We’re very grateful to West Lothian based poet Will Samson for writing a poem to celebrate cinema. Will read the poem at the opening weekend of
our 12th edition and we’ve reproduced the text below with his kind permission.

Invitation

As the warlords rattle their sabres
Wallowing in their murderous capers
“Kill, kill, kill.” Is their only invitation
This is not our direction
As the money hungry corporate puppets
Extend their grasping limbs
Delighting in their legal crimes
More, “money, money, money,” is their only invocation
This is not our direction
But there is a place above the circulating suffocating sulfurous smog
Where we can breathe. Here. Together.
Thank you for accepting this invitation.
This is our direction.
Will Samson, 2022.