Second Decade

Muisicianer’s Lament

Gin I wis walkin doon ae road or anither,
files I wis duncin, lik Jagger nor Bowie, tae the soon o a drum.

Nooadays I’m mindin on times weel deid an beeriet,
mindin days fan I pit ma finger on the string an played
ma ain rock n roll, ma ain jazz in the howfs o Aiberdeen.

School Rooms

I had risen to the place between dreams.

Down cramped corridors
My feet dragging on the stairs.
I stooped low under ceilings,
And felt distance compress.

And the walls my fingers touched
Were the walls of a school I left fifty years ago.

Oh, yeah. What'd I Say?

(for the Wilderness Children - and all their mothers and fathers)

But they sing and, singing, love.

Although they take our children 

and slide guitars and synthesisers in their little souls,

rock and roll is raw and real.

It reaches in where text-books never did.

It answers our cries for release from danger,

for comfort in our animalness.

Radios of the world align.

Little ferrite rods are marching.

Copper wires turn into staves

on which the tunes are hung.

Sung in tongues, the hiss of questions come in rhyme —

Sing about this dreamy stuff —

Hush away that loveless ache…

Will the beat be just enough

To give back what we take?

This jive is a dangerous dance,

These creatures sing of chance

That turns a bomb into a saxophone,

Makes laser into Movietone.

Who lulls the monster's many heads to sleep?

Looks for its chains?

Music being both volcano and symphony

Seethes and sooths the savage human heart.

© BH 1988 

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I wrote this to go with a single, if I recall. I can't find it. All I have is a flexi-disk distributed with the fanzine Sowing Seeds #5. (The Wilderness Children "There's A Good Time A-Comin'"/"On the West Coast" (Choabie Records, DOSS I). 1987. It's here. There's another cartoon in the fanzine - The Only Adventure of 12-inch O'Toole - which is not as rude as you think. But it's another story.
I also learned that Fraser Reid who played guitar has recently died. I worked with Fraser when him and Andrea lived in Mid Craigie in Dundee. I did the cartoons at his request. Long time ago. We lost touch not so long ago, as our Christmas card lists decayed.
Sad that he's gone. You can read more about Fraser here.