Edinburgh arrival

12/16
Hello there, do not think it will be easy to get in.
There’s a key on the other side,
Blocking your way.
It grows dark and you are confused.
Next door, the cemetery is silent and wet.
The shops are closed early.
At city center, where the bustle grows
Like a fungus, every language
Curls up the old stone walls.
But your pack is heavy,
2 days heavy with no sleep.
No change, the bus driver says smiling.
———————————-
Aberfeldy hitch

First hold a sign for Perth
A701 south to Edinburgh bypass (45 minute walk)
A720 west to fog at roundabout or straight on to the M8
M8 west to m9
M9 north to m90
M90 to A9 @ Perth
A9 to A827 @ Logierait
A827 to Aberfeldy
——————————————-

When I make it outside again
John Leslie wasn’t serving food
So I head to the old bell inn
All red leather and short wood tables.
Order a 15yr Scapa and fish n chips.
17 pounds. A bundled woman walks in
With a terrier, the two men beside me
Are incoherently drunk and clasping
Each other’s hands very close
To their red faces. It is 6pm.

Later I learn, only one
Was drunk. Tom. 68.
He says two or three words before throwing
The rest away with his hands. He’s 68.
Was in the hazy, now alone. 68. He says
He had 3 sisters, tears fill with eyes behind smudged glasses
How did his fingers get so big, too big to touch eyes.
He pounds his fist. I think he’ll hit me.
I’m sure he’d rather that than cry. After,
I think of where he’ll go. He was wearing
A wedding ring. Still. 68. But it
Was 6pm and he’s too sad for
Me to imagine him home
Anywhere but the old bell inn.
———————————————————
“And it seems like I’ll miss autumn in Edinburgh
That’s the one I should have spent with you—
With the rain lashing down, a fog on the meadows
As the festival lights, as the festival lights go dim”
——————————————————-
At the royal oak
We were joking
About her being a prostitute
Forward limbs in the holiday lights
Two foreigners on a piano bench
Bad teeth. Something about how the fog rises
Outside and the uncollard husky inside
Scratching at the door—
A splotchy man in a turtleneck
Hugging his guitar to his chin
Singing “city of immigrants”
And the whisper of sickness at my
Neck keeping me quiet and
The night could be forgotten one way
Or another but probably
This one.

She was the only sloppy nicotine
Kiss I didn’t want but sometimes
You’ve got a folk tune in there
That doesn’t quite
Fit.

——————
“What are you writing?” She asks —“I’m on
An adventure, look at me
Having feelings and being a pretty lad” then
She hit me in the mouth.
—————————————

Make a big deal about the purpose
Of the trip to a lot of women
A lot of sad women there
And in this room listening to
The pudgey man with the black guitar.
But first thing I do is always first,
Didn’t choose anything, just wanted
Is all. I was quiet enough for her
To project what she desired
And when I did choose 1 book of Scottish poetry
To bring, spent an hour sweating
With my pack in a crowded bookstore—
The poet I chose is from Iran
He never lived in this land
And neither shall I.
Hope is not circumstantial
But constant, not a rain,
But a well
Of purpose.
Here I am sick in the drizzle
Reading the poetry of a young alcoholic
Trying to let down so I can rise
Before dawn.
With the black travel