumberland's men hunt us down
In...

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16th April 1746
The day a country ceased to exist
British Army, Hanoverian scum
Defeated our Jacobite's
Scotland's is on the run
 
Our Tartans banished, bagpipes no more
To lead our troops, to frighten the foe
Cumberland's men hunt us down
In...

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America, in this modern age
Population so proud
On their ancestors heritage
 
But in the annuls of time
Not that long ago
To a new world they came
Immigrants so
 
They travelled far and wide
Some further than most
Open invitation from...

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CULLODEN FORETOLD

A man he once said ta'e me,
You'll lay on heather, your gut will bleed.
Near Inverness you should na'e be,
Your end is there upon thee.

I paid no heed, jumped to my feet,
Charged through the Highlands,...

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Tradition and dress
A nations finesse
Symbolic in style
By a country mile
 
The drone of the pipes
Tartan clad
Bonnie on the girls
Proud on the lads
 
Highland dancers
In kilted skirts 
Grooms at weddings
Kilt and dirk

But our Tartan and Pipes
Go...

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The battles ower ,smoke settles ower the moor,
Clans are broken flying aff tae the hills.
Redcoated sodjers mingle with red Heilan blude,
Killing the wounded in Drumossie mud.
Oor Prince has fled leaving dreams in the dust,
Of a...

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The shore it’s seen, calm so near, 
But rocks and swells deterrent to all,
Prevent a landing? It is not clear, 
The Stuart Prince dismissed his fear, 
Landed his launch, and began the call.

A call to...

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Weekend away in medieval castle
Traveling to Scotland on overnight train
Read the account of Culloden battle
Highlanders lost cherished domain.

Eyes feeling heavy am swept away
living the moment from long ago
Brave clan tartans fought that day
Historically painful tale...

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This mighty Fort
Hanoverian built
To suppress the Scot's
Deter the kilt
 
This Star-fort design
One of Europe's best
Never attacked
No enemy zest
 
Strategically set 
On the Moray Firth
This fort of forts
Hanoverian best
 
Near Inverness
Where Culloden was fought
The Jacobite's defeated
Our...

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When one sits on the moor at this Culloden place
Where the Clans of the Tartan lay in deathly deface

On many a night through the following years
Families would gather, and continue their tears

If you listen carefully...

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Paler than the hills I walk
I hear the bleat of sheep long still
and see the thistles of the Saltire’s home,
yet wear the weave of no clan’s name

The red of my discordant neck carries
the match of...

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