At the end of the royal mile, the runner stopped to check his map. Behind him, the streets teamed with actors and street performers but the address scribbled in his own handwriting said 'holyrood' and here it was - a strange deconstructed smorgasbord of granite blocks, shaped metal and dreams -standing at the centre of one of the most important decisions in the history of Scotland - whether to stay in the UK, or leave it and become a new, separate and independent state.
This was no circus and the colour and energy and madness of the surrounding city seemed suspended a few yards before it.
"What do people want from this place if not circus tricks and spectacle", he asked.
In the public circulation area, Edwin Morgan, the great scottish poet, explained .
"What do the people want of the place? They want it to be filled with thinking persons as open and adventurous as its architecture.
A nest of fearties is what they do not want.
A symposium of procrastinators is what they do not want. A phalanx of forelock-tuggers is what they do not want. And perhaps above all the droopy mantra of ‘it wizny me’ is what they do not want."
"I see" said the runner "so not a juggler or a sword swallower?"
"No"
Outside, a fire-eater walked passed, flame extinguished for now. He stopped, "you are running away to the circus?"
"Yes"
"So am I"
"Do you know where it is?"
"No - we are all trying to find the road that leads there - all the performers and street acts you see around here. i don't know where it is but i think it is in the west - we have a week to get there - if we do not find it we will perform here on these damp city streets. Good luck, my friend, in your search."
The runner nodded.
"Good luck"
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