My friend published a book
of collected Scots Proverbs.
200 pages and more, filled
with countless ways of saying
"Don't show off."

And that precious wisdom,
generations in the making
percolated through smokey thatch
in dismal dripping glens,

Tattooed into tenement bricks
with the soot of dead industry,
added to the diet
with the excess salt and saturated fat,

Paving the roads
on which all ambition travels south,
And fizzing through the lager
on its way to the head

Now hangs around the kids
like the stink around an ashtray
and stifles any pride
they might invest in themselves.

They will pass it on
with their genes
and their endless disappointments,
despising anyone who rises
above the station
at which they are
eternally delayed.