Events

Sorry to announce that the gig in Sanquhar on Saturday with Darcy and myself has been cancelled. Here's another instead:

Readings and conversations with the National Poet of Scotland – Liz Lochhead- and Hugh McMillan

  

Readings and conversations with the National Poet of Scotland and Hugh Macmillan.
For the benefit of The Ian Wardlaw Drama Trust
Wednesday 10th October at 7.30pm
Brigend Theatre
Market Square, Dumfries, DG2 7AB
Tickets £10 (£5 for students and unwaged)
Tickets available from The Midsteeple Booking Office, High St, Dumfries.
Tel: 01387 253383

September/October

Some events. If you're in the Upper Nith Valley, Darcy and I are not to be missed on the 29th September in Sanquhar! She's a brilliant emerging singer songwriter and not so green in real life!

Also appearing soon- Best British Poems 2012, in which my poem 'Too Big a Part' appears.

Bacchus and Ariadne

Bacchus and Ariadne


See Theseus is away then,
wis it the old
couldnae help it a Goddess telt me to routine?
Load o bull.
Better aff wi me,
weel kent roon here,
pimped ma own chariot,
bit showy but ken how tae party.
Dinnae be pit aff by wee Airchie,
goats’ feet run in the family,
wee pun there.
Did you see my Uncle Davy
daein his snake dancing in the X-Factor?
Simon Cowell owes me, hen.
Stick wi me, see your name in lights,
make ye a star.

Yesterday was the 200th Anniversary of the birth of Kirkpatrick McMillan, the inventor of the pedal bicycle. The McMillans went down to the Smiddy where he lived and a wreath was laid at his grave in Keir Mill. In attendance was George, the Clan Chief. Here's a poem for the occasion:

Both Feet off the Ground



What makes the difference is letting go:
whether peddling or dreaming,
letting go of the ground.
I wonder what’s in this landscape
that turns whiskered sons
of the soil or manse into dreamers?
Not far from here are cottages,
yards apart, that in the space of fifty years
turned out an Oxford Don
and an Admiral of the Sultan’s navy;
not posh boys, boys from the village school.
I suppose it’s our imagination that makes
ordinary things marvels,
the Dandy Horse a bicycle,
a road from Carronbridge to Holywood
the runway to infinity.