Our Lady of the aeroplanes
Our Lady of the catacombs
Our Lady of the instagram
Our Lady of Guantanamo
Our Lady of Abu Ghraib
Our Lady of the dusty towns
Our Lady of the borders
Our Lady of the killing fields
Our Lady of the broken word
Our Lady of the night
Pray for us : sinners
Our Lady of the poppy fields
Our Lady of the fever chart
Our Lady of laboratories
Our Lady of the rubbish dumps
Our Lady of the body count
Our Lady of the waterboard
Our Lady of the wayside
Our Lady of the trolley parks
Our Lady of the underpass
Our Lady of the morgue
Pray for us : sinners
Our Lady of the superdraw
Our Lady of catastrophe
Our Lady of the trading floor
Our Lady of the treasure house
Our Lady of the customs post
Our Lady of the tax return
Our Lady of the printing press
Our Lady of the network
Our Lady of the anthill
Our Lady of the web
Pray for us : sinners
Our Lady of epiphanies
Our Lady of the six degrees
Our Lady of infinities
Our Lady of belief
Our Lady of the beating heart
Pray for us : sinners
The Ring of Brodgar is a neolithic stone circle in Orkney, between the sweetwater Loch Harray and the salt Loch of Stenness.
Brodgar is the working title of a long poem that is so far mostly unwritten. I have its architecture in outline, but its themes are many and I have not yet been able to fix any boundaries for it. In Jacques Derrida's phrase, Il n'y a pas de hors-texte.
I have envisaged a section of Brodgar that would map to the 21st century geopolitical landscape. A variation of this idea stands alone for now, as No Visible Marks, although the pace of political upheaval has dated some of the specific references.
It was included in Found Poems.
During the intercessions we sometimes leave a silence for members of the congregation to bring to mind their individual prayer concerns, so these may be included in the corporate offering. The space before the final stanza of this poem serves the same purpose. When I read it aloud I measure out a silent space equivalent to one 5-line stanza.
Stephen Halliday 