Brian Holton is a translator of modern and classical Chinese poetry and fiction, into both English and Scots who has won the Sarah Maguire Prize for his translation work on Anniversary Snow by Yang Lian. He is also a poet, singer, and songwriter.
Maybe Mr Brontë’s fear of fire came earlier, Before TB, night sweats, fever, blood-tinged sputum Took his wife, entire kin, five daughters and a son, Till near blind, like Rochester, and alone He circled the table in the parlour: a lost prayer. Perhaps Patrick Brontë could see himself like this: Standing on the edge of […]
The rain on the caravan roof – a skin drum, or birds dancing – and in the morning, the hens come to the caravan’s steps, feathery feet, on the hunt for bacon, maybe egg. Then – guess what? BIG surprise! The period arrives! I’m eleven. You’re eleven! Claire Innes says. Some don’t get them till […]
Would Jane Eyre come to the Information Desk? The speaker voice at Heathrow Airport said. There was I minding my own business. And when she came near, she was shouting: My name is Bertha; my name is not Jane Eyre I come from Kingston, Jamaica. Look here. Well, they’d placed handcuffs on her. Ras! She […]
This place to be named for those held and lost, Those who were driven from their homes or fled, For those of us not allowed to cross The border, who might visit for an hour at most The sacred place, if sick, if we possess a pass. Named for those shunted from pillar to post, […]
We closed the borders, folks, we nailed it. No trees, no plants, no immigrants. No foreign nurses, no doctors; we smashed it. We took control of our affairs. No fresh air. No birds, no bees, no HIV, no Poles, no pollen. No pandas, no polar bears, no ice, no dice. No rainforests, no foraging, no […]
(for M.) It is following you and you can’t escape. You cannot hold your head up or be happy. You lose your confidence. You turn a corner: it is there. You cannot step on it; make it disappear. Dawn raids strike and you are terrified. You are imprisoned in your own life. Every time you […]
(after the photograph by Richard Greenhill, 1976) Ten minutes after you were born, the books fell to the one side; your big brother continued playing Lego, putting the bits together, as if there was an order to life, and she stitched me up, that lovely midwife, and sorted out my afterbirth: and cut the cord […]
O ma darlin wee one At last you are here in the wurld And wi’ aa your wisdom Your een bricht as the stars, You’ve filled this hoose with licht, Yer trusty wee haun, your globe o’ a heid, My cherished yin, my hert’s ain! O ma darlin wee one The hale wurld welcomes ye: […]
Whether the weather be dreich or fair, my luve, if guid times greet us, or we hae tae face the worst, ahint and afore whit will happen tae us: blind in the present, eyes open to the furore, unkempt or perjink, suddenly puir or poorly, peely-wally or in fine fettle, beld or frosty, calm as […]