In all our sanctuaries we sit at risk

  • Mr. Johnson’s Competition

    The UK Tory Party Conference is taking place in Manchester, as I write this. In the little poem above, written this morning after a very rainy night, I am thinking of various misleading and dishonest pronouncements made by Prime Minister Johnson in and around the conference. Perhaps the one that struck me hardest, was his statement delivered to the respected interviewer Andrew Marr, on television at the week-end, that UK wages have gone up. Mr Marr challenged Mr Johnson  on that score and gave the true picture, which is that they have gone down. Mr Johnson repeated his lie, this time a bit louder.

    (It’s the Narrative, stupid. Why bovver with Reality ?).

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  • The Good of Language

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  • The Potent Appeal of the “Strong Model”

     

    Why do certain behaviours, or opinions, or political policies, become popular at some point, where before they would have been rejected out of hand ? Why do certain approaches, or qualities of presentation, previously scorned, suddenly start to be given value ?  And do all such changes represent advance, or improvement ? No. 

    And caught up as we are in a world transforming faster and faster, it is surely hard for all of us to keep track of it all, let alone make sense of it. There are so many elements at work, each one rushing, in both foreground and background, some drawing headlines and brief comment, others just slipping through and past, almost as if unnoticed, just part of the general blur. But these less noticeable changes and new features might then begin to show themselves and start to be commented on – not as changes, but as new norms, furnishings in the room that are now treated as if they’ve always been there, and therefore, by definition, are beyond challenge or question.

    But in all my own confusion and anxiety in the present maelstrom of things sweeping us all along, I’ve noticed a particular feature, or strand, or thread running through, which seems to stand out a bit and may be worth recording here. It could be that others have spotted it already, but if so, I’ve missed what they have had to say on it and, certainly, it hasn’t featured large.

    Is it significant ? Is that why it seems to me to stand out ? Or does it stand out only because unmarked ? I simply don’t know.

    I shall start with some background context – a concept which an experienced trainer in mental health social work once described to me. She called it “The Strong Model” (this was well before our present time in which the word “model” has come to describe a computer’s prediction of what’s in store). I think the concept this trainer described to me might have been original to her, the result of her own observations over the years. But it is also reminiscent of psycho-analytic perspectives on how organisations work, and how people work in them. I would associate these perspectives with the Tavistock Clinic during the 1970’s and 80’s, a time when the Tavistock’s voice was strong and confident and people across the caring professions were receptive to it. One name often associated with the Tavistock of that time, well-known in the care networks during the period, is Isabel Menzies-Lyth.

    The trainer was talking to me about social work practitioners whose particular responsibility is to involve themselves in the lives of people in serious mental and emotional crisis. These practitioners need to be able to call on a high and wide-ranging level of relevant knowledge and expertise, and also of emotional maturity and intelligence within themselves, in response to human situations which most of us would prefer not to think about, let alone empathically engage with. The practitioners are dealing with a reality to which often there is no clear or obvious solution, and few simple “happy endings.”

    Behind them and available to them, there must be a support system and a theoretical frame of reference that is sophisticated enough to deal in shades of grey, so to speak, rather than more obvious blacks-and-whites. And that is actually quite difficult. Amid the anxiety-provoking conditions in which the practitioners have to intervene, assess and act, the temptation is strong to retreat from complexity and involvement and resort instead to a more simplistic, more detached, less empathic black-and-white approach, more to do with quantities than with quality, outer aspects rather than inner ones. The “Book” is available and actually essential in these fraught transactions. But too easily it can  be deployed alone and predominantly. The “Spirit” must take the lead.

    Often the simpler black and white model will be imported from another discipline or profession altogether. Rather than emerge from within, as good practice that belongs specifically to this important activity, it will be copied, second-hand, from without. It is more than likely that the imported model will not serve as a real and sufficient addressing of the task that faces these workers, but that is not the point or purpose of it. Its purpose is to lessen anxiety and emotional upset in the workers themselves. It offers them a suit of emotional armour.

    So a certain “tough guy” culture might set in among the worker team ; and “tough” decisions might start to win favour and status among peer colleagues, greater than the sensitive and empathic, more realistic approaches that are actually required and called for. Paradoxically, it takes a strong and able manager to prevent the “strong model” culture setting in among the team.

    But I have not introduced this concept of the “strong model” in order to write about social work. I think the idea is relevant across a far wider field of activities than that. Any field, in fact, which calls for human connection and empathy and in which there is a high degree of responsibility and significant room for anxiety.

    It is relevant, for instance, to democratic politics.

    Democratic politics is a system within an open society which allows for and facilitates a shared engagement in issues of common concern, in a fashion which holds community leaders to constant account and treats all citizens with respect, as having a range of clear rights upheld by the law, under which all are equal (at least in principle). The implications of that (relatively) simple statement are not simple at all. In times of anxiety, or at the hands of leaders (and led) who are not up to the task, it is much easier to drop the true vessel, the Ark, and import in its stead a foreign “strong model”.

    I suggest the most popular strong model used in present day democratic politics is that of the market and the hard sell. The politician becomes a person who sells a product previously researched as being marketable, with that person’s true purpose being, less to deliver sound and needed policy, than merely to perpetuate his/her own position of prominence and privilege. Engagement with the electorate is reduced essentially to catchy slogan and advert, in preference to genuine engagement, honest interchange and the sharing of proper information. The electorate becomes, of course, merely the Market, an anonymous grouping made up of numbers and categories, often conned without scruple into “buying” products of no worth whatsoever, through the ballot box.

    There are many ways in which democratic politics and politicians can become corrupt and unfit for purpose, adrift without moral compass. But the importing of the market “Strong Model” is one of the most obvious and most destructive. It describes all too accurately how democratic politics is being conducted in the UK under Mr Johnson and his disgraceful gang.

    I shall attempt to pursue this line of thought in a bit more detail, in a third post soon (I hope) to follow     

     

     

     

     

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  • In Search of Good Faith

    I have been carrying a little string of thoughts in my head for several weeks. They make a point I haven’t seen being made elsewhere and which might be worth adding to the mix. Maybe it would be of interest to someone passing, even throw some further light, however dim and peripheral, on what’s happening around us, or at least offer a perspective on it.

    But aside from my desire to add my own tiny drop to the daily word-lake, I knew that writing the thoughts down would simply relieve me of my own silence. Staying silent feels too much like being rendered silent and somehow adds to the tension and grief of difficult times. You feel more of a victim if you’re not talking. Talking brings your own unique creativity into the picture, your own small but fervent being out into the avalanche of things. It may be delusional, yet it seems truly the case that “having your say” is good for the health. It helps to have a meaningful hearing, as well.

    But I have found it really difficult to get started. To an extent, I’m used to that, of course, or to some version of it. Before take-off, you need a count-down. Before sitting for any exam, you might find yourself listing excuses for not turning up. It’s part of realising what it is you’re about to take on. It’s part of getting ready.

    But my recent difficulty feels different. It’s not that I don’t know what I want to say. There is a clear line of thought which I can see ahead of me and want to explore and which I do seriously think might have some small value, if I can do justice to it.

    So it’s something else, or something more, that’s been causing the blockage. I’ve had a few thoughts about that too and am giving it its own post and title here. Perhaps then, and only then, I’ll be able to apply myself to the first post, the one still waiting for me !

    I think the issue is that the need to make sense of things, and then to put that into words, is a fundamental one, basic to being human, basic to staying more or less afloat through the day. Just to achieve some coherence, however briefly, can improve morale, keep the forces of chaos at bay, the brain buoyant in the flood of present events. Coherent commentary can’t stop the wrong things happening. But it can at least take their measure, find their shape, look them in the eye.  

    But “making sense of things” feels especially hard these days, the struggle for coherence especially daunting. And on top of that, I feel a greater than usual sense of hopelessness. It feels even more difficult than usual just to put sentences together, string an argument across the gulf. It’s like building a tower in a shattered landscape. Is it worth the effort ? Truthfulness, or at least a genuine aspiration to truth-tell, is the only mortar conceivable. But does that mortar still work ? Is anyone still interested in truth ? Actually, at present, speaking in words feels less like building a tower than putting up a little sandcastle with a paper flag on it. The flag says, hey listen, I have something I want to say, something that matters. Then the tide comes in, with a roar. There is no matter, roars the tide. Just force, chaos, unstoppable fury. Nothing matters.

    It is surely a factor that language is an especially damaged currency in our time. The Lie has stolen all the words. The catchy sales slogan or computer-game image has swept reality from the reckoning. What words are still meaningful, uncontaminated by the all-pervasive Lie ? What language is still un-befouled, clean of desecration ? What words still hold good ?

    Here, for example, is the UK Prime Minister, Mr Johnson, on the Nolan Principles of appropriate conduct for public life in our democracy : “The precious principles of public life – integrity, objectivity, accountability, transparency, honesty and leadership in the public interest – must be honoured at all times,” he writes. Or someone wrote for him.

    But the same Mr Johnson who might or might not have written those words never stops lying. His words on the Nolan principles – just another sleek and smirky lie, further befouling and making nonsense of the standards of behaviour the words set out and which, in reality, he treats with contempt or simply ignores. His own immediate gratification in being at the centre of things, soaking up attention, freed from restraint, is Mr Johnson’s only measure of good. It is on public record that he has been sacked twice for lying. I do keep going on about this, I know. But it is a very large elephant in every space occupied by our nation’s elected leader, in every human encounter in which he is engaged, at any level, at any time. It is a mop-haired mammoth, smirking. To have been sacked twice for lying is a remarkable record by any standard, possibly unique in this country and far beyond. In “normal” circumstances, such a record would (and should) make him unemployable. And yet we allow this man of bad faith, this anti-social element, this repudiation of all things honourable, to run the government of our country, in these critical times. And two years on, despite a disgraceful record as leader throughout that time, he is still astonishingly popular. What does that say ? What does it mean ?

    It does all rather take one’s breath away. Short of breath as one is, words are even harder to come by than usual. What is there left to say ?

    But every day, knowledgeable and observant journalists and feature writers keep reaching for words, and often those I read seem good to me, they make sense, and are therefore reassuring in some fashion. It is helpful to hear a sane and honest voice making sense of something, throwing light on a small patch of the darkness and turmoil.

    But, even in those cases, what are the words doing, really ? Are they setting any weather ? Do they do anything more than make the writer and some readers, (the majority of whom are already sympathetic, of course) feel a little better – temporarily, at least ?

    I have used the adjectives “sane” and “honest.” I assume these are attributes that are still valued. I need them to be. But are they, in this era in which Johnson is popular, in which Trump can still retain a rapturous following ? Do “sane” and “honest” represent a position worth defending, worth championing, worth trying to restore ? Is there any lasting value in writing anything at all ?

    There. The question asked, this piece is finished. Perhaps the next piece will come easier, now. I shall write it in good faith, on the assumption that there is still such a thing as good faith, that we can’t do without it and must somehow remain loyal to it and fight for it. I shall write my next piece to the best of my uncertain ability, as truthfully as I can, in the shaky belief that it is worth the attempt.

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  • What Are Words For ?

    So how are we to use this astonishing power we have ? This ability to shape the air into sounds of meaning which then we can share – is it purely and only a survival tool, a way to influence, or sell a line ? Are words just hooks to fish with ? And on from that, does communicating through words all boil down to propaganda, slogan, manipulation, cover-up, disguise, lie ? Are words just for keeping a felon toad in power ?

    Or can they help create and sustain a worthy human community, fit for a future ? I am bound to believe that indeed they can. I know they have to.

    And I have to believe that poetry is a currency of value, that it has a valid part to play in the real world, a world beyond arts festivals and poetry competitions. I know first-hand that it’s healing to write the stuff, especially if I feel I’ve got the words about right. But might it be healing to read it, as well ? Or, if not healing as such, something else of real and significant value, whatever that may be ? But let it be more than just entertainment for a few, or prettification, or diversion, or escape…

    Above all,  let it facilitate, even bring about, real connection between people, not just a matter of smart words read from a pedestal. Empathic connection. Words of integrity that reach out and touch.  An opening up of some sort, in and between people, both writer and reader, but beyond mere personality. Some sort of finding together. Words of community.

    During lock-down, and among – and maybe in response to – some of the feelings associated with that strange time, and with other contemporary events and conditions, I found myself formatting a number of different sets of my own poems, as small booklets to give away.

    Nowadays, these can be produced at home to quite a high standard of design and production, of course. It being possible, might it not also be desirable ? Not only designed and printed at home, but hand sewn together at home, booklet by booklet. And then handed on to some friend and acquaintance, perhaps with reference to a conversation we’ve had, as part of our relationship.

    So I’ve dropped all thoughts of reliance on specialist publishing expertise, or considerations that go with the commercial. Poetry is warm words of living connection. It’s a personal between thing. It belongs in the open hand. So let it travel warmly, hand to hand.

    I have said “hand-sewn.” Sewing the pages and cover together is also a matter of threading a needle. Quite a few times per booklet, as it happens, in my case. I am not a dab hand at it and sometimes I get fed up with it, while neck muscles protest, and it takes too long, and so on.

    And yet here is more imagery that fits and enriches this whole booklet idea. Getting the poem right is in itself a matter of threading words through the eye of a needle. Sadly, the wrong words also get through, and too frequently, but later – at least sometimes – you realise the shortcoming and return and try again. And when at last you are ready to let the poem leave you, it does feel as if the whole item has been carefully sewn together, each of its elements examined and accepted, found worthy and allowed through.

    So for me, “publishing” my poems has become a matter of sewing words together and handing them to people who live in contact – people I know, people I’ve been talking to, people for whom a particular booklet might be relevant, following a topic we’ve just discussed, or a subject one of us has broached or shared. It’s another form of working from home, you might say.

    I have uploading here an A4 version of the latest booklet (booklets don’t really work onscreen). It is an exploration of two items which have changed the world – their obvious differences but also their less obvious similarities. One is the face-mask which we have now lived with for so many months, but which one day we might be able to do without. The other is the digital screen, primarily that of the mobile phone. This of course has been around for longer and is less likely to go away. On the contrary, it will be accompanying and shaping our children’s lives in ways still hard for older people to imagine.

    The poems were written over the last six weeks or so.  

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  • UK ’21 – Resumé from the Cage

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  • The Death of an Old Man

    Yesterday, a grand and often very beautiful funeral was held, following the death of a likeable, shrewd and vivid man.

    It is of course hard to separate the image we are given of Prince Philip, or ourselves put onto him, from the man he actually was.

    He surely had a similar problem, himself. Who was he, apart from his public role, and the image the public projected onto him ? Who was he allowed to be ?

    But there is no confusion over the fact that a man once alive – and for a long time – is now dead. Those shrewd and clear-seeing eyes are seeing nothing now. They are relieved of seeing.

    And he has been alive and featuring on the edges of my life, in public view, under public scrutiny, in some way as public property, ever since my early childhood. So his death feels significant. Something of me has gone too.

    I am old enough to have lost people less on the edges of my life than he was. By pure coincidence, a few days ago, I came across some old poems written following the first such death. This was the early nineteen nineties, just before the computer became standard equipment and changed the way everything got written and then stored. So these poems were typewritten on paper and I had stuffed them away in a file somewhere.

    In pulling them out, assessing and uploading (some of) them, I have done some revising. I like these two uploaded here. They are a bit bombastic perhaps, but I quite like that, as well. And today I would just like to dedicate them to the late Prince Philip, who became old unto death in my lifetime, keeping his back straight to the last.

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  • How to Speak in Times of Clamour

    A long time ago, I went away to Greece and spent three months there alone in a hut, facing the rock pictured above. By now, I had lived a youth and much of an adulthood and this was a time for reflection, in case I could make some sense of all that living, never to be repeated or recaptured, all that taking in and giving out.

    Soon I was producing quite a lot in both prose and poetry and it came to a point when it didn’t seem to matter, from one morning to another, which medium I would be writing in that day. I would find out.

    The prose pieces turned out to be a series of essays, a few of them a bit ranty, others more like fables. And that is what in the end I called them : “Fables and Reflections.” I saw them as a sort of collation of learning points, or strategies, or navigation guides for times of flux and tempest. You can find the series in pdf on the right hand side of the Home Page of this blog.

    Is it the best place for them ? Possibly. One of them seems especially relevant just now, and provides its own answer to the question I’ve just asked. Here is a link to it.

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