Scottish psycho babble,

    on a hill appeared a rabble

somewhere between Edinburgh and Glasgow

    in Highland bubble.

    The wild furnace

    of one on top of another

In a second each replaces another

    in the tumbling down of numbers

    both sides betting on themselves

    flashing signals

to each ‘another’ (they were cousins).

    And

    in

    a

    trance

    it dawns on themselves they’re in a wrestle eternal

    while falling

    a long way and back

    drunk on the humour of the Big Yin Ben

    singing to themselves “amen”.

Although not god keeps them alive but the devil.

The bloody mist, how deep it went is this.

    These eyes of our fathers

    we thought of happiest

    every drinker on mead benches with smiles that sparkle,

    refeshing eternal sight with the cup of life monarchal.

    All our blood was this.

With names like:-

Bloody Mary,

    Doggie Don Donald,

    John/Coffin

    and

    Bonnie Prince Fairie.

All on parade and at the main event.

The most fearless of all Mad Margaret - an ancient Gaelic -

    otherwise known as Lights Out, Meg Merrilees, The Maid of Perth.

    She spewed forth from heated tunnel –

thrust concentrated

    and without thinking

    in blind tempo,

"Hold the door open, Gladiator, you ken.

    I'll fight the restaurant boy

And send him hame to think agin."

As there standing by a tree

    is the youngest, boy best, stand-out stood,

    Ranald, Chief of All the West.

    How do you describe him?

As Bringer of War?

Or Peace?

    By Jupiter,

    All and everything –

    trained well.

For engagement to see nobody.

    How friendly,

    His boot the size of Murrayfield.

    A certain tendency.

    Suddenly he had a vision

aroused this sleeping forest,
    the sun to rise, to warm us.
An end to this exile

  for the Northern King,

    the bloke over the water

    whose like shall not be seen again.

    Everyone's Heaven heard this,

All the birds began to sing at once.

    The trees now aflame

In perpetual summer.

    Where is this peaceful wood?

This heavenly mansion,

    This path strewn with dreams,

And footfalls to you

    In earthly moving –

    An air as fragrant as honey.

Each flower its own perfume.

    Breathing deeply,

The trees grew as straight as pillars.

    I heard a rainbow sing,

As Meg realised atop her throat screaming:

a loon as equally ugly as dishevelled.

    Still a moment to ask for a drop from the distillery.

to pass to my neighbour,

    to be his slave forever and name our child ELVIS.

    As when the King appeared in Memphis,

    his history traced in descent from a Haggis,

    of Scots, dead, useless

    naked and topless,

We raise a glass to remember

    the master magus

both Norse and Norman

a cross between man and woman

Not in our glen but in Las Vegas.

                                             B H Fraser

He seemed to be in the grove,
Where the eye meets dot.
Press send,

I said passing him
On the cross between Strand and Fleet.
Acknowledged as friends
Amid the bright din
A delete with unknown horn yet.
Wasted was this breath to stop his melody,
As he turned
As quick
Into traffic:

Walked across the road in front
The watch he had still watched
A world on its axis stopped
The flame was bright still and he fought
Then gave a rattle, a rally,
A man approached
The shoe travelling,
An air of hostility in flight
A vision.
Behold it.

Landing in old ovens tonight
Recording only the dead.
Although
The passing cloud
Had looked rather different earlier.

                                             B H Fraser

Blessings on Monaco
    And all its palaces –

Particularly the one I live in

    Covered in bourganvillea.

Or the yacht I forgot to mention
                                          Abacus 1,2,3.
          
Or a matter not unconnected,
        The boiling of the sea.

                                             B H Fraser

To arrest the error

    To tackle the devil

   To offer steps to Sibyl

To unravel the riddle

      Of trade perpetual.

I give you a séance/stance

   Of monkey dance

And half a chance

  To get to France

To fix the farmer who went to Basel

  To clip my hedge

   German or French

Watched from my floating note

   With trail upon trail

      Of scented soap.

                                             B H Fraser

    It was clear, blue, immobile.

Suddenly on command

    And quite snappy

In one direction and then another

   Straining at both illusion and shadow

It made me quite happy

   Getting directional

With every aspect of infinity

   A trade of itself

So pure

   I stayed up late

Uncorrelated to behaviour

  As he or she was

Or could be

   Possibly.

                                             B H Fraser

With flag and acropolis,

   As animal spirits greeted us

The air shook,

  Sound mutinous,

A trade Med with Club dead.

  Some of this familiar.

Hurriedly, I put my ear to the ground

  To hear junk trembling.

Soon they would come,

  These default virgins

Bearing rotten olives

   Without demurring.

                                             B H Fraser

Running powerfully

   From Berne to Washington

The sound of tut tut and drumming.

Above, bells

for new marriage

between regulator and regulator.

Isn't it wonderful

data correlated

to voice and nervous sinew

by young business school

as star crossed models

the new brothers

all names inter-twinned - winners.

Fooling millions.

Pure velocity, surges/rallies.

Suddenly last message reads:

            blame the Alternatives.

                                             B H Fraser

With LIBOR neutral

    We wait for Godot.

The jokes we share,

    Make sense of the ruin.

For some out there a failure.

                                             B H Fraser

I shall bring you now by muted mouth

    To sacred text

Naked and extinguished.

I shall bring you now

    Either

    To the end of time

    Or new summit.

I shall bring you now

    To entertainment.

To boys

    Who take you up and
                                        Down

And around again

    In simulation

Until the music breaks.

    I shall take you now

Into a sea of ruin

    Where chaos
            Is computer-driven

And the cancer
    Has every tongue still

I shall bring you now

    To neither good nor evil

        But observation.

                                             B H Fraser

Licking his lips

Without tank, fuel empty,

Contemplated below

No signal
The new normal -

Instrument and eye combined in symmetry.

    A hawk, hunter killer,

      Circling,
  In his glide wondering,

    Like every killer he would be hungry

                    After killing.
        His machine/stomach always empty.

Hunger turned him into missile

                    Aimed at cities.

Making the new extreme quite normal.

                                             B H Fraser

Could not mistake in the mist a-making,

    the drazzle blazing

of a cuckoo.

    cut through to summer's coming.

a clear cut call, shook the wood

we were like good sunday people,

    dared not say a word

while that bird was chirping.

    Blessed god in those stamped lips

while our children wept,

    knowing the fool of it all.

While Yyydrassil watched

    beyond a table that had been set.

                                             B H Fraser

One hell of a carry to put around you,

    Your ears, your face,

All flesh will soon be blessed

    With Dollar Calamare/Empire Squid.

A bug bitten son of a trail commission

    Hero of friendly, breaking-your-leg, persuasion

Some giant playground to return to later

    Performs a ten minute trade with naked option.

When trading, just a feeling he's just visiting

    His pathetic victim

Tied to wheelchair or investment prism.

    The prospectus read: that's for little people.

By lowering you down to depths

    Of unimaginable shrimpness

Where they borrow against you

    Before you're eaten.

Stunned by some flash trade

    Others deeply impressed

Can help with clarification

    By easing the trading of funnies,

Pegging the currency or stress testing unfavourably

    Competitor.

If not squid,

    A bank that's on the move with giant tentacle.

Knowing it cannot fail/quite impossible.

    The house wins like every best casino.

Monte Carlo or Dead Sea Scroll

    It doesn't matter,

If you have the ace,

    You have the hole.

                                             B H Fraser

      In a single step bound

                     To April

         When the remains are still

               A shallow breeze

                        Lifts the cuckoo

                              To tell of summer.

As cups become full

                                    With fresh flavour,

The season moves more cheerful

To sound unmistakeable.

         Each step madder now,

                  The first girl I saw I gave a kiss to,

She was a stranger.

       That's what's strange about nature.

                                             B H Fraser

   About love aloud

You quietly type

Sitting as moon behind a cloud.

   "Dallas, is that…. ?"

   "Houston, come in !"

That rocked launched, was it you ?

   And in your voyage,

      Travelling

Who were a million instruments

   All talking to?

As ranger

   You guard, I see,

      Orion's Belt.

With something wonderful.

A light with the power of twelve stars

Where a million canyons join.

I sometimes see you

   In your electric chariot

     Adding word to word in ecstasy.

                                             B H Fraser

Lift your eyes.

  Who are you ?

Now a hand cold

  Warms me.

Laying up

  Like two ships froze.

Watching.

  Both of us

Watching ourselves.

  What is broke lies hidden

Waiting below.

  The cold it has is fire.

It melts all rigging

  And every soul.

                                             B H Fraser

    In inscriptions, dates and confidences,

Preserved, rallied, referenced.

    A high up misrule

At angle.

    Echoed a hoped for

Resurrection.

    I knew your voice.

Paid for at entry.

    There was fire drill:

For the grave has its own music

    Flat and wasted,

A note frozen behind cypresses.

    This electric horse you spoke of,

Had it any reference to the way

    I looked upon you

Riding along the Westway ?

                                             B H Fraser

It is sunrise over Ruislip –

 
In circles that are ornamental
  So-called by council

Those names are silent and gentle.

 
An almost light yet

As everywhere,

    The commuter is stirring.

Awakes to thunder (rail to rail in competition).

 
    A heat to somewhere.

Home organised perfectly –

  Dinner prepared before leaving.

With urgency and haste.

   Gentle, merciful motherings relate.

 
Returns confused.

  In text,

           we,

                          god.

Shall we dango the fan?  Really?

  Earlier that afternoon,

I took tea and tango.

My red shoes nearly killed him.

They did.

                                             B H Fraser

To beat the clock, my alarms ring –
Please god, give them what they want.
I lie awake sometimes like this,
Unable to think
Until I manage the leap
From bedroom to basin
To begin my week.

                                             B H Fraser

Her ambition is killing

as

Miss Wembley sets out on the six thirty,

  reading of holidays, manicures, pedicures–

enters
  perfectly in ironed veil
doing admin in excelsis to the metal rhythms,
  
   and computerised voices directing thoughts and noises
firmly between train and platform.
 
  So making her way by season ticket

up through Maida Vale and the wealthier mezzanines.
 

Who is she?
     Secret, searched for somewhere
            on the North Circular,

is she the lark she sometimes says she is?

     Just for a moment

while still visible in this setting out and setting in

   her wings still visible,

in the rapid, early commuting.
  
Others noticed but did not say

   as they went up and down

       and along their way

           in their more ordinary migration.

                                             B H Fraser

So how about tonight?
Conditions seem somehow right.
You remember the filing cabinet,
Fax machine and stranger blackberry?
Now we have something more agreeable.

To sit alone amid hotels
Indulging ourselves in all those smells;
And when it takes our fancy
Call ourselves Sid and Nancy.

Worry, worry, worry,
Time's such an absolute bother
Except when rendezvousing
By the nearest railway
Without a need for endless email.

And think of all the gifts -
Silks, bracelets, shifts.
Clothes wrapped in seeming eternity
With shoes of the finest diamante.

Scent of roses and clementine
And diamonds from Tiffany.
'Come on down then'
Join me on this bed of flowers
To pass each minute and every hour.

                                             B H Fraser

In a crash of symbols, recessions, jingles

   With all the trappings of failure

In rally between nought and zero

   As rates encourage more mania

Carried away to darker pools and caves

   On the wheels of twelve casinos.

Now in a mass of bleeding liquidity,

   A bladder with too much credit –

Circuits of pipes and plumbing

   Beyond treatment.

What lies there

   A simple domino of taste.

A golden apple.

   A matter not of net but gross.

More than life or death.

   A lifetime spent to blind Greece.

   To guarantee a fortune

Without any benefit.

   Let our villas, though, be saved

                                             B H Fraser

With something personal

Hand upon receiver

Make this truly awesome.

Die Hard guys laughing and giggling

   To themselves as they ordered pizza.

Who measure this smallest tremble.

Kids raised on Marx and aphrodisia

The same boys (spoilt I think)

    Who broke the campus window

To the hot gates

Every top floor directed -

Ice sculpture of ourselves in victory.

Told to be alert, sensible

As the smirk shifted

To bundled reserves

In mysterious havens -

Correlated lights

For many to swim to.

Make science alchemy

If crazy/others madmen.

We stand in shadows

At times motionless.

   From the depths: Listen. Terror. Kiss.

To those who push back

Who fall but want a piece of us.

Instead we step aside

  To take to the inferno

Where dogs clean their bowls in pure lust

And money is like gold dust

A four minute warning is all you've got to join us.

                      Outstanding.

                                             B H Fraser

Like some infectious carp,

      My bonus out

Ponders the darkening.

      A hundred pound predator,

An inland shark
      Swims towards the great metropolis.

No system should despair

      Nor Michigan resist.

Every good American, booted, on.

      He paid our debts.

Made our borders strong.

      And the greenback,

What you'll find at Kingdom come.

      If it please the mighty Abraham

In smile-less state

      Opening those holy and beloved gates.

                                             B H Fraser

And did those words in City speak
    tell us much about what was said?
And was this secret place still England
    now it's owned by global inc?

And did the governor (himself divine)
    Judge like Mercury upon a whim?
And was mammon raised here
    amidst these bright, intelligent things?

Bring me my bonus of burning zeros!
    Bring me a nod from my manager!
Bring a decent appraisal, o career unfold!
    Bring me a car with two steering wheels!

I shall not rest from making millions,
    nor shall power sleep in my wallet,
until we have built a new Jerusalem
    where money is without limit.

Shall I compare an option to a future?
The thought of all that money is lovely.
Markets are volatile - alleluia.
Wow, the contract has a month longer
And the market's gone loco.
Hey, it could be an opportunity (in such confusion).
As once in a while you get this kind of thing -
To go away in May and come back in September,
Overpowering us happy few with a price
Nobody can remember.
I guess we couldn’t believe it -
The vanity of the forbidden City.
For as long as someone’s able and willing,
There’s always a chance to make a killing.