
Best Scottish Poems 2004 Introduction \| The Poems \| Acknowledgements

The poems

Gael Turnbull

Source

Editor's comment

Biography

Do You

after Jacques Charpentreau

Do you see who dodges away,
disappearing into the blue?
That is life, on its way,
dancing beyond you.

Do you feel a breath tease
your cheek, stir the grass, lift the dew?
That is time, like the breeze,
having fun with you.

Do you hear singing, a choir
of echoing voices, promising anew?
Relax. That is only desire
playing tricks with you.

Do you sense at your elbow
an old friend but can't guess who?
That is death, faithful shadow,
laughing with you.

Source

First published in The Dark Horse, 15, summer 2003.
Reprinted by permission of the Estate of Gael Turnbull.

Editor's comment

Gael Turnbull’s death in July this year has robbed us of a truly individual voice. ‘Do You’ is typically Turnbull: sparked by another work (he was a great homager), full of repetition, a sing-song quality, a wry humour, an enticing simplicity saying profound things.

Hamish Whyte

Biography

Gael Turnbull (1928-2004) was born in Edinburgh, where he lived after spending most of his working life as a doctor in England, Canada and the United States.

His poetry is characterized by an unusually wide range of technical resource and invention, extending to his recent kinetic poems (seen on the streets of Edinburgh during the Festival).

He published numerous books and pamphlets of poems, most recently Transmutations (Shoestring Press, 1997), A Rattle of Scree (Akros, 1997) and Might a shape of words (Mariscat, 2000).