The Land We Love                 © Will H Ogilvie/Iain H Scott

Just a line of blue hills to remember.  

Just a valley one fails to forget,  

Whether bound with the gold of September.  

Or the jewels of midsummer set! 

Just a fringe of dark woodland and coppice. 

Just a ribbon of river and stream,  

For a hem to the cornfields whose poppies, 

Burn soft as a rose in a dream!

Just a sweep of marsh-moorland and heather,

Just a brae where the blackfaces climb,

Just a loch where the grey gulls forgather,  

And the bums out of Cheviot chime!  

Just a glen where the wild duck and pheasant,

Find a sheltering nook from the blast,  

Just a peel-tower that stoops to the Present,

With the legend and lore of the Past!

There's a spell in this land of the Marches, 

In this Border that gave us our birth,  

In this spot where the heaven's wide arch is, Spread blue o'er the best of the earth!  

Tis the shrine where our hearts keep returning, Wherever our feet may be led;  

All our love on that alter lies burning,  

All our song-wreaths around it are spread.