Makar (meaning Poet or Bard).

Each year the Federation asks an established (or emerging) Scottish poet to act as our Makar for the year. We have been lucky in the past to have individuals in the role who have been hugely supportive and made a lively contribution to our organisation.

Maggie Rabatski is the Makar for 2011/2012. She is from the beautiful village of Rodel on Harris but has lived in Glasgow for a long, long time. Maggie came to writing poetry quite late in life but is all the more enthusiastic for that. Her first poetry pamphlet Down From The Dance, was published by the Federation's publishing arm New Voices Press in 2010 and was short-listed in the First Book category of the Scottish Mortgage Investment Trust Book Awards in 2011.

Maggie was delighted with her Makar appointment and said she was grateful to the Federation for helping her develop as a writer, and for the reading opportunities. Maggie is currently a mentee on the Clydebuilt Mentoring Scheme.

Dark (By Maggie Rabatski)

Coming home 

                        over the Squinty Bridge

it’s a frosty evening into December

my friend is talking

about the crimson cashmere cardigan

she’s bought her daughter for Christmas

and I’m looking at Glasgow 

                                            all laid out

lit up and genial on the winter sky

when I remember 

in a punch to the gut

that you are nowhere in this city tonight

and suddenly it is dark 

                                     desolate

as the swept slopes of Strathnaver

where soon we’ll give you back 

to the wind