A Sober Crofter Looks at the Thistle

‘A Scottish poet maun assume

The burden o’ his people’s doom,

And dee to brak’ their livin’ tomb.

Mony ha’e tried, but a’ ha’e failed.

Their sacrifice has nocht availed.

Upon the thistle they’re impaled.

You maun choose but gin ye’d see

Anither category ye

Maun tine your nationality.’

Crofter shows his cards

Hugh MacDiarmid, born Christopher Murray Grieve in 1892 in Langholm, Dumfriesshire, died Biggar 1978, excerpt from “A Drunk Man Looks at the Thistle”