East Windy West Endy: A Pastiche

Of astragals in fenestrals
Coach houses   stables round the back
Brash Craig did whisper madrigals
To Geordie Drummond -- city hack

One sits and waits great thoughts to come
In Edinburgh New Town
One scans the literature full scored
Of Edinburgh New Town
For here was young Davey given his door
And here Our Rab laid many a whore
In Edinburgh New Town

( James Craig did set his open Squares
  Where Robert Adam drew his brush ) 

Pompous arrogant stony Squares
Full of bowlers   those cultured players
Financial houses of every grade
Whose mechanics may live
Say Once a decade

( Oh Charie wid ye come again
  Wi the pubs all hid doon some wee lane )

Rose street   rabble invested pubs
Alcoholic absorb an excellent lunch
Of tourists workers students thugs
With strong ale supped
In half pint jugs

( Old Moray had the right idea
  Where once is green there green should be
  The pox on his spavin feuin son
  Sold out to the Nobs
  So they could have them a Town )

Young Paxton came to clinch his fame
So they led him to Calton Hill
There to trowel and to culture a flower
To pretty the Parthenon

James Craig he worked on his own Square
And a right high place did make it
But the moment he did turn his back
They all moved to Haymarket

Advocated India Street
Of inken doors
Brass plate relief
Neat ivy red Northumberland
Of girlish chambers
Barred to man
Royal Circus   Drummond Place
Linked by Great King's grand embrace
A one eyed tom   Ginger   well worn
Bears witness   that life
Is not all stone


         Written in Great King Street, Edinburgh New Town, 1967. 

Expiation

We masters of the blue sword
All fish of a Freiburg night
Carried away by the magic of Ford
Now gasp with the sharp delight
The candles glitter around the lake
As lovers drown love drink a bottle
We splash along in Fritz's wake
Mad race for the centre the grotto
White bodies capering under the skies
A blending of Europa's kinder
And René cursing the water's ice
Cool death of Teutonic cauldron
Crisp freedom from the loving thought
Sad heart of a dark eyed witch
Thrashing free I leap like trout
She lost a father at Auschwitz

Marlene driving in her bare feet
Still mustached with a froth of beer
A red haired cat packed in her seat
With my hand I worked the gear
Six in the back We two at the wheel
And on the roof two more
The car raced with ecstatic feel
As Fritz looked in the door
The smooth slide of our bodies
Her fists at my chest
The sun through the windows
The soft of her breast
Lying nearnaked by some pool
I and a green eyed minx
We silent touch my secret soul
Some father died at Auschwitz

Perched in the munster at Strasbourg
The distant cut of the Rhine
Below the bourgeois iceberg
Preserved for lack of wine
The Nymphenburg   foul brown house
Now the Nevsky baked in clay
Leading far from fountained Paris
And fresh Florence of today
Fritz and I we traded the world
And thought of the summer age
Cursing Hegel's idealist mould
Regretting the written page
A Jewish girl in dreamtime
Alone in her strength of need
Joined us in dark pogrom
Made love our only deed

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