Labi Siffre - Into The Light

The leaves of these trees are stained with blood

They are tall trees and broad

Is that not enough?

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Tenth of April Two Thousand Ten

It was a sitting in the garden

Holding hands in the sun day.

Elsewhere crowds were marching in protest

Or gathering mourning

___

Of her life we know little

Bread broken newly; made
Her begging words wasted
On jailers lunching with wine

Olives and risen loaves; while
Waiting for the torturers
To arrive

Did she beg to be freed from injustice?
To see her children?
To be forgiven

For the crimes she had not committed?
No, she begged the men to kill themselves
To make the world a better place

And when the farmer, tilling, found her corpse
She had no face

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World AIDS Day

Line seven men and seven women

Seeking and deserving justice against
A wall and shoot them dead

The result is much the same as shooting
Fourteen branches off an oak tree
More will grow but credibly

We have less branches than bullets
More bullets than women and men
More bullets even if we add children

Still acorns wear little acorn hats
Have you noticed? And underneath
Keep secrets hid while we are open books

Packed with pages filled with complex texts
On every page subtle subtleties;
Nevertheless
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She mashes in a bowl, locusts

With crushed seeds of grass
To feed her child

In Trafalgar Square she is not
On a plinth nor anywhere

This morning, in a tantrum, he kicked a garden rock
Fracturing his toe; through the bus window on his way
Back from hospital to Redbury street he notices
The tip of an iceberg breaking through
The surface of the shopping mall car park

Glancing around it’s clear none of his fellows
Have noticed this nor his fear, only now does he realize
His thirty second birthday passed a week ago
No cards arrived, even he has overlooked

Growing older; he feels the fist of time
Squeezing the small walnut in his head
Meanwhile, machete men return; soon after
She and her child are dead
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I know I don’t have a handle on death

When someone aged 57 dies, like Patrick Swayze

Just did; and I find myself saying things like

“That is ridiculous!” and, “57 is way too young to die!”

And, “What the hell is going on?!!”

As if any of that has anything to do with anything

___

The cloud brushes the mountain's hair

Continues to do so
I make a stand in the bracken
You make a stand in your wheelchair
We hold hands
You are the brave one
Beside the reservoir police and ambulance
Sirens drown sheep bleats

Across from the pine tree'd island
(An homage to Swallows and Amazons,
Duffers and fair play) small arms fire grows louder
Artillery delivers sporadic thumps. The ground
Settles, and jumps, and settles and I watch the leaves.
Smoke weaves. Villagers hurry to gather children.
All the children are all their children

I hold my jacket around your shoulders
Cold, I watch ripples grow to waves
Sure they are of where to go and on arrival fade
Without rancour
The generator conjures emergency light and life
They welcome their first born
Holding dad's finger in a fragile hand
The breeze made visible
___

So farewell Ted Kennedy

You made a fatal

Then a stupid cowardly

Mistake

Then you did good
___

Hearing

The voices in my head
Claim not to know where I'm being led

The voices mutter in my head
Things much better left unsaid

The voices in my head relentless
Chide me guilty in my bed

The voices tell me what to do
Pernicious ugly things to trouble you

The voices know about me trends
I've hidden ('specially from my friends)

The voices on vacation from my head
Have left a monster slavering in the shed

The voices tired of sea views and ice creams
Are back stitching horror to my dreams

The voices plan a special trip and tell me sharks are gentle
The barrier reef in blood soaked clothes
A swim (they think I'm mental)

___

Crush the flower. God will make another.

moving forward through the forest
over hills
of the enemy's dead
they came upon a female child
one of their number
without pausing struck her
there and then the child died
no tears were shed

moving forward through the forest
passed the girl's observant corpse
they came upon a village tranquil
killed the men
killed the boys
raped the women
killed the women
raped the girls
killed the girls
raped some babies just for fun
girl babies only (these are real men
not maricones) then
babies, girls and boys, were swung
by their legs
for tree trunks and walls
to meat their heads

their killers burned the village to the ground
they killed the pigs
they killed the dogs
they killed the chickens
that evening they prayed
and for several days ate well
knowing their souls were saved
___

Sowing the seeds of the flowers God makes

marching to the city
passing faces blurred with hope,
triumph, fear; but hearing only
voices of encouragement
and good cheer

their stride confident, their minds
as all, unfathomable
their leaders, already suited,
negotiating trade agreements
media friendly, affable

soon, having re-arranged the kitchen
cutlery, the books in the library
and the bricks in the walls,
these men will return to peace time life
the winners receiving
the usual rewards
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Sir John Mortimer 1924 - 2009

English Barrister / Author / National Treasure

"Liberty is allowing people to do things you disapprove of."

" . . . I'd love to be a sex object. My own ambition is to be loved only for my body."

". . . writers should, in a way, feel flattered by the censorship laws. They show a primitive fear and dread at the fearful magic of print.

"When you get to my age, life seems little more than one long march to and from the lavatory."

"Old age entails a good deal of sitting and staring into space. This is by no means an uncreative occupation."
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Quotations Source

Obituary
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Odetta 1930-2008

And so farewell Odetta Holmes
another rousing voice of freedom
kind to me you were, invited me
to your
uptown New York home
took my song to China
for women everywhere

introduced me
to Mr & Mrs Belafonte in their mid-town
apartment on the occasion of Mrs Belafonte's
birthday where, wandering from the party,
as I usually do, I found the library
and the poem, "If We Must Die"
by Claude McKay

then Roscoe Lee Browne wandered in
and read, "If We Must Die", just for me,
the way it should be read
with calm, clear, defiant dignity

and now you're dead
having seen more than I have seen
knowing more than I will know
a magic woman I will remember
for the message you wore
golden on your breast
"I am"
___

Paul Newman 1925-2008

I appreciated Paul Newman as an actor from the first movie of his I saw (either The Long Hot Summer or The Left Handed Gun).

I appreciated him as a human being from some time in the early ‘60s when I saw him and his wife Joanne Woodward being interviewed. They were the coolest, most intelligent, no bullshit married couple the planet has ever known. If she thought he was OK ... he was OK. My condolences to her.

I used Newman (and hope he would not have minded) to help make my point against racism (in that instance anti-Semitism) in my first book Nigger in the poem Positive Images.

I was not surprised but I was warmed and encouraged in the struggle and my respect for Newman grew when, in an interview (radio I think) I caught just the last sentence of this typically no nonsense Paul Newman view:

“I'm a supporter of gay rights. And not a closet supporter either. From the time I was a kid, I have never been able to understand attacks upon the gay community. There are so many qualities that make up a human being ... by the time I get through with all the things that I really admire about people, what they do with their private parts is probably so low on the list that it is irrelevant.”

And so farewell Paul Newman
husband, racing driver, maker
of salad dressing, actor; no less
fallible than the rest of us
(I, who didn’t know you, can
only guess) but I reckon
you to be
one of the very
very best

^{(Photo:Rose M. Prouser  CNN via AFP/Getty Images)
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local sights of interest

there are tables
there are chairs
plastic and metal ware
men sit at some of the tables

others stand still or sway
one, unable, has fallen away
there is a window
and a door

and a body, dead, on the floor
through the window you can see
the shrubbery
and the lime trees beyond

the gate is a lane
its condition poor
and a phone box
and a road sign
to little moor
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The Olympic Spirit of Repression

BEIJING — Today, as part of a government crackdown to silence dissidents before Beijing plays host to the Olympic Games, a Chinese court sentenced Hu Jia, an outspoken human rights advocate, to three and a half years in prison after ruling that his critical essays and comments about Communist Party rule amounted to inciting subversion.
Full story HERE

His name is HU JIA

Remember him while you watch the games.
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G'bye Abby & thanks

"I believe that a writer worth his salt at all has an obligation not only to entertain but to comment on the world in which he lives, not only to comment, but maybe have a shot at reshaping the world."
... Abby Mann screenwriter, director and producer.1927-2008
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the forgotten

i take remembrance sunday seriously
i respect its emphasis on the memory
of our fighting dead betrayed serially
by forces hidden from them. saddened

my search informs me that in the wars
and violent conflicts for various causes
in the twenty-first and twentieth centuries
by far the most deaths from warfare were

civilian

and so i say there should be a day
of remembrance to honour the millions
children women men civilians all. lost.
their lives erased by our enduring need

Auteur Obit

and so farewell and thank you Ingmar Bergman
you wrote and directed my favourite movie

"The Seventh Seal"

and inspired both Woody Allen and me
(though my movies are much shorter)

Free Abdel Kareem Nabil Soliman

Sign the Petition

A court in the port city of Alexandria has sentenced a young Egyptian blogger to four years' jail for contempt of religion, insulting the president and spreading false information.

Abdel Kareem Nabil Soliman, 22, is the first Egyptian blogger to stand trial for views expressed on the internet. The case against him was based on a complaint from al-Azhar University, where he studied law until he was expelled last year because of his critical writings about religion.
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Iraq Obit December 2006

and so farewell Saddam Hussein
a horrible man (among so many)
who as president Bush numero dos

grudgingly admitted had nothing to do
with 9/11 and was in many ways our
constructed creature having at least

one feature in common with George Dubya
and British prime minister Tony Blair and that’s
the killing of thousands of innocent Iraqi

civilians which as secretary of defense Donald
Rumsfeld let slip is, “in effect, the definition
of terrorism” though, as you know, we’re not

supposed to show that kind of info to our citizens
nor even admit it to ourselves but life is murky
muddy swirling oily grey brown sickly and smells

of rotting meat in spite of those posies we keep pressed
to our desensitized noses (democracy, God, God’s will,
Jesus, Mohammed and that “we’re doing the best we can
for our children” guff)

in spite of this complexity of murder in pursuit of noble ends
(a policy continuously undermined by the results) somehow
we have to persist like vultures in soaring beautifully
while trying much, much harder to land like doves
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Entertainment Obit December 2006

and so farewell Charlie Drake - comedian
and straight actor - from the early partnership
of Mick and Montmorency you made me laugh

from my child to adult hood you were
a good part so i hope for your sake
you found contentment and not

(like so many funny people)
heartache
___

Zeit Macht Faul

A change has come about. We’ve decided
to shout less and shoot more; a policy

growing in popularity, though not yet
reaching the glorious heights
of global wars of yore
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Aung San Suu Kyi

As of today Aung San Suu Kyi has been detained for a total of 10 years and 330 days.

Aung San Suu Kyi is now serving her third term of house arrest.

She was arrested on 30 May, 2003 after the regime's militia attacked her convoy and killed up to 100 of her supporters.

Free  her immediately.

Free the other 1400 Burmese political prisoners immediately.

Free Aung San Suu Kyi  immediately.

_{Asian Tribune}

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