The Written Word
This year's first selection of poetry is by our old friend, retired Unitarian minister and psychogeographer: The Very Reverend Dr Stanford Razall. A word from Stanford:
"These poems were written on one of my infrequent perambulations, or as us so-called psychogeographers call them, derive(s). I have entitled this cycle of poetry 'A not so distant continent of uncertainty'.
I do hope you enjoy them as much as I did in the writing process"
A not so distant continent of uncertainty
Rev Dr Stanford Razall
Ever out of reach
Derive...for the sake of self-preservation;
Wandering for the good of the spirit.
A soul tormented by the rigours of time,
And of fear;
The fear of the very life itself,
Of my self,
Today...
The Hack
Working for mere luxury:
The graft of the urban ponce.
The artifice of the nonce...assailed by estuarial vowels, consonants of hate.
A necessary delusion
God in the margins; small share of peace,
As minarets tumble, mosques/smoking ruins,
St Anthony's war of attrition,
Not mine, or yours...
Juno goes east
Shame-faced? Hardly: a noble man,
Though in a faithless country,
Thompson was right;
God is in the gutter,
Loving the guttersnipe,
The fool,
The drunk,
The wounded,
The Realpolitik of the streets.
Solid oaf (for Iain D McGeachy)
Free love/free with...
The drunken mouth,
The soft fists,
Of the trip-hop king;
Can't hear you anymore,
Can't separate the beast,
From the alleged beauty...
Size zero
(for all those in advertising/PR/marketing/fashion)
Withdraw the food of choice for a nation: salt and sugar,
1 in 3 Scottish kids obese today.
The poor get fatter,
As the rich eat only themselves:
Jack Spratt gorging on Mother Hubbard's larder of nouvelle dust.
And posh waste is deposited in the porcelain bowl,
Just to keep stylishly thin,
A diet of espresso and fags.
As zero insight is achieved,
And zero weight gained,
Stylists fiddle as the laughter of Carthage,
Echoes ever hollow in the hollow cheeks,
Fame, wealth, incipient social cancer,
I smile widely and order some Dublin goodness.
Keenan was also right;
What is rehab without bacon and Guinness?
Not, not gone
Surrounded by mortal events;
A blanket of deathly reassurance.
In a cold world, I'm burning;
Ashes in my mouth, but alive with possibilities.
Port O' Leith 2003
A separate self sups the black beer in an 'ain folks' boozer,
In a snapshot of future memories.
A time when I was fat and on the pig's back,
And unstoppably violent.
A penny dreadful cliché:
Vigilante language, dead fish eyes...