On National Poetry Day Gavin Bell joins a postman poet on his rounds
of Kintyre, where inspiration seems to hang in the salty air and the
muse can be encountered on any bend on the road
IT WAS the two heifers blocking a narrow road near Machrihanish that
made Angus Martin stop and think. He was behind schedule with his
morning postal deliveries, and he was irritated by the hold-up. Then he
thought: ''My destination isn't going to move. I'm still going to get
there; just a wee bit later.'' So he sat back in his van and admired the
young cows, and by the time they moved on the outline of a poem was
taking shape in his mind.
A few hours later, Martin sat on a deserted beach watching the grey
Atlantic rollers breaking on the shore. Then he lit a pipe, and wrote a
poem about the absurdity of allowing the demands of the clock to
interfere with the natural rhythms of life. He called it Two Heifers At
Machrihanish.
It often happens like this with Angus Martin, the postman-poet of
Campbeltown. He'll be driving along on his rural rounds, thinking of
nothing in particular, when he'll see or experience something that will
summon his muse.
On another occasion, watching fishermen emptying their lobster creels
inspired an allegorical verse in which a human ends up in a ''keep box''
-- the last resting place of lobsters.
''I find this job very conducive to both thinking and writing
poetry,'' he says. ''As you can see, it's relatively stress-free, and
quite pleasant most of the time.''
We are bumping along a muddy track meandering over the green hills of
south Kintyre, past farms and whitewashed cottages, with flocks of gulls
and rooks wheeling in the fields. Washing lines are snapping in a fresh
breeze, and friendly sheepdogs trot up for a pat as Martin delivers his
letters.
''I can say I'm quite happy doing this job. One of the benefits is
that at the end of the day I can lock up the van and go home, and forget
my work till the morning. That keeps my head clear for my own
thoughts,'' he says.
It is just as well for Martin that he enjoys his ''day job'', because
he would be hard-pressed to support his family on his income from
writing poetry. Although well regarded in the writing fraternity, and
lauded by the Scottish Arts Council, there is limited public demand for
his verse. His last royalty cheque, from a collection of poems, was for
#2. He has had five other books published, on social history and the
fishing industry, but they have not made much money either.
He accepts this state of affairs philosophically: ''Obviously, poetry
doesn't have a wide popular appeal, and I don't see how that can ever
change much. It will probably remain a minority interest. That's just
the way it is.''
In any case, Martin is happier driving his red post van around Kintyre
six days a week than he would be locked away in an ivory tower with his
muse. ''I don't think I could just write poetry. It could be done, of
course. You could shut yourself away and just write, but I prefer
society. I think it's more sensible to keep active in the world, and to
move around people.''
It is still hard to make ends meet on his salary, with three young
daughters to bring up, and he is deeply grateful to the Scottish Arts
Council for its support. A bursary awarded this year, designed to give
him more time to write, was very welcome. ''In a sense, I don't approve
of hand-outs,'' he says. ''If you're a writer you'll write, even if all
you have is a candle and a stub of pencil. But there are times when a
financial lift is necessary, and that's where the Arts Council does
really good work.''
Martin's job helps him in other ways. Working in a traditional, rural
community he hears old Scots expressions which are peculiar to the area,
or which have died out in other parts of the country; he collects such
words and phrases for the Scottish National Dictionary project in
Edinburgh, and incorporates many of them in his poetry, which is
increasingly influenced by Scots idioms.
But most of all it is being in the open air, and having time to
reflect on nature and history, that inspires and breathes life into his
poetry. He recently stumbled across a small, bronze-age site while
hill-walking, and four poems came from the discovery. At Ballygregan
Farm, an old, grey place on a hill, he says: ''There was an ancestor of
mine, Colin McGuiness, who lived here a couple of hundred years ago.''
He says it as if it was yesterday.
Before joining the Post Office 16 years ago, Martin was a herring
fisherman and his ties to the sea remain strong. Weather permitting, his
favourite spot for contemplation and composition is a remote beach where
his only company is gulls and sometimes starlings flitting above the
flying spray.
He will not be participating in any of today's National Poetry Day
events, partly because he has not been invited to do anything and partly
because he is reluctant to organise anything himself. He is a
soft-spoken, modest man who does not impose himself on the community he
lives in. ''I usually do only one reading a year. There's only so much
you can do in a small place like this.''
He has not cultivated a wider audience because he is happy where he
is, and he dislikes travelling. Family holidays are spent a few miles
away in a caravan at Southend. He has never driven on a motorway, and
doubts if he ever will. A forthcoming jaunt to Edinburgh, to take his
daughters to the zoo and the National Museum, will be undertaken by bus
and train.
So while other poets are rushing around today on reading tours, Angus
Martin will be driving his van at its usual sedate pace through the
Kintyre countryside, with a notebook in his pocket and his thoughts
drifting towards the birds and the animals around him.
This suits him fine -- he can live without fame and fortune, and he's
not sure he deserves them anyway. ''I don't rate myself particularly
highly as a poet,'' he says. ''I've some merit, no doubt, but if I was
using a football analogy I wouldn't put myself in the premier league.
I'd be somewhere near the bottom of the first division, I think.'' He
pauses reflectively, then says: ''But then, the potential's aye there,
isn't it?''
At the other end of the country, on the Isle of Lewis, another poet
has taken the bold step of resigning from a secure job to devote himself
to full-time writing.
Ian Stephen, a coastguard at Stornoway for 10 years, made the move
this year after winning a literary award and being granted a Scottish
Arts Council bursary. His prize in the inaugural Robert Louis Stevenson
award, sponsored by the international distribution company Christian
Salvesen, was two months in a French village frequented by Stevenson and
other writers and artists in the 1870s. The outcome was a new collection
of poems which will be published soon.
Free for the first time to concentrate on his writing, Stephen
developed a systematic approach in France which he was loath to
surrender on his return to Lewis. After discussing the options with his
wife, who has a part-time job in the voluntary sector, he decided to
make the break from HM Coastguards.
''It wasn't an easy decision to make, especially since I liked my job
and it was secure and reasonably well paid,'' he recalls. ''We knew we
would take a drop in earnings, but in the end we decided it would be
worth it in terms of having a more balanced life. The award and the
bursary made it a lot easier, of course, and now we're quite happy with
the move.''
Like his kindred spirit in Kintyre, Ian Stephen has been strongly
influenced by his ''day job'' -- seafaring themes pervade much of his
writing, and maritime rescue operations, in particular, have produced
several short stories. Of one of his poetry collections, a Herald
reviewer wrote: ''His main subjects -- seas, winds and tides, shorelines
and horizons -- are expressed in precisely observed details of shape,
colour, texture and movement that capture the spirit of a place as well
as the topography.''
Stephen says: ''The coastguard job was very good for subject matter.
It gave me a lot in terms of experience and contact with the rest of the
world, but writing had to take second place, which was frustrating. I'm
much happier now.''
Finances are tight, with two young sons to support, but Ian Stephen
manages to keep his family above the fiscal Plimsoll line with freelance
journalism and occasional poetry readings on radio and television. He
will not be featuring in any events today, however.
He is busy completing his new collection of poetry, working on a
novel, and preparing to return to France to give a series of readings
and workshops at international schools. It seems likely that Robert
Louis Stevenson would approve.
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