latha-saor

Today was a free day in that I had no appointments or definite plans - the first time for a while which was nice. 

It is also National Poetry Day and I enjoyed listening to Imitiaz Dharker reading from her poem Choice and being interviewed on the today programme.  The poem will be displayed on billboards in Glasgow.

The prompted me to start a project I have planned for my 60th year; namely selecting five poems every month (an old favourite, one from the poetry group I took part in during lock down, one for "A Year of Scottish Poems", one by Seamus Heaney and a chance discovery) by making and collating my October selection*

After lunch we went to visit a local woodstove showroom (which is based on a farm up a single track road) to see what was on offer, thereby starting the process to replace the gas fire in our living room, followed by redecoration. We may also replace the one in our lounge as well. 

The rest of the afternoon has been spent on phonetics as I explore in more depth  how broad and slender vowels change the sounds of certain letters in Gaelic.  As a consequence of my dyslexia,  I can't always tell the difference when listening or make it when speaking and find that studying the underlying phonetics and getting to grips with IPA helps. 


* October poems are: 

An Old Favourite: -  Lord Randal My Son (traditional ballad)
One from Poetry Group: Dunt: A poem for a dried up river by Alice Oswald
One from Year of Scottish Poems:  An acarsaid by Kevin MacNeill
One by Seamus Heaney: Blackberry Picking
A Chance Discovery: Choice by Imitiaz Dharker