Scots poet of the year performs piece on Sarah Everard and gender-based violence for Soroptomists Perth

Celebrated Perthshire makar, Jim Mackintosh, performed his poem, Never Enough Winters, at our IWD event this month. This poem is in memory of Sarah Everard (pictured below) and speaks powerfully to our campaign against gender-based violence experienced by women and girls. Jim has generously allowed us to share his work here, as part of our commitment to provoke thought and reflection on the rights of women and girls to be safe.

NEVER ENOUGH WINTERS
for Sarah

Five winters mark the night she did not reach
her door, her keys still quiet in her hand.
Street lamps along the south-flow river burned,
ashamed of what their light could not prevent.
In London, where broken pavements hum
with borrowed footsteps and the rush of home,
her name is spoken softly – Sarah Everard
with reflection, with memory and ache.
The trust we placed in uniforms
was ripped from the fabric of our lives.
Not by a shadow.
Not by a stranger.
By one who wore the badge
and broke its oath.
A police officer of the Met:
a promise meant to stand
between the dark
and any woman walking through it.
Instead
the dark was given rank and code.
Authority lent teeth:
betrayal camouflaged in a uniform.
So what is faith, after that?
Not blind allegiance
to a stitched crest.
Not silence
for the sake of reputation.
Faith is something harder:
a stubborn flame
refusing to go out.
Faith that truth can enter guarded halls
and ask the questions
no one wants to be asked.
Because women move through cities differently.
Keys held between fingers.
Routes rehearsed.

Messages sent,
I’m nearly home.
Nearly.
Their maps are not the same maps.
They are layered with caution
with glances over shoulders
with the quiet arithmetic of risk.
Five years have passed.
The candles fizzled out.
The banners faded
but something stronger remains.
The insistence
light must look inwards too.
That warnings left in plain sight
must not gather dust in files.
That whispers from the margins
must be heard
before they become elegies.
We live inside structures
built long ago – corridors measured
to someone else’s stride.
The doors may open wider now,
but the hinges remember.
And change – real change
must not be a slogan shouted once a year:
questioning the value of
claiming ‘Lessons Learned’
every time they’re not.
It is patient work.
Stone by stone.
Voice by voice.
Vote by vote.
Changing who is believed.
Who is heard.
Who leads.
So let this anniversary be more than remembrance.
Let every badge remember
the weight it carries.
Not only the law

but one of humanity’s purest forms – trust.
Let every woman’s testimony stand clear
undimmed by procedural doubt,
because faith is not granted.
It must be earned.
It grows where harm is faced honestly.
Where institutions choose courage
over comfort.
It grows when girls are taught
the streets belong to them.
Not as battlegrounds,
not as negotiations with fear
but simply as streets.
Five years. We should say her name – Sarah – to be a vow:
let darkness never be allowed to cower behind rank
without relentless light defining its face.
And even in a dominant design
we must redraw lines with steadier, equal hands.
That one day – walking home will be just that:
a simple act beneath indifferent stars.
No prayer required,
no glance defined,
no shadow close behind.

Jim Mackintosh

Things to think about as you read:

• What does imagery contribute to the poem, and how?
• Where do you find the poem to be most impactful?
• How vividly does the poem switch its focus between Sarah’s murder and the time that has elapsed since?

What do you feel after reading the poem? Share your thoughts with us here.