starting over many times
Edinburgh erases its past
making space for the future
am i in the future now?
says the ghost-woman
returned to Edinburgh
some say she’s confused
tour guides point her out
behind the ghost i am
a stone or piece of rock
or a plant in Holyrood Park
silent until you break me open
talking about times when
i’ve been touched, kicked,
kissed, thrown, pocketed
and put back by a relative
always returning, studied by
geologists, secrets in my layers
a hydrogen-helium dance
through dust of silicon and oxygen
Orion Nebula was my nursery
this is not your golden age, Edinburgh
i was part of a bigger family, separated,
moving away in tectonic shifts