TALIESIN IN EDINBURGH
7
And shall I now sing the same sing
In the voice of sweet, sad Sorley?
Mugged on the streets by the muddle-headed,
The roar of impatient buses even in the cobbled ways
Hidden from any sunny truth.
The roar of modernity beating the brains
From the fallen doves of loveliness.
And the peace in the glens (where we lay
And forget even our names for a while),
And the peace of the hills (where we wept
With the rainbow promises of unlikely futures).
I shall walk with the ghosts down to the Grassmarket.
I shall nose into the deep pockets of Death
And await a sign, like Greyfriar’s Bobby,
And love it all, and lose it all – all the loud wanting,
All the measureless cloth and cut of status –
In the dusty bookshops down New Town way.
The hidden waters, unsuspected, below the gardens,
Below the pavements. The rock of ages
Staring down as it ever was: an emperor,
Purple in the dawn, where the pigeons quiver and coo.
It was mine. It was all mine, without taking one step.
Lungs filled with with barley malt from the breweries
There by Usher Hall. Seeping into every hope
On frosty mornings, the warm rusk scent of it,
Crossing the Meadows beneath whalebone arch
And cherry aisle. Old straight tracks
Converging on soot-black steeples.
Our slender grasp on life reaching for thistles
(And the harsh wind, a plaid of discomfort
Walking us into winter along the long grey cliffs
Of tenement and aspiring views).
Across the hills to the hills beyond,
And beyond that to the long dead hills
Dreaming in the Kingdoms of Fife
And the shining Forths.
Diesel chokes the throat at dawn chorus.
The sun, too neon, misses us out
And rises nonchalant.
The myth is always there, dressed in rags,
And us, looking down, scanning the pavements
For the wrong kind of gold.
simonhlilly 