Feels like cheating ...

Off to Spain for five days! Temperatures in the mid-twenties. Yes, it does feel like cheating, as if God gave me November to endure and  I'm giving it the slip ...

:) 

I Haven't Written A Poem About Damon Runyon

I haven't written a poem about Damon Runyon

This, is an omission, so

Without his permission, (being impossible to obtain because

Nothing remains except, this figure in my head:

In short, he's dead)

 

I am thinking, as would he, eternally, In the present continuous, of mobsters

And their molls. Those Guys and Dolls, who are singing and dancing and murdering each other

With rampant inhibition - it being Prohibition - through

The highways and byways of New York

Through Speakeasys and Vaudeville,

Racetracks, playhouses and

This and That on Broadway:

Anyhow: here and there.

 

Cheesecake at Mindy's, out of town hucksters

Young ladies with high hopes,

Dealing them off the arm -

 

Safe-crackers. Pie-eaters, old ladies with attitude

Babies with Pop!

 

I

 

Love 'em all. New friends in a New World.

Delightfully, deliciously, sailing close to the wind

In a world of Romance and Danger. To which

I remain,

 

A stranger.

 

(Funny, where inspiration comes from.

 

Don't you think?

 

And now

 

I HAVE written a poem about Damon Runyon.)

Postscript:

I have also made the cheesecake. All the better for having ' a story that goes with it'. So this is for the cheesecake experts out there:

http://www.timesunion.com/living/article/Lost-recipe-for-legendary-cheesecake-found-3631242.php

:)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Identity Theft

I remember the excitement of waking up one morning  and realising I was a citizen, not only of the United Kingdom, but of the European Union, too.

It meant something to me, it really did. Through the EU SOCRATES programme  I have worked with colleagues in France, Spain, Estonia, Romania and Austria. I have enjoyed the commonalities of our lives, and savoured our  differences. I have benefitted form freedom of movement and from ease of transfer. I have appreciated the work the EU institutions have done to maintain peace, secure human rights, and foster understanding between nations. 

And now it's over. I am not reconciled. I will never accept that this stupid, vicious, manic, forced separation from the Eiropean Union, that stole my right to citizenship from me, with the lies of egotistical, ambitious freaks like Boris Johnsom and xenophobic demagogues like Nigel Farage, was anything other than a woefully stupid act of political vandalism. 

The United Kingdom will break up. Our influence in the world will diminish, our prestige vanish - for what? So that some very stupid people, who are about to become immeasurably poorer, can say, "We've got our soevereignity back?" Dupes. Fools. Morons.

The worst aspect of the whole disaster, for now, are the hate crimes. People attacked on our streets for speaking another language. A man killed buying a pizza because he was Polish, a woman having her hijab torn from her face because she's a muslim. 

Frankly, I am ashamed of being Britiish right now. Deeply, deeply ashamed. If this is what, "Having our sovereignty back" means, you can bloody well keep it. 

So to the readers of this blog who are citizens of the European Union, who  must be wondering what the hell the British were thinking, all I can say, is: Your guess is as good as mine." Cherish your national identity AND your EU citizenship, and if you're ever tempted to throw it away, take a look at the disaster unfolding over here, and think again. 

To sum up: 

Brexit is Brexit 

And

Unmitigated F***ing Disaster is Unmitigated F***ing Disater

There! I've said it. 

Motes and Beams

Today is Buble Study Day. 

A small group of us meet once a month at Chris' house in Aston Ingham. We catch up over tea and homemade cake, then sit together in silence for five minutes, allowing ourselves to just be, revelling in contemplation of the Author of Love, who is my dearest and closest friend. Some who read this will think me deluded, or crazy, but that's OK, you create your reality around your Significant Other and I'll create mine, and may you be as blessed as I am by it.

 

We are examining our worldview around the Gospel of Luke and we are, after many months, wrestling with Chapter Six. It's serious stuff, Jesus gets down to the nitty-gritty with anti-capitalist heresy like, "Blessed are the poor ..." We rich are a tad uncomfortable with the implications of THAT, and so we should be. We concluded that if Christians paid as much attention to the eight Beatitudes as they do to the ten Commandments, we'd have transformed the world a millennia ago. But there you are, we don't and we haven't.

 

Today we are hitting up against 'Do not judge.' This is some deal, because we judge the behaviour of others all the time, usually with the intent of making ourselves feel better at their expense. I can see we're going to have fun with this.

 

The Carpenter takes the metaphor of a speck of sawdust and a plank of wood. How we delight in offering to remove the slight blemish that obscures true vision in someone else, whilst ignoring the the bloody great plank that blinds ourselves to our own faults.

 

I got to thinking about this. 'Do not judge' isn't a wish, or an aspiration, or a polite suggestion:it's a command.

 

Wouldn't it be amazing if we Christians actually obeyed it? 

Buddhists routinely practise the cultivation of a non-judgemental mind. We Christians could do with the humility to recognise this as a great spiritual insight, and do likewise. 

 

I talk to God all the time, and sometimes I even wait for a response. Here's one that is relevant for today:

 

"You can have judgement, Mary, if you want it. I'll start with you, shall I?"

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