Category: Dominic Cummings
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Who’s Human ?
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The quote towards the end of this new poem is from “Requiem” by the great Russian poet Anna Akhmatova, translated by A.S. Kline, 2005. She was writing of the Stalinist purges. Her poem of witness was not published until decades later, in her old age.… continue reading
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The Gaze Blank and Pitiless
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WB Yeats’ poem “The Second Coming” was written almost exactly a century ago, but if it’s possible for a poem to become truer still with age, then surely this one does. And yet…Yeats wrote his poem in 1919, in the aftermath of the First World War and the beginning of the Irish War of Independence…
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Word Play
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“What is the purpose of poetry ?” I ask myself. Sometimes I find this question simple to answer. And sometimes the answer itself is simple. The purpose of poetry is to work.… continue reading
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I See Everywhere the False
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I thought this was true in 2014, when it was written. I did not know then that the truth can become truer.… continue reading
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Counting
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This poem seems to follow on a bit from the previous one uploaded here. But whereas I wrote “I Insist my Ribs…” over three years ago, “Counting” has been written in the last few days. I have a vague idea of what was in my mind as I wrote this latest poem. And looking at…
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Might Labour be the Force to Renew UK Politics ?
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Our democratic politics isn’t working and, in my view, its dysfunction is one of the major causes of our present national crisis. In so many ways, our political structures and democratic processes – not just here in the UK, but manifestly in other countries too – are under attack and also in question. We have…
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I Send Greetings from this Place
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The place I’m thinking of this evening is called St Aldhelm’s Chapel, pictured above. It is a small and simple Norman structure built right on the edge of a Dorset cliff, facing out over the English Channel and beyond that to Europe. The chapel has no electricity and the interior is dark. It has…