Saturday 27th August 2022
11am – Start at Bridge No. 3
It’s warm and sunny and still
No ripples on the
water
yesterday’s raindrop
ripples gone now
A new and different
present here and now
A busy day of tooing and
froing, cheery
More of us on foot
today, less of us on
bikes, walkers and
talkers, many sitting
still, bramble pickets
children, babies,
saunterers and joggers
And a hen party
paddle boards by
the bride-to-be
in the lead
People there to
witness and follow
for the hour
and many chance
encounters glancing
back, watching from
a bridge above, or
from a metal seat
Some cosy little
things – touching the
stone
immersing in the
willow tree
Watching the sun
on the water
dipping barefeet
into the cool and the
clear
It looks so murky to
the eye, the canal
but is so so clear to
the touch of the
skin
Do we privilege the
visual as our
way of knowing?
What of knowing in
the skin
What does it mean
to know a place
this way
The skin of it
and the skin of me
Surfaces
undersurfaces
textures
temperatures
The softness of
sandstone
and its raggedy
surface
feeling paint on
metal
Plants that brush
the forearm
and the inside of
the wrist
The spine aligned
with a wooden post
and the opening of
the ribcage
Being held by
willow trees
The feeling of the
run
The height of things
The height of things
and the height of
me
Swinging round
a metal pole
A fence that
lets me soar
A tiny rock that
lets me balance
Clothes and skin
marked with the traces
of the journey
water
plant-life
sandstone
graffiti coloured
paint
dust
and spiders webs
my cheek still
feels the moss
Do we have to love
being in the world
in the here and
now – knowing and
engaging with the
world of nature
and material –
the materiality of
things
as a way to
problem solve and
find solutions
watched by a crow
And a person who
found me because
another person
asked them
“are you looking
for the dancer”
I think again of
the valve of the
chance encounter
the unexpected
combinations
and the open-ended
gentle invitation
the be with something
in your own time
and your own way
with porous edges
that allow for choice
the unknown
the spontaneous
literally creating
small shifts and
ripples
bringing life and
spirit and fluidity
into how we are
This human-made
canal for industry
and capital
Then abandoned
disowned
discared
is teeming now
with life
The human and the
more than human
sharing
space and time
and place
unregulated
overlapping
sometimes
open-ended
looking out and
looking in
not brittle, not rigid,
not fixed
NEXT ENCOUNTER: Sunday 28th August 3pm
Tow Path, Bridge of Harrison Park
and the Eastern Edge
Whatson Crescent on one side
Polwarth Place on the other