The Burgh

Like some other Scottish places,

this town abides, if not dilapidated,

then resting like a lean to on its past.

The sadness is in shadows that never go,

cannot be modernised and improved,

that daytime never lessen, unresolved,

a hangover of history that even

the internet cannot erase.

Some different people here now,

but not really. Always nearly

the same as it ever was.

In the doorways of places

that are locked, faces of men

who may be traced to would be

saints of a thousand years ago,

ancestors ruined by Reformation,

others befouled by allegiance

to Rome.

This land lost religion’s game.

Sandstone capricious as crimson

rowans, honeyed as bell heather,

step gables high above in black granite,

stairways to the sky for the Others

not now spoken of.

I have lamented you in these streets,

we who will never meet again.

The over real facades masking

a crazy paved patina

in the buildings’ souls beneath.