Poet in the Museum
Oct. 27th, 2023 07:52 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
smokingbootBetween going to the GP for a neuro and blood test,and West Lothian's public consultation yesterday afternoon, I was busy. But magic happened in the middle of it all.
I've never got round to visiting the local museum before; it's tiny and full of war memorabilia. But from behind the counter out popped an old gentleman with crutches. And, like a bard just stepped from the glamour of a fairy rathe, he told me stories to keep me rooted to the spot.
He told me of Princess Marjorie's being the first caesarian in Scotland, of the wooden castle whose remains can still be seen by aerial outline on the golf course, of the 'good laird,' and of so much I must list it all out soon so I don't forget. But most of all, he broke into a beautiful long poem I cannot find on the web; I think it began with the words 'the mair I think,' but am honestly not sure, because his dialect was deep and enchanting, and the words, often incomprehensible to me, became a melody of many notes running together like the strings of a harp.
As far as I could work out, the story in the poem was this; a man meets another in the town, and they sing and drink together becoming fine friends, and the man says something like he reckons even King James (IV? V?) at Linlithgow Palace isn't having so fine a time. His new friend suggests they go to the palace and see! Away they travel over the hills between the two towns to find the palace, and it turns out that the friend is indeed the king himself, who promptly knights the man and gives him lands. But I may have got much of it wrong. The merriment of the bard entertaining me was palpable when the first man says something like 'who here is the king?' and his companion tells him 'it's either you or me!'
But I cannot convey here the rich music of his voice, the sweet sound of the poet's words in the old stone cottage.
It should not be lost. Someone should record it all. But maybe it's a foolish thing to try and pin an experience down. If I went back and asked him to repeat it into a tape recorder, would it be the same as watching an old man suddenly burst into all this beauty of language, a song out of nowhere?
There's a magic isn't there, in the stones and the earth and the ordinary day. Whatever happens, I won't forget that.
I've never got round to visiting the local museum before; it's tiny and full of war memorabilia. But from behind the counter out popped an old gentleman with crutches. And, like a bard just stepped from the glamour of a fairy rathe, he told me stories to keep me rooted to the spot.
He told me of Princess Marjorie's being the first caesarian in Scotland, of the wooden castle whose remains can still be seen by aerial outline on the golf course, of the 'good laird,' and of so much I must list it all out soon so I don't forget. But most of all, he broke into a beautiful long poem I cannot find on the web; I think it began with the words 'the mair I think,' but am honestly not sure, because his dialect was deep and enchanting, and the words, often incomprehensible to me, became a melody of many notes running together like the strings of a harp.
As far as I could work out, the story in the poem was this; a man meets another in the town, and they sing and drink together becoming fine friends, and the man says something like he reckons even King James (IV? V?) at Linlithgow Palace isn't having so fine a time. His new friend suggests they go to the palace and see! Away they travel over the hills between the two towns to find the palace, and it turns out that the friend is indeed the king himself, who promptly knights the man and gives him lands. But I may have got much of it wrong. The merriment of the bard entertaining me was palpable when the first man says something like 'who here is the king?' and his companion tells him 'it's either you or me!'
But I cannot convey here the rich music of his voice, the sweet sound of the poet's words in the old stone cottage.
It should not be lost. Someone should record it all. But maybe it's a foolish thing to try and pin an experience down. If I went back and asked him to repeat it into a tape recorder, would it be the same as watching an old man suddenly burst into all this beauty of language, a song out of nowhere?
There's a magic isn't there, in the stones and the earth and the ordinary day. Whatever happens, I won't forget that.
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no subject
Date: 2023-10-27 12:24 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2023-10-30 10:33 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2023-10-27 01:15 pm (UTC)... That he was on crutches, too.
There's a magic isn't there, in the stones and the earth and the ordinary day. --Oh yes. Yes yes yes.
(Thank you also for your wonderful *telling* of it--I love your storytelling!)
no subject
Date: 2023-10-30 10:34 am (UTC)I am delighted you felt the magic. He was a powerful bard indeed!
no subject
Date: 2023-10-27 01:17 pm (UTC)Someone should record it all.
In fact, that would be an excellent project once all this health-related mishegoss clears up: to seek out the more elderly residents of the area and tape a bunch of oral histories.
no subject
Date: 2023-10-30 10:35 am (UTC)I am so glad you had a good time at the museum ❤️