The new Manx Bard Bradley Chambers writes his first column on the iconic poet T.E. Brown.

Becoming the Manx Bard is a privilege. I didn’t expect it to happen to me. Imposter Syndrome.

What to do with it? Beyond some obvious commitments, it is a blank canvas with a wealth of possibilities. That is overwhelming, but exciting also.

And what to do with a monthly column? I am told that I can write about anything I want. That can’t possibly be true – but I take the point, and I’ll take the bait.

I’ve met some of my ten predecessors. I’d like to meet them all. Seems to me that they are the richest resource I have.

There is one I can’t meet though. T. E. Brown. He was born in Douglas, studied in Oxford, moved to Gloucester, then Bristol, retired to Ramsey, and his grave is in Redland. He moved around a bit, as have I, and it raises a question.

Was he more of an Englander or a Manxman? Of course you’d say the latter. I agree. He is the poet of the island after all, with a bronze statue on Prospect Hill, sometimes resplendent with a traffic cone on his head. He’s the true Manx Bard.

Yet, he spent most of his life in England and he wrote most of his poems there too. He adored the English countryside and although he visited the island frequently, it was no longer his home.

Distance creates perspective. Identity is fluid.

Perhaps there was something distinctly sentimental in how he came to recall the island of his birth. He conceded this in his letters, that, in his view, he reflected a ‘merely superficial appreciation’ of the island.

This changed though. Later in life, when he returned, he came to discover the island afresh and to see it differently, with a deeper appreciation for it. Perspectives change.

I’ve tried to reflect some of this in my poem.

We are all the product of our environment; where we live, how we live and who we know. We can’t help but reflect this.

Less than half of the island’s population were born here and that includes me. Meanwhile, the Prime Minister describes the UK as an island of strangers. Are we an island of strangers too? I’m not so sure. Strangers are just friends we haven’t met yet.

The Poet of Mann

And stood beside the Bristol Bridge

looked down the Avon Gorge

imagined distant hills in which

his island heart was forged

Brunel’s bridge spans the hinterlands,

beyond the Irish Sea

recalling people of the past

the voice of Betsy Lee

A Douglas teacher, clergyman,

mused Manx in Clifton lanes

knowing every knoll and nook

high up at Sheeragh Vane

He defined his lyric language

by peace within Glen Maye

the rolling grass of Ballaglass

the sands of Laxey Bay

And what to say then of this man

today less read or known

through life, through love of Vannin Isle

the Island Bard lives on