Please join me in Cromarty’s Victoria Hall on the 25th of this month. I will have a table where we can discuss all things booky…
Kilted Scribblers Book Fair
‘What Light Through Yonder Window Breaks’
My Recitation of William Shakespeare’s ‘What Light Through Yonder Window Breaks’, from his Romeo and Juliet…
‘Somebody Said That it Couldn’t be Done’
My Recitation of Edgar Albert Guest’s ‘It Couldn’t be Done’…
‘Oh Captain, My Captain’
My Recitation of Walt Whitman’s ‘Oh Captain, My Captain’…
‘If I Should Die’
My Recitation of Emily Dickinson’s ‘If I Should Die’…
‘Once More Unto the Breach Dear Friends’
My Recitation of William Shakespeare’s ‘Once More Unto the Breach Dear Friends’, from his King Henry V…
Community
Community; to commune.
A co-operative place in which to live.
A collective of commonalities.
The rank and file of a bloodless family.
Ragged Out Rider
He sat upon the start-line with his neck all wet with fear.
The pride he’d gain from this one jump would last him all the year.
He glanced at all the gathered crowd who came to watch him ride.
If he failed to do this one great thing, he’d lose more than his hide.
.
He revved the engine once or twice, the sound it made was right.
His helmet was securely on his head and his jacket zipped up tight.
He stared right down the run they’d made and focused on his prize.
The things they’d found for him to jump were not all unisized.
.
When the starter yelled and blew the horn, he tore off down the line.
He made the jump and landed well and all in all went fine.
But when he heard his father shout, he knew he was in deep,
For the field it was his father’s and the things he jumped were sheep.
.
The Girl on The Bridge
She tried.
She failed.
She tried her best and failed again.
Then tried and failed.
She’d tried to best her best again.
She cried.
She’d failed.
She’d tried her best but not again.
splash
.
The Cruise
Peter, for years, saved to go on a cruise.
He decided on old Saint-Tropez.
He got on the boat, prayed, ‘Keep it afloat.
Let the whole trip be happy and gay.’
.
The boat, as it happened, was not all that good.
It sunk on the very first night.
Our Peter did cry, ‘Please, don’t let me die.
Redeem me from this awful plight.’
.
He managed to swim to an unknown dry land,
deprived of all that he’d brought.
Though he didn’t know then, a party of ten,
Would soon serve him a large cooking pot.
Nothing My Thumbs Press
- In Response to ‘Text’ by Carol Ann Duffy
.
Nothing my thumbs press,
will ever be heard.
At three in the morning,
My vision being blurred.
My tongue tastes of cotton,
And language is slurred.
My message goes out,
But no-one is stirred.
.
The verse that I sent out,
I tried to reword.
To speak out, in person,
I would have preferred.
I look at the message,
And think a cross word,
Throw it back in my pocket,
And go home, perturbed.
.
I wake in the morning,
My mouth is like curd.
My eardrums are banging,
Not one thing be heard.
I remember that last night,
My mind then disturbed.
Texting while puddled,
Should really be curbed.
.
Death Poem
I
It was hot, that intense summer’s daytime,
The weather, close without reason or rhyme.
Skin slips off; the bodies before me thaw.
Escaping, where once it held; now withdraw.
Spiritual. Can murder be thus? Discuss.
Nature loves to take back what it gave us.
This feeling, it soaks me like delight.
II
I watch them as a passion enthrals me.
The body, degrading naturally.
It was wild, in the heat of the moment.
Not mutual. A true act of bestowment.
A romance, yet emotionless; endless.
The taste, too, I do find delicious.
I was alone and merely being playful.
Daddy, Daddy (Corrected)
(In response to The Night Watch by Niall Campbell)
.
Daddy, daddy, hear my cry.
The moon came out. I try and try,
To sleep but bracken on the glass,
Scratches at my soul and lasts,
Till you can come and ease the pain,
And send me back to sleep again.
Daddy, daddy, hear me wail,
Take hold of me from o’er the rail.
And hum that tune I love to hear,
To take away my lonesome tear.
The Devil Take Ye (Lyrics)
Jack crept out, one dusky evening, as the snow wisped wild, unreasoning.
He sensed the subtle shift of air; that prophesised of plight, foursquare.
Yet dire need of drink he deemed, far from his warring wife. Indeed,
His britches held his beads of rose; a de-fence from his spouse, imposed.
.
In Bill’s Black Bull, he found his friends, already three-sheets. Stevie said,
‘Six shots, three beers, whisky and wine. Make sure to match and make good time.’
.
As Jack swilled – and swallowed fairly, he pondered on his precious Mary,
Who sat and scowled and warmed her wroth. The drink he drank was not enough.
The furious, fiery, fuming femme would box and bash and kick and crown him,
But in the foggy throws of froth, he deemed he did not care enough.
.
As Jack rode home, through dark and dim, the barkeep found Jack hadn’t paid him.
He and his haughty, hefty friends, took up and tracked Jack round a’ bends,
And dikes and dells and a’where else and planned to birch him with their belts.
Yet Jack did cycle, solemn, sure, and sang of all he saw and knew.
He harked of hills and birds of prey, and lively ladies laid in hay.
.
Then from the edge of paling eyes, he saw a site that held surprise;
A local teacher creeped and crept. Not on a single stick she stepped.
Jack slinked and snuck through sentient trees, then smelt an iffy, funky breeze.
It harkened to a hearth inhumed, which pungent, putrid death consumed.
.
And as he peered, through pale, blurred eyes, he stood there stunned, in such surprise,
For, round and round a ring of grass, danced every teacher, bare of arse,
To ever teach in Alloway. Behind that bush, Jack wished to stay.
.
And up above, a stage so rude, old Satan on a platform stood.
And as the devil danced and sang, he trapped and took Jack by the arm.
Old Satan snared him to the pyre, full of flames; ferocious fire.
.
Yet in that moment, man alive, those gathered gawped in such surprise.
The barkeep burst beyond the trees and shouted loud, ‘What like are these,
Old besoms bopping, twos and threes, in this clearing, if ye please?’
.
The devil jacked our fearful Jack, up to his hairy head and asked,
‘Is he for real or don’t he know – that I’m the devil, here to mow?’
.
It was then, Jack played his part and into Lucifer’s ear impart.
‘Convert yourself into some coin. I’ll tend it there, no more purloin,
And when you weigh it worth the joke, change thee back and have him choke.’
.
He then transformed, before Jack’s eyes, with a sudden, stature sacrifice.
Then, on the grass, there lay some gold, which Jack grasped up, the great freeload.
He placed it in his pocket, sure, beside his bless-ed beads, so pure.
The fiend’s firm form no more could alter. When trying to turn he flailed and faltered.
.
Jack took this chance and fortune fair, and left the barkeep blowing air,
And rife, the evil rallied round to strip and skin, and herd the hounds.
That barkeep now was less than best of meat and blood and bone and breath.
.
And all across the dikes and dells,
Out loud they rang,
Hell’s heinous bells.
The Mysterious & Mischievous Scott McGowan 