Details of Readings at St John's Church, Edinburgh, August 2011

The Golden Thread of Poetry August 2011

The hall/café St John's Church west end of Princes Street Edinburgh

All readings begin at 2 pm

Tessa Ransford will read some poems and introduce golden thread poets each afternoon, all from Scotland beyond Edinburgh. We offer an hour of beauty that is truth and truth that is also beauty. We will be joined by singer-songwriter Toby Mottershead of Black Diamond Express

Enjoy artistic integrity and contemporary relevance, archetypal and topical. Our books are for sale in the Cornerstone Bookshop below the church. All are freely welcome.

Donations welcome

Tuesday 9th August

Walter Perrie and Willie Hershaw: they will together launch lyrics and poems on nature, culture and religion from their collaborative new publications by Fras

Thursday 11^th August

Morelle Smith: her poetry addresses the inner and outer journey

Alexander Hutchison: revisiting Inchcolm and other 'dear-known sites'

(as David Jones called them)

Lesley Harrison: her poems explore remote lonely landscapes and ways of living in them

Tuesday 16^th August

Morgan Downie: original and evocative island and seascape poems

Rosie Alexander: a young poet living in Orkney with a gentle and intelligent talent

Nalini Paul: her new book Slokt by Sea reaps a rich harvest from her year in Orkney

Thursday 18^th August

Lesley Duncan: her poems take in acute observations on Scottish history,

local Stirling themes including 'Leonardo Ponders Scotland'!

Anne Murray: her well-made poems include sonnets from travels in the Holy Land

Tuesday 23^rd August

Tessa Ransford

Iyad Hayatleh

We have been working together on poems inspired by the Five Pillars of Islam, translating each other's poems. The resulting book is entitled A Rug of a Thousand Colours

Thursday 25^th August

Hazel Buchan Cameron: a Scottish voice, modern, feisty and full of surprises

Dawn Wood: a poet-scientist, a persuasive and highly distinctive talent

Patricia Ace: poems on family relationships and nature from Crieff-based yoga teacher and writer

We are grateful to our personal sponsor

Two Quintas for the summer solstice, Hungary and Bulgaria

Elizabeth Empress of Austria, was married to the Austrian Emperor Franz Joseph. Too much of a private person to enjoy court life she stayed away as much as possible. She had a fondness for Hungary and spoke the language fluently. She was influential in the re-establishment of the Hungarian constitution which led to the Austrian Empire becoming the Dual Monarchy of Austria-Hungary. Clearly her feelings for the Hungarian people were reciprocated, as an area in Budapest, Erzsebetvaros [Elizabethville], part of the old Jewish quarter, has been named after her.

20/6/11 - Budapest

The streets in Erzsebetvaros

have a familiar echo -

monochrome dipped in fierce sunlight -

footsteps, a songbird -

all feels like home

21/6/11 - Neseber, Bulgaria

it gets dark so quickly -

the sun plunges to its next assignment

where it has a pact today

with a meridian, before it shifts its angle,

and begins to turn away

Golden Thread of Poetry Readings 2011

The Golden Thread of Poetry readings will take place at St John’s Church in the west end of Princes Street, Edinburgh on Tuesdays and Thursdays from 9^th August until 25^th August at 2 pm in the café.

The Festival of Spirituality is charging for the venue this year, so we have chosen the café rather than the much more expensive venue of the church. It has also meant that the readings are reduced in number from eight to six.

However the poets not included have other readings: Pauline Prior Pitt and Chrys Salt at Word Power bookshop, West Nicholson Street, Edinburgh 24^th August at 1 pm, and Jila Peacock at Rosslyn chapel on Sunday 28^th August at 5.30 pm.

All these readings are free and given freely. Books will be on sale at the Cornerstone Bookshop, below St John’s church.

The complete listings will be posted shortly.

What is hidden in our chests?

Laughter

(Rumi)

Laughter secret, laughter hidden

trapped in my chest

splitting my sides

deep in my heart

the interior court

which is the anywhere

angels are happy

Tessa Ransford

Purple Iris

An image from Freda's garden.

More images can be seen here

The Nature of Things

Hermes with Gift, is Dawn Wood's new poetry collection, published by The University of Abertay Press.

Cover image is by the Scottish artist Ronald Forbes, whose work is currently showing at Perth Museum and Art Gallery (until 15th October).

Hermes with Gift can be bought online at the University of Abertay Press
.and is also for sale at Perth Museum and Art Gallery.

On the Nature of Things is from this collection




ON THE NATURE OF THINGS

Just as a hummingbird – one so small

it is no more than a moth, half the length

of your thumb – still has the correct parts

overlaid and sleek, so it is with atoms.

Just as a baby sparrow can’t help

the gorgeous patterning of white spearheads

on its breast, a feast for St Sebastian,

so it is with atoms. Omnipresent,

plain and overlaid with only void.

The void that takes the form of a human

hand, that holds the gift of a thorn,

the spur of a rose, a greener field.

Dawn Wood

.

Epiphany and Sunflowers

EPIPHANY

HELIANTHUS ANNUS

For me an epiphany is one of the wonders of the world that touches ones heart and spirit, affects us physically, psychologically and emotionally. Yet I believe that this experience is not only felt by us humans but is a universal phenomenon, a celebration of life itself.

Therefore I have entitled my artwork, Helianthus annus, (Sunflower). Sunflowers have a type of phototropic response called heliotropism (sun turning). The leaves and heads of young sunflowers follow the sun and so to my mind they experience a daily epiphany as their heads turn each morning to the sunrise.

This piece is a mixed media triptych 35cm X 22cm and is constructed from recycled barrel struts, my handmade paper from sunflowers grown in my garden and pressed leaves and petals, collage and paint. All my artwork is predominately made from recycled/found materials, apart from paint and hanging materials.

My work has been widely exhibited in Edinburgh, East Lothian, North East Scotland, Dundee and Rome. Unfortunately I have not yet got round to organising a website!

Coincidentally, International Sunflower Guerrilla Gardening Day is 1^st May when guerrilla gardeners around the world plant sunflowers in neglected public places and bare roadside verges in their neighbourhood. The day the exhibition opens!

Mary Archibald.

A Cup of Kindness

A cup of Kindness

Faith, Hope and Charity

wrote St Paul in his hymn to Love

these three abide

In Iraq, explains Canon White on the radio,

Democracy is not what people yearn for

blasted on them as it was through missiles and bombs

What they most want, why can’t we understand,

is water, electricity and kindness

life, communication, things working normally

God only knows

Buddha only knows

Mohammed only knows

everyone knows we want the kindness

which lies at the heart of our being

For boys and girls, men and women, animals and plants

for all who go about their lives

for daily bread and caring for one another

it is kindness we want

In Scotland we have given a song to the world

‘a cup of kindness’

to take, to drink, to share

Water, electricity and kindness,

but the greatest of these is kindness.

Tessa Ransford