The Man Who Threaded Words

Tags

boteh, braes, Burns, Caledonia, cloths of Heaven, dragon's teeth, Ferguslie, Mount Olympus, Paisley, peesweeps, Robert Tannahill, Scottish poets, Skylarks, weaver poet, Woodside

 

The man who threaded words together, like

silk yarns in a Paisley shawl, showed respect

for his woven jacket and removed it,

carefully, with his silver watch, before

quietly lying down in a culvert,

no longer walking iambically.

 

A lass singing his lyrics ambled by;

muffled clacks from cottage shuttles faded.

The lava tide which slumbered in his soul

erupted and he saw Mount Olympus

and heard himself ask the gods for a bard

in Caledonia.  They said, Not one,

but two are granted: Burns and your good self.

In fact, your verses, like sharp dragon’s teeth,

when sown in the ploughed minds of your peers,

will multiply the poets of your land.

Where the peesweeps and the shy skylarks soar

your resting place will be; no unmarked grave

will contain you: this tunnel’s mouth no stop

for such as your unlimping lines.  And now

Paisley Buddy, you are transformed into

the waft of wild mountain thyme on the braes;

the arabesque of a bent cedar tree;

the elongated curve of a boteh,

such as you might have patterned on your loom,

or incorporated into a phrase

now echoing in the winds of Woodside,

or whispering through fogs in Ferguslie.

 

Tannahill, you wove the cloths of heaven

into Scotland’s literary fabric.

 

Photo by stephencdickson – Wikipedia

 

 

She’s Leaving Home

Tags

Art Deco, Celestial City, Clyde, Clyde-built, dredgers, Dumbarton Rock, Flybe, Glasgow airport, Glasgow University, John the Baptist by Da Vinci, Kilpatrick Hills, Luftwaffe, Paisley, River Cart, Singer Factory, soor ploom, speug, Titan Crane

Yes, folks, I’m back.  Here’s a wee poem for you, describing my thoughts as

Flybe took me out of Glasgow Airport:

SHE’S LEAVING HOME 

Instead of a speug’s* view at ground level,

I have a skewed vista doon the watter.

There’s a lump in my throat like a Soor Ploom,

as my keen eye picks out Dumbarton Rock,

before the plane’s wing and cloud wisps obscure

the Ben and those Kilpatrick Hills – cradle

of my childhood.  The tributary Cart,

where mighty hulks dragged their chains,

buoyed up those liners that would cruise the world,

while dredgers kept the channel free of silt

and every vessel seemed to be Clyde-built.

A solitary crane marks the spot

where political tourniquets strangled

the life out of industry and population.

Patchwork fields look as if they have been stitched

into a quilt by a local giantess,

the boundaries hemmed in by Paisley thread,

before Singer stopped treadling out machines

and its Art Deco clock had its hands tied,

as the shriek of town sirens was stifled.

I see my house, my school, the High Flats,

where Luftwaffe rained down a thousand bombs,

before I saw the light of day.  Yon spire

of Glesca Uny soars toward the sky;

beckons to a Celestial City,

just like the finger of John the Baptist:

a pointer to a life outside the frame.

Education – the sky was the limit.

And now I can never come truly home.

Photo by Stephen Sweeney, Wikipaedia Commons

• speug- a sparrow
• * soor ploom- a sour plum-flavoured sweet