What can poetry offer our enforced Corvid-19 seclusion, this locked-in time of question, tension, upset and loss, this desert time ?
In some eras and cultures, poetry has played and still plays a major role in the community’s life. In others, barely any. And only partly does that depend on how good the poets are. In the UK, how many… continue reading
Category Jeremy Corbyn
Songs from our Seclusion (congratulations, Keir Starmer)
Britain’s Return to Health
I want to talk about the British Labour Party which – despite everything – still occupies the ground I look to for the beginning of this nation’s regeneration and return to health.
But “ground” is one thing ; the withered and stunted vegetation I see presently over-running and littering that ground, is another.
To understand better why the Party is… continue reading
Cat Vies with Hard Drive for my Soul
Our race has re-made the world to be a reflection of our own chaotic inner lives and processes. We’ve fashioned our environment in such a way that it has become our self-portrait (if we dare to look). Perhaps we see ourselves for the first time, when we look out on the world we have made.
And perhaps we choose, or… continue reading
Where the Hoodlums Are
The stanza was written and uploaded on the day the UK left the EU, January 31st, 2020. The picture is of a tower built in Victorian times in belated tribute to the great William Tyndale. It stands on the edge of the Cotswold escarpment, overlooking the Severn estuary. The lovely photograph was taken by Derek Harper.
“A new dawn,” is… continue reading
High Noon is Nearly Upon Us. Where’s the Sheriff ?
Around the world, the hoodlums and outlaws are running amok, in their suits of armour made of lies. By contrast, the sheriffs seem downcast, overwhelmed and on the run. I feel downcast and overwhelmed, too. Might it mean that I’m a sheriff, in disguise ? But there is no star in my cupboard. The picture I have, or image I’m… continue reading