Standing on top of the National Museum of Scotland
We find the roof garden.
Its little patch of moorland, birches,
heather so perfect it might hide
grouse turd, quartz, even Tunnock wrappers.
A mountain peak handkerchief
picnic-pack pooled
until the air all around is streaked with dry
leaves and the ghost of pollen.
And the sky opens out above all the glass
inaccessible VIP pathways.
How did we get here like this?
And the face of volcanos: did I mention
Arthur’s Seat with its buzz cut of tourists?
Will one of them fly?
Fighting vertigo with talk and tin cans,
the children snail the big rocks,
impossible here, and the glinty light
changes. And I feel happy
lifting off slightly over to Blackford Hill
and Salisbury Crags, bigger than
anything this family thing.
And as we trooped down to the café;
the blank plastic clock below
cried out the hour like birdsong
telling me later
that was the moment that you died.
About this poem
This poem was included in Best Scottish Poems 2022. Best Scottish Poems is an online publication, consisting of 20 poems chosen by a different editor each year, with comments by the editor and poets. It provides a personal overview of a year of Scottish poetry. The editor in 2022 was Ifor ap Glyn.
Editor’s note:
The significance of a moment is not always apparent at the time. The careful litany of detail in this poem, with its occasional flash of humour, apparently records the wonderful view from the top of a museum. Only the ‘ghost of pollen’, the idea of flying and the ‘glinty light’ change suggest there might be more, and yet the close of the second stanza with ‘this family thing’ again lulls us into a false sense of security- before the gut-punch of the last line. A masterful delineation of the detail of sudden loss.
Author’s note:
I wrote this poem after visiting the National Museum in Chambers Street. Somehow or other we found ourselves in the roof garden on top of the museum. In amongst all the family chaos, I experienced a moment of great joy as described in the poem. Later I realised that was when my Dad had passed away. He had a huge fondness for Edinburgh, had met my Mum here and especially loved the music and, as an Australian, the endless summer light. I feel in some way he had taken a moment to connect before he left. Of course, there are more things ending in this poem but I will leave you to judge for yourself as to what they might be.
