An Edinburgh Poem

                             


I seem to have a deadline for Thursday night for the next typescript. I seem to have to be 170 miles further north early on Friday morning. With a short story (unwritten as yet ) and in fancy dress (no idea!). So I can't wax as lyrical as I usually do.
                             

Next week you are getting a blurb on what it means to be Glaswegian and why we have over 60 words for drunk.
                           

But this week I thought I would treat you to a lovely poem by my good friend Betty MacKellar. She's the award winning poet who writes mostly in Scots but this poem is in English. And it's about some wee rubbishy place on the east coast where they wear fur coats but can't afford knickers.

Or so I am told.

 Seriously tho, a lovely poem about a lovely city. If you like that sort of thing. 

Edinburgh

The city of my childhood wore a face

for afternoon tea,

she was a Jenner’s kind of lady.

A trace of her is left in me –

“Hold your back straight,’ she’d say,

“Speak nicely.

Put on your gloves”...

Eight years she tutored me.

I was beguiled by her refinements

for her face was all sunshine and smiles

in Princes Street Gardens

and the tram

to the Zoo in far Corstorphine

or Portobello Sands.

Sometimes I happened on her shadow places

saw the dark side of her face

the queue of thin men snaking round the corner of our street

waiting for soup

and tramps in the Meadows

shell-shock bleary in their eyes.

Did I hear the word “meths”

reeking

on that old man’s breath?

My mother rushed me past

too fast to be sure.

No trainspotting allowed in the thirties.

Sciennes was my school; it had a swimming pool.

I can still hear “Rule Britannia” playing

as we marched en masse

like little soldiers of the Empire

into class.

All quite up-market for the non-fee paying

but I recall my mother saying

that the colours were same as Queen Street College – navy and red.

I could almost have been swanking to the private one instead.

The War saw me away

evacuee in a pixie hood,

then after a lifetime

Holyrood.

My hat was yellow

wide-brimmed

with flowers

smarter than the Queen’s

I had forgotten how beautiful the Crags and Arthur’s Seat had been.

The sun still shone

for cucumber sandwiches and French cakes

on the Palace lawn.

The face for afternoon tea smiles on…

And my grandchildren went to George Watson’s. 


Betty MacKellar
                                   


Caro Ramsay  31 10 2014