As a nine year old I used to read serious historical books about Bonnie Prince Charlie. My best friend David Peacock read about Napoleon. We used to play with toy soldiers. We both had 'Action Men' that we'd play with but that seemed childish even at the time, we were only serious collectors of toy soldiers. We'd recreate famous battles of WWII or invent new battles and then throw rocks at each others troops to simulate battle damage. He was a better at placing his forces, I was better at throwing stones. You couldn't buy plastic civilians so it was all innocent fun. On school bus trips to the local swimming pool, we'd discuss the landscapes that we passed in terms of where we place soldiers under our command in battle situations in different eras.

Gay used to mean either homosexual or just plain happy. Now it means either homosexual or pathetic and weak, at least in supposedly adult conversation. That's not progression but it is instructional. On the schoolkids internal pecking order, me and David were okay. That complicated hierarchy was a web of competitive behaviour. For boys, it goes without saying that the best fighters get most superficial respect, but all competitions count. The best swimmers were respected, the best runners, the best footballers, the smartest kids. Even the best dancers , which ensured the survival of homosexuals. I was one of the schools best fighters because I came from a tougher background. David was better than average at everything. In football he was an striker, I was a defender. He is the only person I've tried to hack but missed. He joined the Royal Navy, I went into electronics.

I think we became interested in Napoleon and Bonnie Prince Charlie because they were successful because of who they were, their personalities created armies, but that is common historically, we were fascinated by them because they also failed because of who they were.

Historically, territorially, no Scottish army could ever have realistically hoped to hold onto more than Newcastle and Carlisle, and only then with the support of the locals. Many of Bonnie Prince Charlies most realistic and best military advisors and confidantes would've told him that. A few of them would've been saying 'Look, we are closer to London than ever. We've suffered for centuries. The English armies are abroad or behind us, press on.' Dynastically too, the Bonnie Prince wanted to unite the UK as the UK, but he wanted his father to be king, not himself. He turned back without trying for his prize.

Englands 'best living poet' has just died in my arrogant opinion. It is a cursed title, being the best living anything, a sure death sentence. Those lines of hers about Charlie, I think even Prince Charlie would appreciate. No wonder she never got made 'poet laureate' despite writing at Cheltenams womens college. Despite writing at Cheltenams womens college, when she got promoted there she soon left because the power went to her head. You can be sure you are a tyrant when you start bossing the Cheltenhams womens college staff around. She was better than Ted Hughes ever was, the best Laureate that never was.

So we have our first Scots Poet Laureate, Carol Ann Duffy, our first female Poet Laureate, celebrated in the press. She is no Ursela Askham Fanthorpe.

Edwin Morgan is Scotlands Makar, openly gay. I don't know who is currently 'Englands Best Living Poet', so many have died but some are maybe still alive, some are certainly just starting out.

By the way, a Laureate is a state or monarchist poet. I think we should elect an anti-Laureate, a poet who can't be bought. I would've voted for UA Fanthorpe. This is what we are competing with. I think most poets who are reading this can do better than this.


THE MAIDEN NAMES -Carol Ann Duffy

I got a shock

hearing the grown-ups talk

to find that my Grandmother's name

wasn't her name at all,

only her married name.

I listened hard

till I heard

that the same was true

of Grandmother Two,

who had nearly been left

on the shelf

long ago

when she was called something else.

The maiden names

were their real names.

I spoke them aloud-

Mary Wallace, Agatha Hart,

Mary Wallace, Agatha Hart

and saw them as maidens, lassies, girls

in their lost young worlds

with their own names.

Language inside me flared, burned,

then to my Mother I turned.

HIS NINE SYMPATHIES

were for the mothers,

listening to flute scales stop and start;

and for the fathers,

whistling their tired ways home in the dark;

for younger brothers,

sent with the jingling cows to market;

or for eldest daughters,

hymned up the aisles till death did them part;

for orphans,

led by a piper out of a pretty park;

and for paupers,

scraping their fiddles for small change in a hat;

for old ones,

tapping their sticks on the twisting path;

for soldiers,

stamping their boots on a victory march;

and for the lovers,

the broken chords of their hearts.

YOUR SCHOOL

Your school knows the names of places-

Dhaka, Rajshahi, Sylket, Khulna, Chittagong

and where they are.

Your school knows where rivers rise-

the Ganges, Brahmaputra, Thames-

and knows which seas they join.

Your school knows the height of mountains

disappearing into cloud.

Your school knows important dates,

the days when history turned around

to stare the human race

straight in the face.

Your school knows the poets' names, long dead-

John Keats, Rabindranath Tagore, Sylvia Plath -

and what they said.

It knows the paintings hanging in the old gold frames

in huge museums

and how the artists lived and loved

who dipped their brushes in the vivid paint.

Your school knows the language of the world-

hello, namaskar, sat sri akal, as-salaam-o-aleykum, salut-

it knows the homes of faith,

the certainties of science,

the living art of sport.

Your school knows what Isaac Newton thought,

what William Shakespeare wrote

and what Mohammed taught.

Your school knows your name-

Shirin, Abdul, Aysha, Rayhan, Lauren, Jack-

and who you are.

Your school knows the most important thing to knowy

ou are a star,

a star.

PEGGY GUGGENHEIM

Peggy, Peggy Guggenheim,

favourite drink Italian wine.

Peggy, Peggy Guggenheim,

favourite smell is turpentine.

Peggy, Peggy Guggenheim,

favourite jeans by Calvin Klein.

Peggy, Peggy Guggenheim,

favourite herb is lemon thyme.

Peggy, Peggy Guggenheim,

favourite fruit a Tuscan lime.

Peggy, Peggy Guggenheim,

favourite art Venetian mime.

Peggy, Peggy Guggenheim,

favourite tree a creeping vine.

Peggy, Peggy Guggenheim,

favourite statue free of grime.

Peggy, Peggy Guggenheim,

favourite poem has to rhyme

with Peggy, Peggy Guggenheim.

SAFE SOUNDS

You like safe sounds:

the dogs lapping at their bowls;

the pop of a cork on a bottle of plonk

as your mother cooks;

the Match of the Day theme tune

and Doctor Who-oo-oo.

Safe sounds:

your name called, two happy syllables

from the bottom to the top of the house;

your daft ringtone; the low gargle

of hot water in bubbles. Half asleep

in the drifting boat of your bed,

you like to hear the big trees

sound like the sea instead.

NIGHT WRITING

Only a neat margin of moonlight

there at the curtain's edge.

The room like a dark page.

I lie in bed.

Silence is ink.

The sound of my breath dips in

and out. So I begin

night writing. The stars type themselves

far out in space.

Who would guess,

to look at my sleeping face,

the rhymes and tall tales I invent?

Here be dragons; children lost

in the wood; three wishes; the wicked

and the good.

Read my lips.

The small hours are poems.

Dawn is a rubber.

GLAD

Glad we don't have to bark.

Glad we don't have to cock

one leg and wee on a lampost.

Glad we don't have to cluck

or lay an egg. Glad we don't

have to moo, neigh, baa, eat grass

or hay, be milked, fleeced, ridden.

Glad we don't have to hoot, hang

from the thread of a web, sting, slither.

Glad we don't have to mew, eat mice,

peck, breathe through gills, dwell

in shells or form a chrysalis, hiss,

hum, hover. Glad we don't

have to kip upside down in the dark, bark.

VENEZIA

Here today

Gondolier tomorrow.

Carol Ann Duffy made good, my apology to her.

The Twelve Days of Christmas 2009


1
ON THE FIRST DAY OF CHRISTMAS,
a buzzard on a branch.

In Afghanistan,
no partridge, pear tree;
but my true love sent to me
a card from home.
I sat alone,
crouched in yellow dust,
and traced the grins of my kids
with my thumb.
Somewhere down the line,
for another father, husband,
brother, son, a bullet
with his name on.

2
TWO TURTLE DOVES,
that Shakespeare loved –
turr turr, turr turr –
endangered now
by herbicide,
the chopping down
of where they hide –
turr turr, turr turr –
hawthorn thickets,
hedgerows, woodland.
Summer's music
fainter, farther…
the spreading drought
of the Sahara.

3
THREE FRENCH HENS –
un, deux, trois –
do not know
that French they are.

Three Welsh lambs –
un, dau, tri –
do not know
that Welsh they baa.

Newborn babies –
one, two, three –
only know
you human be.

Only know
you human be.

4
THE GRENADA DOVE IS CALLING.
The Condor calls from the USA.
The Wood Stork calls from its wetlands.
The Albatross calls from the sea,
on the fourth day of Christmas.

The Yellow-eared Parrot is calling.
The Kakapo calls from NZ.
The Blue-throated Macaw is calling.
The Little Tern calls from Japan, calls
my true love sent to me.

The Corncrake is calling; the Osprey.
The Baikal Teal calls from Korea.
The Cuckoo is calling from England,
four calling birds.

5
THE FIRST GOLD RING WAS GOLD INDEED –
bankers' profits fired in greed.

The second ring outshone the sun,
fuelled by carbon, doused by none.

Ring three was black gold, O for oil –
a serpent swallowing its tail.

The fourth ring was Celebrity;
Fool's Gold, winking on TV.

Ring five, religion's halo, slipped –
a blind for eyes or gag for lips.

With these five gold rings they you wed,
then slip them off when you are dead.

With these five go-o-o-old rings.

6
I BOUGHT A MAGIC GOOSE FROM A JOLLY FARMER.
This goose laid Barack Obama.

I bought a magic goose from a friendly fellow.
This goose laid Fabio Capello.

I bought a magic goose from a maiden (comely).
This goose laid Joanna Lumley.

I bought a magic goose from a busker (poor).
This goose laid Anish Kapoor.

I bought a magic goose from a bargain bin, it
was the goose laid Alan Bennett.

I bought a poisoned goose from a crook (sick, whiffing).
This foul goose laid Nick Griffin.

7
THE SWAN AT COCKERMOUTH –
of a broken heart, one half.

The Mersey Swans, flying
for Hillsborough, wings of justice.

Two, married and mute on the Thames,
watching The Wave.

A Swan for Adrian Mitchell
and a Swan for UA Fanthorpe,
swansongs for poetry.

The Queen's birds, paired
for life, beauty and truth.

8
ONE MILKED MONEY TO MEND HER MOAT.
Two milked voters to float her boat.
Three milked Parliament to flip her flat.
Four milked Government to snip her cat.
Five milked the dead for close-up tears.
Six milked the tax-payer for years and
years and years…
Seven milked the system to Botox
her brow.
Eight milked herself – the selfish cow.

9
BUT THE DEAD SOLDIER'S LADY DOES NOT DANCE.
But the lady in the Detention Centre
does not dance.
But the honour killing lady does not dance.
But the drowned policeman's lady
does not dance.
But the lady in the filthy hospital ward
does not dance.
But the lady in Wootton Bassett does not dance.
But the gangmaster's lady does not dance.
But the lady with the pit bull terrier
does not dance.
But another dead soldier's lady
does not dance.

10
LORDS DON'T LEAP.
They sleep.

11
WE PAID THE BLUDDY PIPER
fir 'Royal Bank;
twa pipers each
fir Fred and Phil,
fir Finlay, Fraser, Frank.
Too big tae fail!
The wee dog laughed!
The dish ran awa' wi' the spoon…
We paid the bluddy pipers,
but we dinnae call the tune.

12
DID THEY HEAR THE DRUMS IN COPENHAGEN,
banging their warning?
On the twelfth day in Copenhagen
was global warming stopped in its tracks
by Brown and Barack and Hu Jintao,
by Meles Zenawi and Al Sabban,
by Yvo de Boer and Hedegaard?
Did they strike a match
or strike a bargain,
the politicos in Copenhagen?
Did they twiddle their thumbs?
Or hear the drums
and hear the drums
and hear the drums?