Today is National Poetry Day, here in the Old Town of Edinburgh we are celebrating with a poem from Patrick Geddes who lived here and worked to make it a better place to live
'By Leaves We Live’The poem's title greets visitors to the Scottish Poetry Library just off the Canongate
“This is a green world, with animals comparatively few and small,
and all dependent on the leaves.
By leaves we live.
Some people have strange ideas that they live by money.
They think energy is generated by the circulation of coins.
Whereas the world is mainly a vast leaf colony,
growing on and forming a leafy soil,
not a mere mineral mass:
and we live not by the jingling of our coins,
but by the fullness of our harvests.”
Members of Save Our Old Town ended their deputation to the council planning committee on the 9th March 2006 with the poem, when they asked for a longer public consultation period on the Caltongate Masterplan and for consideration of the community alternative strategy.
A close up showing the leaves in the SOOT BannerThe SOOT Banner was begun during The Canongate Project last year and will be making her public debut this Satrday. People involved in the Save Our Old Town Campaign have joined with others to support the need to celebrate and remember the work of women in the struggle for equality and universal sufferage.
Come and Join the Gude Cause March through Edinburgh Saturday 10th October 2009
