The Clearances
O, Patrick Sellar, what have you done to this glen,
You chased all the women, the children and men;
You burned down their houses; they had nowhere to go,
You could not care less though they died in the snow.
They left their dear land with tears in their eyes,
With grief in their hearts, they said their goodbyes;
They bade their farewells to the hills and the streams,
No more would they see them except in their dreams.
They sailed the Atlantic with its boisterous wave,
Alas for so many the seas were their grave,
No tombstone to mark where they drew their last breath,
Their bodies did not rest in the dust of the earth.
But others who made it to far distant shore,
To places they’d never set eyes on before,
They were given a land to clear and to plough,
And this they all did by the sweat of their brow.
But the God whom they worshipped in their own Highland way,
Was the God who was with them for all of their days.
At the end of their life, on eternity’s shore,
He welcomed them home to joy ever more.
America and Canada, you took them all in,
You gave the chance, a new life to begin,
While day follows night, and there’s a sun in the sky,
You will always hold on to the name of MacKay.
John MacSween, Scalpay, May 2008
page last updated 20th September 2008