23rd August 2022, 11am

Start at the Greenway

brutalist concrete

bridge in Wester Hailes

The day of turning

back

Returning

Retracing

Revisiting

Reexamining

Reentering

Reexperiencing

Feeling reluctant

And for the first time

knowing in my bones

the distance there

is to travel

No wind today

It is warm

and humid and still

The canal dark

and murky looking

slow slow moving

if moving at all

I put my hand in

and the water is

clear and cool

More people today

Coming and going

A woman asks directions

to Wester Hailes Plaza

People carry shopping

back and forth from

shop to home, both

directions

Friendly as ever

I’m asked what it is

I’m doing here

Experiencing the

canal I say

by moving on its

edges

I learn they walk

here daily and

really love this

place

Exchanging pleasantries

I’m left to go about

my business

I hear trains

and cars

running close to the

canal

Parallel lines

The sound of car

alarms, and birdsong

Intrigued today by

the wooden ledge

that runs under the cut stone edge –

a softer buffer for

the boats –

The habit of the

wooden edges

my Art Festival

companion says.

Nearly always these

decayed

robust

weather worn

strong enough to

take my weight

Notice empty

mooring docks

along the other side

waiting

on canal boats

to set up home

I trace a tangled

clump of weeds

moving

Oh so slowly

on the surface of

the water

moved by something

underneath –

and turning gently

on their axis

who do we come up

against that

turns us round in

life?

The slow of the turn

that the weeds

are making

Is a slow

that is slower

than the slowest

turn I can find

in my body

I run for a bit

Up a banking and

down again

The feeling of the

run enlivens me

The same red van

reflects in the

water, like

yesterday

Music plays from a

bike that cycles

past. I have a

wee private boogie

to myself

Weeds and rushes

and plant life

flourishes

Green and yellow

and pink

Tree roots raise

the tarmac of

the towpath

heading for the

water

I play with a branch

that’s landed in the

canal

the weeds are thick

and the water

heavy

I think of the weight

of water

its force and its power

The canal widens

and narrows and

had v shaped

stone edging in

places

And I end today

on the cut stone

bench, perched

atop a wall, that

I sat on yesterday

on the edge of

Hailes Quarry Park

Going back to where

I started

with the same

anticipation

sense of discovery

things not yet

noticed

Feeling I am still

on the way to

somewhere

Feeling an abundance

And realising everyday

in nature, in our

city spaces, is a

different day to the

days before

Fodder for the senses

Keeping us alive

Oh and finding

veins in stone

that look like the

veins on the

underside of my

wrist

Reminds me how the

discovery of the

circulation of

the heart

(Harvey, 17th Century) and

the system of

arteries and veins

in the body

gave urban planners

the notions of

streets as arteries

“People’s culture

comes out of

interpretation

and

importations

of ideas from

other realms”

RICHARD SENNETT

There is such

entaglement

between

the human,

the non-human

and

the more-than-human

The organic and

the inorganic

weave and

intertwine

NEXT: Wednesday 24th August 2022, 7.45pm

Starting on the stone seat

in the wall

by Hailes Quarry Park