Jim, Mark, Gregory and Ann - so glad that Karine Polwart's wonderful performance of "I Burn But Am Not Consumed" struck home so well for Karine is a very great singer and a truly lovely person.
Part of her - and, in Scotland, our - horror at the whole clamjamfry of Trump and his circle's behaviour, is based in our identification with how we see ourselves as true internationalists - the polar opposite of the isolationist, 'British exceptionalist', post-imperial nationalism of the currently dominant (in provincial England and Westminster) Brexitanian ideologues, from the over-anxious May right down to the repellent Farage.
As the tide for a second independence referendum rises here - forced on by the Tory government's intransigent unwillingness to listen to our First Minister's compromise solutions for Brexit in relation to Scotland - there will be fresh debate about a Scottish anthem. Many will favour the great, late Hamish Henderson's "Freedom Come All Ye" - a fine poem and a moving song. Though I personally fear that its Scots is too difficult, for too many, to fulfill such a purpose, this rendition by Karine in the extraordinary setting of the chapel built by Italian POWs on Orkney during WWII, is an experience to melt anybody's heart.
Its sentiments we could all do with - on either side the 'English' Channel, of our mutual 'pond', or you, on either side of your aisle.
You can find it at -
https://vimeo.com/73406037 and the full text of Hamish's poem at -
http://www.scottishpoetrylibrary.org...om-come-all-ye