Joe Hill ( 7/19/1879 -19/11/15) Joe Hill's Last Will

Joe  Hill the workers martyr was executed by firing squad, today on November 19th , 1915, framed for a murder that many believe he did not commit.An innocent man condemned to death for his passion. Many historians have come to recognise it as one of the worst travesties of Justice in American history. After a trial that was riddled with biased rulings and suppression of important defence evidence and other violations of judicial procedure, which was characteristic of many cases involving labour radicals. A guard reported that at about 10.pm, Joe Hill handed him a poem, through the bars of his cell. It was his last will, which has since become a prized piece of poetry in the heritage of the American Labour Movement.
Born Joel  Emmanuel Hagglund in  Sweden, he emigrated to the United States in 1902, where he changed his name to Joseph Hillstrom. After several years as an itinerant worker - a 'hobo' he joined the IWW (The International Workers of the World) .  A wobbly organiser, balladeer, he was also a man of pride, the flag that he proudly followed was was one of international solidarity.
On the same day that he was executed he sent a telegram to fellow International Worker of the World (IWW), Bill Hayword, telling him "Don't waste time mourning , Organise!" An estimated 30,000 people attended his funeral in an impressive 'singing demonstration' under the banner ' In Memorium - Joe Hill - Murdered by the Capitalist Class.  A rebel to the core, his voice still rings out loud and clear, venerated and celebrated.

Joe Hill's Last Will

My will is easy to decide
For there is nothing to divide
My kin don't need to fuss and moan
Moss does not cling to a rolling stone.

My body - Oh - If I could choose
I would to ashes it reduce
And let the merry breezes blow
My dust to where some flowers grow

Perhaps some fading flower then
Would come to life and bloom again
This is my last and Final Will
Good luck to all of you,

- Joe Hill

Joe Hill's Last Will - Utah Phillips

Paul Robeson - Joe Hill

( one of the most stirring, emotional versions of this song I know.)

Doris Lessing (22/10/19 - 17/11/13) - Uncompromising Spirit R.I.P

Nobel Prize winning novelist, short-story writer,poet, playwright, biographer has sadly passed away at the grand old age of 94. She was the author of over 55 published works of fiction, and non-fiction, a figure as iconic and inspiring as she was polarising in some quarters.
Both of her parents were British: her father, who had been crippled in World War , was a clerk in the Imperial Bank of Persia, her mother had been a nurse. In 1925, lured by the promiose of getting rich through maize farming, the family moved to the British colony in southern Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe). Like many other women from southern Africa she did not graduate from high school, but she was to make herself into a self-educated intellectual.
After moving to Britain in the 1930's, she was drawn to the like-minded members of the Left Book Club, and she joined the Communist Party. However, during the postwar years, she became increasingly diillusioned with the Communist movement, which she left altogether in 1954. By 1949, she had moved and settled in London with her young son. Her first published novel, The Grass is Singing was published in the same year, the start of a a very prolific output.
Many of her brilliant literary works take in themes in defence of freedom, third world causes and the developing world, and  often from a biographical slant, her prose  marked by its vividness and effectiveness. Her range was vast, not afraid to experiment with form, even turning her hand at science fiction,  engaging between idealism and reality. Alternative ways of seeing and living were also  themes that ran through her work, (she herlself explore sufi mysticism in the 1960's), and the exploration of human nature  being central to her words, investigating its curses in an attempt to find cures..
Her life was marked with a reputation for being a maverik and outspoken, with a refusal to compromise. Her subversive spirit meant that she pusued truth whilst maintaining her individual tongue.
In recognition of her achievement she was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 2007, at the age of 88, becomming the oldest woman to do so, and only the 11th woman ever to recieve the prize.
This great writer was also a reluctant feminist, who was first and foremost a storyteller, loyal to the power of the written word, and her belief in it never wavered.
She "saw the Soviet Empire, Hitler's Germany, Mussolini's Italy, the British Empire, the White Supremacy of South Afica and the Southern Rhodesia." her words capturing the spirit of her time, and now as they shimmer, the spirit of ours.
Doris Lessing R.I.P

' But for a while the dance went on-
That is how it seems to me now
Slow forms moving calm through
Pools of light like  gold net on the floor.
It might have gone on, dream-like, forever.

Doris Lessing
- from Fable, 1959

' Very  few people care about freedom, about liberty, about the truth, very few.
Very few people have guts on which a real democracy has to depend. Without people with that sort of guts a free society dies, or cannot be born'
-Doris Lessing - The Golden Notebook


' Whatever you're meant to do, do it now. The conditions are always impossible.'

Doris Lessing - The reluctant heroine

 

Gaza without Electricity.

Gaza's main power plant  stopped working  on November 1st due to severe fuel shortages. Power cuts effect Gaza for 12-18 hours a day. The power cuts are having a serious impact on the abilities of hospitals to cope and primary healthcare clinics to provide essential services, plus sewage treatment and water filitration. This is effecting about 5,000 people. Immediate action is necessary, but this is something happens quite frequently in Gaza. it's people daily under siege.
This is the eighth day that the people of Gaza have had no street lights, sewage pumps, no hospital operating theatres, no fridges, incubators, no heaters, no lights, no power, no fuel for the power station,sanitation, health all disrupted.Their lives one of miserable toil, simply because Israel won't allow any diesel in, and the fact of life when under occupation. These people are trapped, powerless in everysense of the word. Suffering unimaginably as the leaders of our so called civilised world do nothing to help them. Why is Israel  allowed to get away with this. This siege must end.  Free Gaza, Free Palestine.Lots more information from  here:-

http://www.map-uk.org/

Sleepwalking into Police State Britain as Tories apparently dislike opposition

Police State Britan seems possible as UK Government is about to pass legislation which will make behaviour percieved  to 'cause nuisance or annoyance' a criminal offence. Thus anyone being 'anti-tory' could be arrested.
Personally who is causing the most nuisance or annoyance in Great Britain at this moment in time. That's right the bloody Tory's.

http://mikesivier.wordpress.com/2013/11/11/sleepwalking-further-into-police-state-britain-as-law-offers-new-powers-of-repression/

David Cameron calls for permanent Austerity whilst attending banquet of richness

Last night, David Cameron gave a speech at a banquet calling for permanent austerity, we should all simply get used to it, this bungling hypocrite declared, whilst dressed up in all his finery, eating and quaffing the finest food and drink imaginable. http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2013/nov/11/david-cameron-policy-shift-leaner-efficient-state
Speaking at the Lord Mayor's Banquet in the City of London, he said the best way to keep the cost of living down was to take " difficult decisions on public spending" to leave a " state we can afford".
He said all this while his life of comfort doe not change one  a bit, while the rest of us are forced between heating our homes and eating. There he stood standing behind a gold speech stand,  surrounded by all the vestiges of wealth and  the disproportion that  it brings.
I can almost hear him sniggering 'yay to austerity,' but I also believe  he is simply beyond the pale, completely out of touch,  and after stuffing his face, his shirt it seems could no longer take the pressure and his shirt buttons popped open.

 His words are hollow and empty,  we have to kick him and  his consorts out as soon as possible bfore he creates even more damage. We have to shout NO to austerity, kick out the Tories Now. Enough is enough.

Haymarket Martyr's Anniversary

Today November 11 1887,  the Haymarket martyrs were hanged, wrongfully convicted  for the deaths of  eight police during a Chicago labor rally.
The Haymarket affair refers to the aftermath of a bombing that took at a labor demonstration on Tuesday May 4, 1886, at Haymarket Square in Chicago. It began as a peaceful rally in support of workers striking  for an eight hour day, but the police  then attempted to break up the public gathering. An unknown person threw a bomb at police as they acted to disperse the meeting. The bomb blast and ensuring gunfire resulted in the death of seven police officers and at least four civilians.
This was a time of mass strikes and demonstrations and violent repression by the police. The demonstrators were calling for greater power and economic security and the overthrow of capitalism, and were gaining much popular support, a reason why their were some who wanted to destroy the movement.
 Four unarmed strikers had been shot and killed the day previously, and there were believed to be many spies and infiltrators among the strikers, and to this day many believe the Haymarket martyrs were used as scapegoats to stoke up division and resentment.
The next day martial law was declared, not just in Chicago but throughout the nation. Anti labor governments across the world used the Chicago incident to crush local union movements. Labor leaders were rounded up, houses were entered without search warrants and union newspapers were closed down
Inevitably anarchists were rounded up, and treated to what today would be termed rough justice, with August Spies, Albert Parsons, Adolph Fischer and George Engel being executed. A fifth, 23 year old Louis Lingg killed himself in his cell the night before.
Engel, Fischer, Parsons and Spies were taken to the gallows in white robes and hoods. They sang the Marsellaise, then the anthem of the international revolutionary movement. According to witnesses , in the moments before the men were hanged .Spies shouted, " The time will come when our silence, will be more powerful than the voices you strangle today!" Witnesses reported that the condemned men did not die immediately when they dropped, but strangled to death slowly, a sight which left the speakers visibly shaken.
250,000 people lined Chicago's streets during Parsons funeral procession, with the executions eliciting an international outcry. The Haymarket affair is now generally considered significant as the origin of the International May Day observances for workers,  when in July 1889, a delegate from the American Federation of Labor recommended at a Labor conference in Paris that May 1  be set aside as International Labour Day n memory of the Haymarket martyrs and the injustice metered out to them, and has become a powerful reminder of the international struggle for workers rights, that I for one try not to forget.

Remembering the Haymarket Affair

Remember Me -Curtis D Bennett

Curtis D Bennet of Lawrence, Kansas was a military pilot and served in the marines during the vietnam war in 1968. He is also an outsstanding modern war poet. His poems are powerful , incisive, sometimes shocking, deeply thoughtful and deeply felt. Here I reprint this poem to reflect a different mode, on today Rememberance Sunday.
Today I remember the hundreds of million slaughtered by swords, bombs and guns, vaporised into shadows on broken walls, the innocent lost, the propoganda, that dishonours peoples lives, the plunder and the carnage,  histories full of lies and deceit.
Heddwch/peace,

Remember Me

I was once the pride of this country,
The healthy, the young, the strong and brave,
Then I quickly became the acceptable casualty
In my country's undeclared war
In the name of national interest,
A country where I was too young to vote!

I went because I was still too young
to know any better, though others
Cleverly refused or ran away to hide.
I never once dreamed my own government
Would ever lie to its own people,
But I was mistaken and they did for years.

I fought their war in a hell for one year
Then came home and found another hell
Awaiting from thevery people and country
who determined I go in the first place
Then their war, suddenly became mine,
And I was the converted scapegoat!

Today, I am the broken bodies and minds
Shunted off out of sight, behind heavy doors
Of VA hospitals and mental wards to die
I am in wheel chairs and braces, in hospital beds;
I walk the streets, I wander the railroad tracks,
I sleep beneath the stars.

Albert Camus (7/11/13 - 4/1/60) - His Enduring Appeal

A 100 years  after his birth, and more than half  a century after his untimely death, Albert Camus still resonates with the modern world. On 4 January, 1960, this writer, intellectiual, and absurdist philosopher skidded of the road  whilst a passenger in a car, and was killed instantly.
On all accounts  he was of  a sensitive nature, a seeker of maximum unity. An admirer of revolutionary syndicalism, anarchists, conscientious objectors, and all manner of rebels. Standing against totalitarianism in the form of Stalinism and fascism, and was never afraid to speak his truth.
Born in extreme poverty, in French ruled Algeria, to an illiterate mother who was partially deaf, who lost his father in the horror that was  World War 1, despite tremendous disadvantages by the age of 44 he was collecting the Nobel Prize for literature.
At the time his philosophical writings, which  continued the themes explored in his novels - the absurdity of the human condition and the necessity of rebelling against it, were not popular with critics, but his words and their power live on. Does the realization of the absurd reguire suicide? " No" Camus answered it requires revolt. " The struggle itself is enough to fill a man's heart."
Long have I been an admirer of this man who was not afraid to preach justice, to reconsider his stance, to take candour and reflect, to be as honest as he thought best .After all there is no authority but yourself.
With this year being  his centenary year, I am sure  there will be a renaissance of interest in this great man, this visionary of the absurdity of life,  who expressed so articulately  that human life  is rendered ultimately meaningless by the fact of death, his themes of the alienated stranger, or outsider, the rebel in revolt,  tempered by his own experience,  showing us the readers, the individuals paths where  we can truly be free.
He has undoubtedly become one of the most profoundly original thinkers of the modern age. For him the urge to revolt was one of the ' essential dimensions' of the human race, seen in man's continuous struggle against the conditions of his existence, through solidarity and our shared humanity.
It was his persistent efforts 'to illuminate the problem of the human conscience in our time' that were one of the main reasons he was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1957, and I for one am very grateful to have discovered his enduring words, that  continue to flow with inspiration.

" Thus I draw from the absurd three consequences, which are my revolt, my freedom, and my passion" -  from, Albert Camus's famous celebrated essay The Myth of Sisyphus.

An earlier post with more biographical detail can be read here :-

Albert Camus - The Smoking Philosopher

http://teifidancer-teifidancer.blogspot.co.uk/2012/05/albert-camus-71113-4160-smoking.html


Pictures and Quotes from Albert Camus

 

Albert Camus - The Man who made thinking cool;
music by the Velvet Underground

Camus and the Stranger ( Rare BBC documentary)

 

 

Autumn Rhythm

          
                         Jackson Pollock's Autumn Rhythm; 1950 

Crossing the Bridge of sighs,
I return home to write,
to fill in blank pages,
with vapours of love and rage,
shadows pass, intervening with time,
holding on and letting go,
in moments of silent whisper.
Winter wraps around my breath,
drifting over autumns flight,
dreams drift, vast and unbound,
releasing immaculate flames of hope.
The daily surge of passion,
undertakes its sustaining journey,
as meanings wake from cavernous sleep,
relinquishing visions of intent and faith,
into the lifeblood of growing destination,
and the kiss of tomorrow's promise.

Bonfire of Austerity

I know that I'm not the only one effected by depression, but on this day November the 5th, 2013, at least I am safe in the warm environs of a West Walian library. But I really wish I could have mustered up some energy, and taken to the streets, to join other people who really have had enough, as this manufactured austerity rings and their darkness implodes, I commend people now full of indignation, burning bright with rage.
Today hundreds of anti-austerity campaigners will converge on Westminster Bridge, to express anger at the the failed government  economic policies. To protest against the Tory's continued assault on the very fabric of the state, and on the most vulnerable members of society, in particularly the poor, the ill, the unemployed and the disabled.
Parallell protests will be taking place all across Britain as part of the 'Bonfire of Austerity' which was initially set up  by the Peoples Assembly Against Austerity initiativehttp://thepeoplesassembly.org.uk/. These actions are supported by more than 25 groups including trade unions and pressure groups , and will see giant energy bills set on fire to highlight the growing living costs and falling wages which are now the sharpest in Europe.
The mainstream media will probably avoid reporting it, but the spirit of dissent lives on. People raging with defiance against a government that simply does not give a ****.
Anonymous are also getting involved with their own 'Million Mask March' campaign http://millionmaskmarch.org/locations. Am sure it will be a blast.

 Gil Scot Herons might have  said 'The Revolution will not be televised', but enough is enough the people cry, remember, remember the 5th of November.

.

Anna Kavan (10/4/01 -5/12/68) - On Truth

Recently discovered the work of Anna Kavan. Born Helen Woods, in Cannes, France. Kavan was the main character in her novel Let Me Alone.
A lifelong heroin addict she adopted the name after a spell in  asylums in Switzerland and England.
As well as being  a writer, she was also a talented painter and interior designer.
Her early writings were fairly conventional, but after changing her name, her works took on a more transformative air. Apparently she also used to daily take amphetimines whilst writing.
Her books seem to weave between a fevered imagination that finds their way into her often unclassifiable books, that are  filled with hauntingly surreal magical landscapes. They contain an otherworldly strangeness that I like a lot.
She was to become an influence on writers as diverse as Doris Lessing, J.G. Ballard, Anais Nin and Jean Rhys.
She was sadly  found dead in her London home clutching a syringe. If you have not read her previously, I strongly recommend you checking her out.

Stark Vision - detail from self-portrait by Anna Kavan

The following is an extract from her 1947 book ( a classic in my humble opinion) Sleep Has  His house.

' TRUTH, it's everything. The man who said, What is truth?  certainly touched on a big subject. The  truth of the matter is that there's far too much truth in the world. The world, from whichever you observe it, is altogether too full of truth. It isn't easy to recognise this truth in the first place, but it's impossible ever to ignore it once it's been grasped.
Every single possibility or impossibility is true somewhere to someone at some time. It's true that the earth is as round as an orange and as flat as a pankcake. It's true that the wicked island goddess Ragda is a good goddess when she takes off her mask. Black magic on top, white magic underneath. That proves that black's whit, doesn't it?
It's true that the idea odf America is a bright and shining thing in the mind. It's true that the idea of America is a crude and brutal land inhabited by adolescents and gangsters.
Defeatism's true; war's true. So's idealism and the hope of a better society. You pay your money and you take your choice. Civilisation's gone down the drain. Utopia's just round the corner.
It's true that civilization marches on: atomic energy plus universal war. The Hallelujah Chorus from Handel's Messiah; H.M.V, recording. That's a truth, although universal war. There's the truth that you go to bed with and the truth that wakes you up at three o'clock in the morning when the tigers are jumping up and down on the roof and eternity is flapping at the earth like somebody shaking a rug. the truth of loving and hating, being an extrovert and an introvert, a success and a failure, travelling all over the world, living your whole life in one place, having security, accepting all risks. Then there's the truth that you find with the dirty glasses stacked in the sink. That's a different sort of truth.
Books continue to be written in one truth and read in another. The radio announces various kinds of truth to suit every listener. Atomic warfare is true and so is the Sermon ofon the Mount. Truth is everywhere, in eveything, all the time. That's why it's true. It's true that all this is obvious and has been said often before. That truth's as true as any other truth too.'

 

Primo Levi (31/7/19 - 11/4/87) - If This is a Man

( dedicated this  new year morning to Ian Duncan Smith) 

You who live safe
In your warm houses
you who find, returning in the evening,
Hot food and friendly faces:

Consider if this is a man
Who works in the mud,
Who does not know peace,
Who fights for a scrap of bread,
Who dies because of a yes or a no.
Consider if this is  a woman
Without hair and without name,
With no more strength to remember,
Her eyes empty and her womb cold
Like a frog in winter.

Meditate that this came about:
I commend these words to you.
Carve them in your hearts
At home, in the street,
Going to bed, rising;
Repeat them to your children.

Or may your house fall apart,
May illness impede you,
May your children turn their faces from you.

The Presence

Today marks Halloween, Samhain, All Hallows, All Saints or Winters Eve,The Festival of the Dead. There are several explanations for its origin, one being the Roman festival of the dead 'Parentalia', but another origin, not necessarily exclusive from the Roman one, is from the ancient Celtic old day of Samhein (sa-wain). and most of the traditions that we celebrate on Halloween have its origins in Celtic/Gaelic Culture.
Samhein, which means November in Irish, was the end of summer and the harvest season in the Celtic calender. It was the last great feast held outdoors before the cold months to come. The last night of October also marked the ancient Celts New Years Eve. Marking the end of the summer and the beginning of Winter.
The Celts  believed that on Samhein, the veil between the living and the dead was dropped for one day, and the spirits of the living could intermingle with the spirits of the dead. The spirits that could now cross into the land of the kiving were dangerous, and often played tricks both playful and malevolent on theliving. In an effort to stop those spirits from meddling with the dead and playing tricks on them, the living would dress up in costumes and  masks in order to fool the spirits into thinking that they were one of them. This is where the idea of trick and treating comes from.
It was I guess the Christian religion  that replaced the early origins with it's own traditions and celebrations  with Pope Gregory 11 moving the christian holiday of 'all hollows Eve' from May 13th to November 1st  to coincide with the feast of Samhein, to downplay the festivals pagan roots, but in many parts of the world on this night special cakes and food are prepared for the dead and remember departed loved ones.
Over the years we have ended up with the modern commercialised, corporate version that is now known as halloween. But Samhein and its energy has bever fully died out and still burns bright.
The following is a poem that I have composed to mark the occasion. Happy Samhein have a magical time.

The Presence

There was a sprinke of magic  in the air,
drifting on a pitch black night,
as the wind hummed and cried,
bending and twisting,
its shadows and shapes.

We heard a knock,
rattling on the door,
we  slipped outside,
into the dark,
but no one was there,
just a cigarette,
smouldering on fallen autumn leaves.

A gust rose up,
a lost soul perhaps?
looking for shelter,
then we heard a primeaval roar,
its siren releasing,
an enticing whistle,
that connected us,
to the evenings presence,
peculiar figments,
poking at logic.

But we'd had enough of trickery,
it was getting to late to fathom,
we kissed goodnight,
sailed upstairs,
to the other side of the moon,
where we concealed our mysteries,
buried our illusion,
beyond the dance of spirits,
whirling through the cosmos.

Stop the gas and electricity rip-off

With news that energy companies have claimed  they should not face a windfall tax because  their £3.74 billion in profits are not " particularly big"  leaves me mightily pissed off to say the least. I at least have the comfort of libraries,( for now!) but  with soaring energy prices expected to kill at least 200 pensioners per day over Winter, this greed simply has to stop.
The tories  are sleeping comfortably as we freeze, we need to stop their coziness with corporate juggernauts and tax these companies now. Enough is enough.
The recent hikes in customer bills really has to stop,  hopefully todays  Energy and Climate Change Committee  will achieve something, but I am deeply sceptical.
Anyway here is a link to the big sixes recent profits, executive pay and bonuses.

http://www.leftfootforward.org/2013/10/bonuses-and-executive-pay-at-the-big-six-energy-firms/

Our current high energy prices are one of the most scandulous things goin on in this country at the moment, and has to be stopped, as people are left shivering, stuck between eating and keeping warm. It is also unbelievable that our utilities are no longer publicly owned.
We are being ripped off, it's  as simple as that the energy companies and this government deserverdly need to be demonised. We must keep up the pressure.
I urge people to sign the following petition.

Stop the gas and electricity rip-off

http://www.38degrees.org.uk/page/s/big-six-energy-petition#petition

 

Transitory ( a poem for Lou Reed 2/3/42 - 27/10/13 R.I.P)

White light, white heat
And another voice flys,
Yesterday the wind twisted
And velvet dreams
Scattered over New York streets.

Volatile tonque defused
A bright intensity,
Blurred into time
The universe shifted
Its pale blue eyes.

The black angel's 

Death song sang.

Goodnight ladies

Waiting for its man.
The satellite of love,

Hanging 'round
Walking on the wild side.

There's a bit of magic in everything
And then some loss to even things out,
After drinking alchemy at 80 mph
Another poet sleeps, does  not compromise,
Slipping slowly away, falling into our memory
To lanquidly whisper, over all tomorrow's parties,
Painting crooked lines from drifting clouds

Laden with chords of rebel attitude.

                                                                                                                                           

Dylan Thomas (27/10/14 -9/11/53) - Poem in October /

Today, the late great Dylan Thomas would have turned 99. I have always been a great  admirer of his life and his unfailing commitment  to his craft, that continue to inspire. Today I thought I'd celebrate his birth, with  one  of his fine poems. Raise a glass and enjoy. We will be hearing a lot more about him next year, what with it being the centenary of this legends birth.

Poem in October

 It was my thirtieth year to heaven
Woke to my hearing from harbour and neighbours wood
     And the mussel pooled and the heron
               Priested shore
          the morning beckon
With water praying and call of seagull and rook
And the knock of sailing boats on the net webbed wall
        Myself to set foot
             That second
  In the still sleeping town and set forth

 My birthday began with the water-
Birds and the birds of the winged trees flying my name
    Above the farms and the white horses
                And I rose
       in rainy autumn
And walked abroad in a shower of all my days.
High tide and the heron dived when I took the road
      Over the border
          And the gates
  Of the town closed as the town awoke.


 A springful of larks in a rolling
Cloud and the roadside bushes brimming with whistling
   Blackbirds and the sun of October
            Summery
       On the hill's shoulder,
Here we found climates and sweet singers suddenly
Come in the morning where i wandered and listened
      To the rain wringing
           Wind blow cold
  In the wood faraway under me.

  Pale rain over the dwindling harbour
And over the sea the wet church the size of a snail
    With its horns through mist and the castle
              Brown as owls
        But all the gardens
Of spring and summer were blooming in the tall tales
beyond the border and under the lark full cloud.
         There could I marvel
              My birthday
 Away but the weather turned around.

It  turned away from the blithe country
And down the other air and the blue altered sky
     Streamed agan a wonder of summer
              With apples
         Pears and red currants
And I saw in the turning so clearly a child's
Forgotten mornings when he walked with his mother
          Through the parables
              Of sun light
  And the legends of the green chapels


  And the twice told fields of infancy
That his tears burned my cheeks and his heart moved in mine.
     These were the woods the river and the sea
               Where a boy
        In the listerning
Summertime of the dead whispered the truth of his joy
To the trees and the stones and the fish in the tide
       And the mystery
            Sang alive
   Still in the water and singingbirds.

   And there could I marvel my birthday
Away but the weather turned around. And the true
    Joy of the long dead child sang burning
               in the sun
        It was my thirtieth
Year to heaven stood there in the summer moon
Though the town below lay leaved with October blood.
          O may my hear's truth
              Still be sung
  On this high hill in a year's turning.

1945




  

Russell Brand talks revolution with Jeremy Paxman

I like this a lot, currently goin viral,
and here is a link to the article  that sparked the interview, We no longer have the luxury of tradition http://www.newstatesman.com/politics/2013/10/russell-brand-on-revolution . I am the first to admit, that I have been more than mildly irritated by Mr Brand in the past, but am liking his drift into a more serious direction have always been partial to a bit of Zenarchy. Mr Brand came across as a man of principle,with what sounded to me like genuine anger, and was more than a match for Mr Paxman, which is always a pleasure to see. Hat's off to him, and power to the people. The old certainties are fading fast.

Storyville - Pussy Riot - A Punk Prayer/ Pussy Riot member moved to new Russian prison Colony.

Watched the above Monday evening, Sundance award-winning documentary which tells the compelling story of how a group of young, feminist punk rokers known as Pussy Riot have captured the world' attention by protesting against Putin's Russia. Through first-hand interviews with band members their fsmilies and the defense team, and exclusive footage of the trial, it highlights the forces that transformed these women from playful political activists to modern-day icons.
In early 2012 , members of the collective donned their colourful trademark balaclavas and paricipated in a 40-second 'punk prayer protest' on the altar of Moscow's cathedral. Once arrested, Nadia, Masha and Katia  were accused of religious hatred in a trial  that triggered protests and arrests in Russia and caused uproar around the world. The film reveals the personal motivesand courage of the women behind the balaclava and exposes the state of Russian justice through the courts final verdict.

Meanwhile it has been reported by Russian media  that Nadehda Tolokonnikova, who is serving a two-year sentence for her part in the anti-kremlin stunt, has been moved to another prison, but the defence has no information on her current whereabouts. Her lawyer told the RAPSI news agency on Monday, " Nadya is no longer in the prison colony. Investigative procedures were planned for today. I arrived, and the investigator told me that Tolokonnikova was not there; I was in shock. He was told that she had been transferred, but where to, we don't know," Khrunova  said.

It is believed she is being transported to the Penal Colony in Nizhny Tagil, in the Sverlovsk Territory, not Siberia but still almost 1800 KM from her familylawyers and supporters. Tolokonnikova  was hospitalised on October 1 after staging a nine-day hunger strike in protest against prison conditions. Last month  Tolokonikova, 23 published a letter that described in graphic detail the brutal conditions inside prison colony IK-14 in Mordovia, where she had been serving since after the end of her trial in August last year. She alleged prisoners work up to 17 hours a day for six or seven days a week, are deprived of toilet access and washing facilities, and are subject to regular beatings. http://www.theguardian.com/music/2013/sep/23/pussy-riot-hunger-strike-nadezhda-tolokonnikova.
Her jailed fellow Pussy Riot member, Maria Alekhina has withdran her early release plea in solidarity with her bandmate.
Let us  remember that the members of Pussy Riot were punished  by a draconian authority, purely on politically motivated grounds. Their right to free speech curtailed, and they remain prisoners of conscience.
Hopefully they will remain brave and strong and are not simply forgotten, and the world continues to demand their absolute freedom.

FREE PUSSY RIOT

Time and Remains: Reflection on the Palestinian Landscape - James Morris

A quick word about the exhibition " Time and Remains: Reflection on the Palestinian Landscape" by James Morris which is on at the Aberystwyth Arts Centre until 2nd November. I would encourage everybody to see it, especially those who do not know much about the recent history of Palestine. It is a very interesting, instructive and fascinating account.

http://www.aberystwythartscentre.co.uk/exhibitions/time-and-remains

In Time and Remains
the photographer James Morris brings together two distict stories observed within  the landsape of Israel/Palestine. The first documents the traces of the now historical Palestinian presence in much of  the Israel landscape and references the destruction and expulsions of the 1948 war that brought about the state of Israel entitled That Still Remains. The second documentsWhen the time comes the physical manifestations of conquest, occupation, settlement and control in the contemporary landscape of the West Bank. Together they are witness to both a cause and a consequence of this on-going conflict.
The work is the result  of 6  visits  to Israel and the West Bank that James Morris visited  beteen 2011 and 2012.

In the first story many of the pictures are taken on or very close to the original location of a Palestinian village or town. Many scenes defy, in what there is left to see, the history of the place. In others it is more obvious.
It also confronts the Israeli foundation myth that Palestine was a land without people, for a people without land, by documenting the sacttered remains from across the country of the now historic Palestinian presence in much of Israel's landscape.

Thee scond narrative  looks at the contemporary landscape of the West Bank;  in the light of persistent failures to achieve any lasting resolution to the conflict, in a place where Israeli settlers and Palestinians  appear to exist in parallel worlds.

http://jamesmorris.info/portfolio/time-remains-reflections-palestinian-landscape/

Free the Arctic 30

It has been 30 days since Russian agents stormed the Arctic Sunrise and arrested all 30 people on board. It has been 30 days of injustice but pressure is mounting.
This weel, 11 Nobel Peace prize winners, including Desmond Tutu and BettyWilliams  wrote to President Putin to aksk him to ensure that Piracy charges against the Artic 30 are dropped. In a personal phone call, German chachellor Angela Merkel expressed her concern over the imprisonment of the30 and hoped the case would be resolved soon.
The U.K, foreign minister William Hague has spoken to his Russian counterpart the the Prime Minister David Cameron said in Parliament this week that he's asking for daily updated on their situation.
They join a growing list of senior politicians including from Brazil. the U.S and the Netherlands, who have spoken publicly aboutthe Artic 30.
The 30 men and women were brave enough to confront the oil industry in one of the last untouched places on earth, protesting new oil and gas development in  the Penchora sea. Seized at gunpoint by the Russian coast guard on September 18, now they are being silenced and intimidated on trumped up charges of piracy.It is impiortant to emphasise that the ship was involved in a peaceful and non-violent protest.

Please join me in keeping up the pressure.
Send letter to Russian Embassy to free these activists and stop the repression of peaceful protest.

-http://www.greenpeace.org/international/en/campaigns/climate-change/arctic-impacts/free-our-activists/

Inequality: how wealth is distributed in the UK

 New polling by ineguality briefing suggests that most people perceive the distributon of wealth in the UK to be far more equal than it actually is, in fact, for more more tha 30 years the gap between the richest and the rest has widened - and the trend shows no sign of slowing, as this oorganisation makes clear.

REASONS TO BE CHEERFUL Pt 1

Pressure mounts on President Obama's failure to close Guantanamo Bay Prison.

Today is Blog Action Day, which today marks the issue of human rights.Where to start human rights effects us all, daily global injustices, a whole myriad of issues. Unfortunately the list of human rights abuses is endless. I have written recently about the plight of the Palestinians, refugees and asylum seekers, today I thought I'd change tack a little and remind the world of the plight of  Guantanamo Bay.
Leading human rights groups have accused President Barak Obama of not following through on a commitment to shut down the prison at Guantanamo Bay, more than four months have passed since he delivered his May 23, 2013, apeech at the National Defense University, in which he committed the United States to the goal of closing the Guantanamo prison, following a broken promise of five years earlier but, since then the population of Guantanamo has only been reduced by only two detainess, noving only from 166 to 164. Of these detainess, 84 were cleared for tranfer by national security officials more than four years ago.
The U.S.A claim to be a champion of human rights cannot survive whilst this prison remains open.11 years since the first prisoners were first tranferred to the prison camp and the world is still living with this insult to justice. It is now time for Obama to give good on his promise.
Guantanamo has come to symbolise the shocking human rights violations associated with the so called 'war on terror, including arbitrary detention, secret detention, torture and other ill-treatment, together with  renditions and unfair trials.
It has also recently been revealed  that the U.S secretly used a variety of tactics to break the will and resolve of Guantanamo Bay hunger strikers, with  Shaker Aamer, the last former British resident, after nearly 18 years behind bars, held without charge or conviction of any charge, being particularly targeted, http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/oct/12/us-military-stormed-hunger-striker-cell .
The fact remains that human rights concerns in Guantanamo Bay remain an unfinished story, where people have been abandoned by the principles of jutice that America, so often proudly boasts about. It  is now time, and right for the U.S Government to  close its book on  this prison, ends its  use of unlawful detention, and  close Guantanamo for good , and meets its human rights obligations.
Though this issue no longer attracts global headlines, it is an issue that refuses to go away, and cannot be simply sidelined and swept awy. The fact remains that many still languish  inside Guantanamo, abandoned by the principles of justice that America so often proudly boasts about.
The following video gives testimony from five detainess, in this animated film revealing the daily brutality of life inside Guantanamo prison, where prisoners are kept indefinitely without charge or trial by the country that claims to be the beacon of civilization for the rest of the world. WARNING: Contains disturbing images.



Here is a link to an organisation called Reprive that  campaigns  to deliver justice and save lives in Guantanamo Bay.

http://www.reprieve.org.uk/

and here is a link to an Amnesty International page about the subject.

http://www.amnesty.org.uk/content.asp?CategoryID=10226

"All in this together:" Are benefits ever a lifestyle choice? by Dole Animators.

Following  yesterday's announcement that the the Red Cross are  going to try and help deal with the grinding poverty in this country, and the reality that millions are being forced  to choose between eating and heating, and Channel 5's latest so called documentary On Benefits and Proud, rehashing the usual crap about scroungers on benefits, glossing over  many peoples harsh realities, adding to the daily attacks by a right wing media , determined to spread propoganda on behalf of the government, I wonder where the programmes are that examine the electricity/gas companies holding our country for ransom, the stories of rising poverty that are overlooked. It is easy to find scapegoats, so called benefit scroungers being the target for a rabid media,  owned by millionaires, intent on serving the governments hand. It is so easy to blame the crisis of government and economy at the foot of the poor, who did  not cause the existing troubles of austerity in the fist place., a media that serves to  to stir up division, without answering any of the problems, while  the Bankers still unpunished, still getting rewarded, and MP's demand subsidies for food and alcohol in the House of Commons.  
The above film captures some of the real experiences people are facing today in the light of the UK governments recent changes in  the welfare system.
Dole animators is a group of benefit claimants based in the UK who have worked together to make this animated documentary.
You can find out more information about this project at:

http://doleanimators.wordpress.com/

100th anniversary of Senghenydd Mine Disaster

One hundred years ago at 6.00 a.m this morning 14 October 1913, a series of terrible explosions ripped through the Universal Coal Pit in the village of Senghennyd,  a town in the Aber Valley, four miles north west of the town of Caerphilly, in South Wales ( U.K).
The cause of the disaster was thought to have been a 'firedamp', when a spark ignites metane gas, and then explodes, this explosion sucks coal dust on the floor into the air and causes a huge explosion. In Senghennyd this spread even further underground of the mines, and was followed by 'afterdamp', where deadly poisonous gases  replaced the missing air and oxygen.
The result was 439 miners and 1 rescuer  being killed and it is now considered to be the worst mining accident in the U.K  and  the most serious in the terms of loss of life. The rescue operation lasted for 3 weeks, although by then the chance of finding anyone left alive had long faded. It would send shockwaves throughout the world, reminding people of the terrible cost of coal. Today hundreds of people have been attending a special memorial event to mark the occasion, with a memorial and a  walled garden opened,on which individual tiles will be laid with the name,age and addresses of all those who were killed in the Senghennyd disaster and a wall of rememberance, acting as a 'path of memory' to all other miners who have died in accidents across the mining community here in Wales.
 According the Carwyn Jones the Welsh first minister ' The Senghennyd tragedy has come to symbolise the dangers and sacrifices made by those who went undergroung in search of coal but never returned home. It is fitting that this should be the location for a memorial dedicated to all the miners that have died in mining disasters across our nations.'
On a personal note I can never forget the tales my own grandad told me, who himself was a miner in the valleys in the 1930's as was his father before him, and many of his relatives, who taught me never to forget the long list of tragedy, human grief and loss in our history, and the sorrow of communities like Senghennyd who have lost their loved ones.I never forget too, how some peoples lives are  expendable in the pursuit of profit.

Mourning of the Valley - Documentary telling the story of the 1913

Senghennyd Mining Disaster

F The Tories Freestyle

Not my usual musical cup of tea,
but respect, even though  they all seem to
be the same sides of the coin,
but in the meantime, this
works a treat.

World Mental Health day 2013: Time to End the Stigmatisation

Today marks World Mental Health Day, a day that provides campaigners to raise awareness of the importance of positive mental health and to challenge the stigma that people with mental health issues daily experience.
Sadly despite the efforts of many, the subject of mental illness remains a taboo subject, the fact is that many in your community suffer from a wide of different problems like clinical depression, obsessive-compulsive disorder, ADHD, schizophrenia, and anxiety and others. In my community it is hardly ever talked about, many of us are left to face our problems in silence, we have to choose  between societies consensus ways of dealing with things, medication, psychotherapy, counselling etc etc, or simply learning to forget.
Personally I started this blog as a means of recovery, I'm getting there but still have a long way to go. I don't have clear answers, but I  now no longer bottle up  my feelings or emotions, I have learnt techniques to release them. I refuse to be labelled.
But I have also noticed how the press stokes up the fears and anxieties of mental illness, stigmatises people that should be getting some kind of support, in the midst of this the current tory government daily attacking the most vulnerable amongst us with their attacks on welfare claimants, cuts in services that are essential to peoples well beings.
What people with mental illness really need is support and understanding, to be accepted as we are  openly and warmly, not to be used, as scapegoats, to be hidden  and forgotten about. People who live with mental illness are among the most stigmatised groups in society. We are challenged doubly. On one hand with the struggle of our symptoms that result from our illnesses and then by the stereotypes and prejudice that results from peoples misconceptions about mental illness. Many people are robbed of opportunities that help define  a quality life,  jobs, safe housing, health care and affiliation with a diverse group of people, and are left feeling almost invisible and on our own.
Prejudice leads to discrimination and so on. The other day the Sun newspaper continued the sterotyping with a disgusting  headline, that further demonstrated the daily attacks that people with mental health issues suffer from. Everyone needs to experiences of 'life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness' without the resort to crude stereotypes and attacks  that do not help remove stigmatisation.
It is time that people change their attitudes and outlook, and for politicians to redress the balance.
Ramble over off to see G.P for an M.O.T.

http://www.time-to-change.org.uk/

Philip Chevron (17/6/57 - 13/10/13) R.I.P Faithfully Departed

Just heard that guitarist with one of my favourite bands the Pogues, Philip  Chevron, died yesterday aged 56 after a long battle with cancer.  He regarded his fate with great stoicism - he told the Irish Daily Mail earlier this year " I am gay, Irish,Catholic, alcoholic pogue who is about to die from cancer - and don't think I don't know it."
He had first performed with the Irish punk band the Radiators from Space, before he joined the Pogues, contributing  to some of their more memorable albums, in addition to playing the banjo and mandolin, he added magic to their legendary performances, who I was fortunate to see back in the day. A punk heart with a penchant for the work of Betolt Brecht and Kurt Weill.
Later  he became almost like the bands unofficial spokesperson.
My thoughts are with is friends and family.

The Pogues - A Thousand Ships are sailing

The Radiators from Space - Faithfully Departed



Philip Chevron and Spider Stacy

Deaths per thousand at european borders : Welcome to Fortress Europe.

It is now estimated that over 300 people will have died when a ship full of migrants sunk off  the Italian island of Lampedusa.Since then on Monday, 13 refugees drowned off the coast of Scicily while attempting to swim to shore.http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-24380247 These people have  joined the thousands of people who have already died thanks to the racist policies of Fortress Europe. Policies  have been designed to make it almost impossible to legally reach Europe and consequently as a result of this people are forced to take desperate risks.
One of the first divers to reach the wreck reported that " There were bodies everywhere, trapped inside the wreck, but also on top  of it and around the boat. I saw at least 100 corpses. But what struck me most was that some of them were locked in an embrace - they were hugging each other as they exhaled their last breath. Nobody wants to die alone. I still can't get the sight out of my head. I can't think of anything else."
The map above shows graphically the scale of deaths on the borders of Fortress Europe - this latest disaster off Lampedusa was of a scale that it was reported on. But as shown again and again there is a constant death toll of small groups and individuals that are not judged to be even worth reporting on.
Europe cannot go on sealing its borders and pretend this is not happening. Movement of people is inevitable due to social conflicts, repression, despaired poverty or natural disasters, there will be further asylum seekers and further tragedies, as  people try to escape persecution.
I believe that Europe must act together and dismantle its barricades to avoid further tragedies. These deaths are not isolated incidents, they are symptomatic of policies that no longer see the humanity of those fleeing their homeland.  For most refugees they are  denied access to the asylum system and are treated like criminals.By making legal immigration and asylum nearly impossible these policies will  lead to further tragedy.Border militarisation, asylum laws, detention policies, deportations and carrier sanctions etc etc. that lead to the  tragic death of migrants and refugees must continually be questioned. Senselessly increasing military  patrols near the coast of North Africa is simply not a solution, and while condolences are always  good to hear, there must be a better way, and the continued detention of vulnerable desperate people must be avoided, and the laws of immigration should not be punitive.  However much European governments try, it is impossible in this global world to shut its doors, we are living in the age of migration, fact, we must look for solutions not more punishment.
The survivors of Lampedusa are now crammed into a refugee centre  on the tiny island, with many forced to sleep in the open.

 

 

Palestinians plant flower beds with spent tear canisters

 

 

 

In the middle of the desert landscape of the West Bank, a small village has become an oasis of Palestinian resistance against the Israeli occupation. It's residents have planted flowers in hundreds of spent Israeli tear gas grenades, to honor those killed during their weekly protests against the seperation barrier in an act of peaceful resistance.This garden is located in the village of Bilin, near the West Bank city of Ramallah, the defacto capital of the proposed Palestinian state.
It serves to commemorate too Bassen Abu Ramah, a protest leader who was killed in 2009, when a tear gas grenade struck him in the chest during a demonstration.
This beautiful garden , acts as a counter marker, against the cruelty of the seperation wall, that divides neighbour from  neighbour, and symbolises directly their complex situation
In the most difficult of circumstances, some how hope, manages to flower.