Eternal Flames

“Up in the morning’s no for me, / Up in the morning early,” Burns wrote, and normally, one takes his point. Not this morning though; we left our beds before the birds began to trill, up even before John Humphreys began the daily grumble. It was too sunny for that, and besides – the Olympic flame was in town!

Walking through Edinburgh’s sun-splashed streets, one could already see small crowds begin to gather along the route the Olympic flame’s relay would take. We spent the time walking to work thinking of the astonishing number of people involved in making London 2012, and all of its cultural offshoots, happen – not least the SPL’s Written World project.

Poetry and sport, you might not think are natural bedfellows. But the poet and the athlete share a dedication to their passion, to perfection, one that is mostly worked out on their own. Whether training on the track or at a desk, the loneliness of the long-distance runner and long-distance poet are not dissimilar. The Written World recognises that sport and poetry at their best can connect people from very different cultures. That’s why the SPL undertook the mammoth project of finding a poem to represent all 200-plus nations taking part in London 2012. Every day, Radio Scotland broadcasts a poem taken from the project, which can then be read on our website.

Just after 7am, we reached the Royal Mile and the top of Crichton’s Close, where the SPL is located. A jolly atmosphere was breaking out. A flotilla of heavily branded buses swept by, accompanied by police on motorbikes. Then – the flame! Carried aloft! Fire is so often used by poets to describe passion or torment. One thinks of Robert Frost’s lines:

Some say the world will end in fire,
Some say in ice.
From what I’ve tasted of desire
I hold with those who favour fire.

The Olympics flame was more of the order of a camp fire, a communal occasion which we could all share in. With big smiles on the face of the woman chosen to carry the torch down the Royal Mile and the spectators, we managed to take a snap of the flame passing by the top of our road (see above).

Arriving in the SPL just after the flame had come and gone, our eye alighted (bad pun intended) on a copy of World Poems on the Underground. It’s a collection of poems taken from 44 different countries, copies of which you can pick up from the SPL for free.

We were particularly taken by Trinidad’s contribution to the booklet, which sums up so much of what today and London 2012 is about, ‘Viv’, a poem by Faustin Charles about the cricketer Vivian Richards: “The player springs into the eye / and lights the world with fires / Of a million dreams, a million aspirations.” We’re our best selves when reading or watching a good game.

Poetry and sport – eternal flames worth getting out of bed early for.