The horrible threat of fascism must be thwarted.

                                     
                                            Thomas Mair, fascist murderer.

Do you know what sorrow is? A pool of blood where resentment clouded in hate devoured hope.It's been a horrible week, where we've seen the consequences of bigoted hatred.
It's looking increasingly apparent that Thomas Mair (the Killer of Jo Cox MP) was a far-right extremist with links to various fascist groups.The media are trying to put his actions down to his mental health, ignoring his political beliefs, despite Mair saying "death to traitors, freedom for Britain" in court this morning it points out that the attack was not some random act of violence, but a politically motivated targeted attack on someone who had spoken out in support of the people pictured in Nigel Farages recent ' Breaking Point' poster. Believe it or not, there are millions of people with mental health issues who don't go around committing politically-motivated acts of terror. An individual fired up by those who propogate. hate and division who deliberately set out from his home armed with a firearm and long knife, to commit a politically motivated murder. According to a US civil rights group, he bought a handbook from an American-based Neo-Nazi group with instructions on how to build a homemade gun in 1999.
Sick white supremacist ideology has driven many to do this is the past (David Copeland, Anders Breivik, Zack Davies) and if the far-right aren't prevented from spreading their poisonous message, many more will probably follow.
By not calling Mair's actions terrorism , the media has been inconsistent and has helped fuel Muslims communities that they are treated differently.Remember that this kind of thinking emerges and spreads in our own communities,sometimes amongst people we know. It's important to recognise this threat and to know who these people are so that we never have to experience the worst consequences of fascist extremism.Those that seek to spread blood on our streets for their own hateful agendas. Certain politicians  are responsible for stirring up the toxic debate on immigration in which the dreadful murder of Jo Cox took place combined  with those who have deliberately whipped up racism and anti-migrant feelings.  .
I have no hidden political agenda, I just have a dreadful  fear of the rise of fascism in a political atmosphere that was febrile and fetid long before Jo Cox’s death and is still being spread.
The lessons of history is that we must all unite to oppose fascism wherever it lurks, we must  stand firm against this vile ideology of hate, defeat it and make a better life for all .Remember that an injury to one is an injury to all., so as we remember Jo Cox we must stand together in solidarity with all victims of fascist violence. Never should this disgusting ideology be given acceptance of any kind.
We must continue push back any growth by the  forces of fascism as has been done repeatedly in the past.

Inner Terrestrials - White Nightmare

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PTE8y7z3-aw&feature=youtu.be

Well this is a story about the war,
This is the futures to unfurl.
And this is about the fate of millions,
Under attack by evil's minions.

This song is about the fascist threat,
And a history full of regret.
And this is a tale of countless dead,
Because of the lies on which we're fed.

A white nightmare
A white nightmare
A white nightmare
The great white nightmare

You know we're taught to believe in our sovereign rulers,
Just one of the lies on which we're nurtured.
Patriotism, blind faith in the state,
Relate to xenophobia and race hate.

The innocents died when the war flags flew
Are scared human beings, no different from you
In god and mercy's name, they'll have to be cleansed,
The commies, the subverts, the gypsy, the jew.

A white nightmare
A white nightmare
A white nightmare
The great white nightmare

You know they're still there fighting for a new world order,
Built on fear and children slaughtered.
And i can't think what they hope to gain,
When the rivers turn to blood, and joy turns into pain.

With a crooked pride in germanic roots,
Swastikas, shaved head, steel toe capped boots.
They're warped ideal is a nazi nation,
Born of loss and bleak frustration.

A white nightmare
A white nightmare
A white nightmare
The great white nightmare

Have they forgotten the lesson of the past?
With their misplaced pride and their aryan path.
Can the rotten see that inside their heads,
Hatred grows and hatred spreads.

Before you realised in had begun,
The world is under threat from nazi scum.
So on your feet now, do us right,
It's time to spread the love, and block out all the lies.

A white nightmare
A white nightmare
A white nightmare
The great white nightmare

You know i look around and i don't see mugs,
Who'll take this xxxx from fascist thugs.
We need one heart, one soul, one nation,
To save us all from annihilation.
We suffered from too many wars,
We must never break under their laws.
We've been hurt enough, we'll take no more,
We must defeat the fascist core.

A white nightmare
A white nightmare
A white nightmare
The great white nightmare

Thoughts on the death of Jo Cox M.P

I am deeply saddened by the tragic news of Jo Cox Labour MP's senseless horrific murder in her constituency in Birstal the North of England yesterday. My thoughts go out to her family and friends at this difficult time.
It appears to have been a right-wing politically fuelled hate attack, the alleged killer named as a local man named Thomas Mair, 53 is said to have shouted Britain First, a reference to a far right fascist paramilitary organisation of that name as he launched his attack. Piece by piece, a picture is emerging of a quiet, troubled man with a history of connections to far-right groups.Mair did have far-right affiliations, so this horrific attack can legitimately be called an act of terror, driven by an ideology of hate that grows from the fertile swamps of white supremacy and xenophobia, such as Nigel Farage’s new “breaking point” advert against the EU and refugees.
In my opinion we have far more to fear from nationalists than from immigrants. The latter often simply want a better life while the former tend towards reactionary xenophobia authoritarian thought and blaming others for their own failings.Their brains are almost devoid of empathy circuits and lack the capacity to feel genuine compassion. They therefore find it easy to dehumanize the "other" and treat their fellow human beings little different than used furniture. They place a high value on authoritarianism and care very little for fairness. At its very core, authoritarianism is a denial of the Golden Rule. They believe that any compromise represents complete capitulation. Their minds are sick having been poisoned by a steady diet of hate. Instead of making a better argument to counter yours, they try to silence you. in this tragic case sadly.forever.
Killing the messenger won't silence what she stood for, I am hoping that if anything, Jo's death would not have been in vain. She was a committed Bremainer and activist and on all accounts she was a wonderful, compassionate lady, mother of two , pro-equality MP who had made several superb speeches in Parliament, brilliant on immigration migrant issues. A rare kind of MP in days like these.. Her murder could well be a game changer for undecideds and those already considering Brexit. 
Cox, 41, was raised in Heckmondwike, West Yorkshire. Her mother Jean was a school secretary and her father Gordon worked in a toothpaste and hairspray factory in Leeds, the Yorkshire Post reported.
A mother of two, she was married to Brendan Cox, an activist and campaigner who was formerly a senior executive at Save the Children and was the adviser on international development to Gordon Brown when he served as prime minister. Jo Cox had studied at  Cambridge University before becoming head of global policy for the international aid organization Oxfam. She was the first in her family to graduate from university.Jo was co-chair of the Friends of Syria All Party Parliamentary Group and an active member of parliamentary groups working on issues involving Pakistan, Kashmir and Yorkshire’s regional economy. She was working toward trying to find a solution to Syria’s years-long civil war. Frequently speaking out about issues that concerned her like Palestine.
In a statement on Thursday following her death her husband said: "Jo believed in a better world and she fought for it every day of her life with an energy, and a zest for life that would exhaust most people.She would have wanted two things above all else to happen now, one that our precious children are bathed in love and two, that we all unite to fight against the hatred that killed her. Hate doesn't have a creed, race or religion, it is poisonous."
Could the news this week get any sadder. From the numbed people of Orlando to the numbed people of Britain, we must continue to send our love, our support, our compassion and our solidarity in our grief and determination to overcome fear, ignorance and hate. It is also worth noting that mental illness seldom functions as a reason in and of itself, especially if the label is applied so selectively. Lessons need to be drawn from what is happening.
The dark  forces of isolation, fear, false bravado, and, above all, just plain cowardice must nor be allowed to win.
Rest in Peace Jo Cox.

In the clearness

The night was black as a raven's wing,
The sky felt tragic and undone,
Slicing through the power of reason,
The world  seemed split in two,
Like a heart when the love affair has ended
Too much darkness and hatred
Time now to turn untangle,
Find in contemplation,
The edges of the world,
where loves spirit never fades.

A point of focus to remind us,
To join  together as one in hope,
Clinging on, taking time.
Booking further reservations,
To look, seek and find,
Destroy the bad, the good to make,
To recount yesterday,
Extinquish desolation,
Igniting desire and emotion.

Peace comes quietly
But surge in spirit is clearly felt,
Carried on the healing balm of day
Delivering the bright bliss,
Of tomorrow's resurrection,
Fold up your calendars,
They will not be needed,
When our dreams become the future,
Walking beside us - unafraid..

Solidarity with Orlando

ISIS is above all a mentality, a result of an international system of fascism. Of course ISIS’s mentality is against a certain way of life – the explicit targeting of an LGBT venue by an individual inspired by their twisted ideology is illustrative of bigoted hate and fascism,. We must not be afraid to call out on its roots, when every day people are murdered as a result of this.
No false flags here, this was a deliberate attack on LGBT people in an LGBT venue. It was a homophobic terrorist attack. Omar Mateen  hated queer people and deliberately picked a club because it was full of people he regarded as deviants and committed a mass shooting. He was just another typical right-wing, homophobic, religious nut, sharing the same DNA with most of the Trump voter base. ISIS and Trump are two expressions of the same violent hate; this country, the United States, made this killer. It has been making killers like him since the Mayflower. The worst mass shooting in US history, if we can conveniently forget countless massacres perpetrated against First Nations peoples like the US Calvary’s massacre of 150 Lakota at the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation in South Dakota in 1890.

Omar Mateen is not a foreign threat. Omar Mateen is America. Yet again, an astonishing act of violence that has us wondering what has become of this society, and why it tolerates such easy access to firearms, this shooting exposes so many of America's faultlines :- http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/commentisfree/2016/jun/12/orlando-shooting-reaction-us-gun-laws-islam-homophobia?CMP=share_btn_tw
When people are considered deviants and deserving of a murderous assault for their sexuality, a trait all of us in the community share, we cannot but come together in sadness and in mourning.Stand in solidarity with the LGBT community who struggles for existence on an everyday basis, solidarity with unjustly targeted Muslims, solidarity with the brave heroes, especially women, who fight against ISIS fascism in the Middle East and remember that in the Muslim world, the Rojava Revolution shines out as a beacon of hope against its own local version of that bigotry - ISIS. The armed forces of that Revolution - the People's Protection Units or YPG, have of course issued their own heartfelt statement in solidarity with the dead, wounded and mourning of Orlando.

We must resist those that seek to use this slaughter to demonise and and scapegoat the muslim community, most of them deplore terrorism as everyone else. We must always stand up to hate. Whatever its motivations. Informed by values of reason and empathy, love and kindness,we can stand up to hate and bigotry. No matter how bigoted a person is we will continue to survive, we will continue to resist, we will continue to live. Together in global solidarity we shall not live in fear. A time for us to unite and stand firm against homophobia, racism and Islamophobia.

" There is no simple monoliths solution to racism, to sexism, to homophobia. There is only the conscious focusing within each of my days, to move against them, wherever I come up against these particular manifestations of the same disease." 

 - Audre Lorde

Rabbis powerful speech to humanity at Muhammad Ali's funeral.

At a time when there is so much hatred and fearmongering directed against Islam and American Muslims by prominent politicians, it took Muhammad Ali’s funeral to bring  humanity together.The world's richest countries can and should do much more to help the worlds most vulnerable people together to remind us of our higher ideals, reminding us of our society’s problems with racial and religious prejudice, opening our eyes to  racial and religious universalism. Am currently still blown away by the powerful social justice speech from a respected Rabbi that has taken world leaders at the memorial service of Muhammad Ali by storm.
Longtime interfaith activist Rabbi Michael Lerner sparked uproarious applause and repeated standing ovations when he addressed mourners at Muhammad Ali’s funeral on Friday with a rousing call for social justice, denouncing the occupation of Palestine, the U.S. drone war, rampant Islamophobia and the mass incarceration of African Americans.  had a hard time loving themselves” and calling for an end to Islamophobia. .
Thousands of friends, family, celebrities, and political figures attended Ali’s traditional Muslim memorial service in Louisville, Kentucky, which spanned more than two days.
  “If Muhammad Ali were here today, I’m sure his message small battles – put your life energies and money into fundamental systemic transformation,” said Lerner, who is also a
political activist and editor of the Jewish magazine Tikkun. Lerner also said that what made Ali a hero was his courage to stand up to the “immoral” war in Vietnam by proclaiming himself a
conscientious objector. Lerner was an anti-war activist along with Ali, who refused to serve in the US army and was immediately stripped of his heavyweight title in 1967.
“Knowing he would lose his title, knowing he would face the racism of American society that would be heaped upon him forsaying no to the crazy war in Vietnam,” Ali said no to the war,
Lerner said. “He spoke truth to power – we must speak truth to power,” he added.
 Lerner’s eulogy, and the entire memorial service, had a strong interfaith message:
To honor Ali, he said:
"We will not tolerate politicians or anyone else putting down Muslims,"“Tell the one percent who own 80 percent of the wealth in this country that it’s time to share that wealth," he continued. "Tell the politicians who use violence worldwide and then preach nonviolence to the oppressed that it’s time for them to end their drone warfare and every other kind of warfare, to close our military bases around the world, to bring the troops home.”“Tell judges to let out of prison the many African Americans swept up by racist police and imprisoned by racist judges,” Lerner continued, raising his fist and pointing his fingers. “Tell the leaders of Turkey to stop killing the Kurds. Tell Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu that the way to get security for Israel is to stop the occupation of the West Bank and help create a Palestinian state."
“The way to get security is for the United States to become known as the most generous and caring country in the world, not the most powerful,” he said. “We could start with a global and domestic plan to once and for all end global and domestic poverty, homelessness, hunger, inadequate education, inadequate health care.”
He ended by affirming his “commitment to the well-being of all Muslims on this planet, as well as all people of all faiths and secular humanists.” Said Lerner:
"We Jews, as well as our non-Jewish allies in all religions and secular humanists, wish to pay honor to the Muslims of the world as they continue today the fast of Ramadan, and join with them in
mourning the loss and celebrating the life of Muhammad Ali, a great fighter for justice and peace."
A Beautiful tribute, talking Islamphobia, Vietnam, Palestine, and justice. Ali's legacy will be kept alive by those who dream of  justice, equality and freedom for all. Ali knew the secret of the butterfly was to transform itself, we too have a continuing part to play in transforming the world. Catalysts for change that keep standing up for the most vulnerable among us, holding the powers that be to account.

"Impossible is just a big word thrown around by small men who find it easier to live in a world they've been  given than to explore the power they have to change it. Impossible is not a fact. It's an opinion. Impossible is not a declaration. It's not a dare - Impossible is temporary. Impossible is nothing." 

- Muhammad Ali 

Solidarity with the Burghfield Blockade

I sends congratulations to Trident Ploughshares and all those who have participated in the very successful blockade of AWE Burghfield this week. This is the site near Aldermaston which works on the development and production of Britain's nuclear warheads. The protest aims to raise awareness of the forthcoming parliamentary decision on replacing the Trident nuclear weapons system.
The new warhead factory at AWE Burghfield will cost the taxpayer almost £2 billion. Parliament has yet to vote on replacing Trident.
Campaigners have blockaded one of the gates, day and night, since Monday, stopping all traffic to and from the site in the process.
 Former Labour Euro-MP for Leeds Michael McGowan says
“At a time when people in our city are depending on foodbanks, it is just abhorrent that we should consider spending such astronomical sums on a weapon that we could never use. Nuclear weapons are not just immoral but totally outdated and it’s time that we got in line with most countries in the world and disarmed.”
During the day the blockaders have been joined by many supporters from across the country and internationally.Activists from France, Belgium, Germany and Finland as well as Scotland, Wales and England are continuing to block the gates to the construction site at AWE Burghfield in Berkshire. No work has gone on there since the action started on Monday morning. But the same group of people have been staying overnight to maintain the blockade. Now they need to leave! More people are needed at the site to take their place. Are you free this weekend and can get to AWE Burghfield, West Berkshire?

Love and support to all seeking to stop wars and bombing innocents.

If you can lend a hand please contact Angie on 07456 588943 or email admin@tridentploughshares.org

Please pass this on to anyone you think might be interested in joining the protesters.

Click here for more information on the blockade, which continues throughout the month.

Click here to see The Guardian's coverage of the protest.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a-h6fCNVEqI

Europe:- Should we stay or should we go?.

 
The EU is far from perfect, but there’s so much at stake in this referendum. Lots of our rights at work and many people’s jobs are dependent on the European Union, and leaving could even mean lower wages.
I have huge sympathy with the anti-capitalist  argument for leaving the EU, the EU like Westminster serving the vested interests of the rich representing the hegenomy of old, and we now have the opportunity to break it but am not sure about getting into bed with the xenophobes and racists either, like Farage and his dodgy crew and if we leave David Cameron will get rid of the human rights act, he's already tried. I don't want to give these other dark forces any credence.
On the one hand , remain to defeat the hard right, preserve rights enshrined in the EU and fight to reform the EU. On the other hand , leave to strike a blow to fortress Europe, and stand apart from a neoliberal alliance and organise on the basis of true workers' internationalism across and beyond Europe . I recognise that the EU is a rather undemocratic organisation, a flawed institution in serious need of reform , it was responsible for forcing austerity on the people of Greece and Spain, but has also been an influence in restraining our own far right Government from its worst excessess, which is why those from the looniest fringes of the right want us to leave. 
I acknowledge that thanks to the EU it does help protect workers rights, Maternity leave, health and safety legislation, holidays, regular breaks, things I don't trust the UK to keep up with. Certainly not under Cameron. Leaving the EU would put all that at risk. Would you trust the Tories to protect those rights if they didn’t have to? Ideally we shouldn't perhaps be at the mercy of the EU or the UK government.
At the end of the day none of this is the world I want, I don't want any borders and want freedom of movement, internationalism not based on national sentiment or interests. But I have to  admit I'm pretty foxed by it all so still pretty undecided.When you get down to the nitty gritty, there's many unanswered questions by Brexit. Leaving would be one hell of a jump into the darkness. We have to think long and hard about the future,and  not be seduced by the politics of fear. Yes  I don't have any concrete answers, hopefully though  have offered you  some food for thought.
Perhaps when it comes down to it, I will just draw a smiley face on the voting slip. At the end of the day the rich and powerful always seem to get what they want.

Hope is a thing with feathers - Emily Dickinson (10/12/1830 - 15/5/1886)

.Hope is the thing with feathers
That perches in the soul,
And sings the tune without the words,
And never stops at all,

And sweetest in the gale is heard;
And sore must be the storm
That could abash the little bird
That kept so many warm.

I've heard it in the chillest land
And on the strangest sea;
Yet, never, in extremity,
It asked a crumb of me.

Rest in Power Muhammad Ali (17/1/42 -3/6/16) - The greatest heavyweight poetical champion of our time

The lyrical heavyweight showman Muhammad Ali who thrilled the globe with his sublime boxing style, unpredictable wit, and gentle generosity sadly died yesterday after a long brave fight with Parkinson's disease. Tragic news. He was 74. Ali, the former Cassius Clay, was not just an athlete who embodied the times in which he lived. He shaped them. His conscientious objection to the Vietnam war, and reasoned rants against a country fighting for freedom on the other side of the globe, while its own black citizens were denied basic rights of their own, energized a generation. Ali refused to serve in Vietnam,and in 1967, three years after Ali had won the heavyweight championship, he was publicly vilified for his refusal to be conscripted into the U.S. military, based on his religious beliefs and opposition to the Vietnam War. Ali was eventually arrested and found guilty on draft evasion charges; he was stripped of his boxing title, and his boxing license was suspended. He was not imprisoned, but did not fight again for nearly four years while his appeal worked its way up to the U.S. Supreme Court, where it was eventually successful. Ali had changed his name after joining the Nation of Islam in 1964, subsequently converting to Sunni Islam in 1975. By the late 1960s, Ali had become a living embodiment of the proposition that principles matter. His power no longer resided in his fists. It came from his conscience. He would become a tireless human rights ambassador and philanthropist, his devotion to charitable causes would feature prominently for the rest of his life whose impact has been felt worldwide.Being a person who championed humanity, justice and civil rights.
Ali would go on to become the first and only three-time lineal World Heavyweight Champion.
Nicknamed "The Greatest", Ali was involved in several historic boxing matches. Notable among these were three with rival Joe Frazier, which are considered among the greatest in boxing history, and one with George Foreman, where he finally regained his stripped titles seven years later. Ali was well known for his unorthodox fighting style, epitomized by his catchphrase "float like a butterfly, sting like a bee", and employing techniques such as the Ali Shuffle and the rope-a-dope. Ali brought beauty and grace to the most uncompromising of sports and through the wonderful excesses of skill and character, he became the most famous athlete in the world.
Growing up Muhammad Ali had such a huge empowering impact on me . A beautiful man. His brave stand against U.S. imperialism and the vile institutional racism that was  in the U.S that still sadly exists, but Ali. was an inspiration for millions fighting injustice and oppression across the world. No doubt the U.S. establishment will now try and bury their systematic and brutal attempt to silence him.
Muhammed Ali belongs to the oppressed. Let's not let his oppressors rewrite our history.
"What Muhammad Ali did—in a culture that worships sports and violence as well as a culture that idolizes black athletes while criminalizing black skin—was redefine what it meant to be tough and collectivize the very idea of courage. Through the Champ’s words on the streets and deeds in the ring, bravery was not only standing up to Sonny Liston. It was speaking truth to power, no matter the cost." Dave Zirin (in the nation)
But for me he was also also a poet. His passing has reminded me of the time when I was about 7 or 8 in the mid 1970's when I first  first became aware of him, I remember his passion and energy his lyrical playfulness, and even though I subsequently never got that into boxing or fighting and have always tried to avoid violent conflict whenever I can, even though my nose is bent out of shape, and other tell tale signs , tells another story,of my own inability to duck and dive, I loved the fact that Ali was able to wax lyrical spontaneity without  rhyming in the usual traditional settings, using an almost beat phraseology to release  rhymes from his heart with an unpredictable wit that made him a lyrical heavyweight too. 
The world famous boxing champion when not jesting, could be undoubtedly serious too, who  once appeared in an interview which was televised in Ireland, in which he recited a poem he wrote about the 1971 Attica prison riots.
These  riots which took place 46 years ago resulted in the death of 39 people, including some prison guards. It all started on September 9, 1971, when a black inmate was killed while trying to escape the prison. Over the following four days, up to 2,200 black prisoners rebelled against the prison guards, taking 42 of them hostage. Nelson Rockerfeller, the then governor, refused to negotiate with the prisoners demands for better treatment and conditions. Soldiers raided the prison facility on September 13, dropping teargas and then shooting randomly into the smoke for two minutes non-stop. 29 prisoners were killed on the spot. 9 prison guards were also killed on that day, some with slit throats, suggesting that the prisoners had killed their hostages in retaliation for the raid. 1 hostage died of a gunshot wound later on.
After reading the poem, Muhammad Ali related the struggle of the Afro-Americans for freedom and justice to the struggle of the Irish against British imperialism. The transcript of the poem can be read as follows :-

Freedom - Better Now
Better far— from all I see—
To die fighting to be free
What more fitting end could be?
Better surely than in some bed
Where in broken health I'm led
Lingering until I'm dead
Better than with prayers and pleas
Or in the clutch of some disease
Wasting slowly by degrees
Better than a heart attack
or some dose of drug I lack
Let me die by being black
Better far that I should go
Standing here against the foe
Is the sweeter death to know
Better than the bloody stain
on some highway where I’m lain
Torn by flying glass and pane
Better calling death to come
than to die another dumb,
muted victim in the slum
Better than of this prison rot
if there’s any choice I’ve got
Kill me here on the spot
Better for my fight to wage
Now while my blood boils with rage
Less it cool with ancient age
Better violent for us to die
Than to Uncle Tom and try
Making peace just to live a lie
Better now that I say my sooth
I’m gonna die demanding Truth
While I’m still akin to youth
Better now than later on
Now that fear of death is gone
Never mind another dawn.

Powerful stuff indeed, which leaves me to remind you of his other often light hearted rhymes that he often used in his pre-match hype, to try and  'trash talk his opponents, which  I am grateful to an acquaintance named Barac Zita whose facebook post earlier today inspired this post :-

'Float like a butterfly
Sting like a bee
The hands can't hit
what the eyes can't see'



"Everyone knew when I stepped in town,
I was the greatest fighter around.
A lot of people called me a clown,
But I am the one who called the round.
The people came to see a great fight,
But all I did was put out the light.
Never put your money against Cassius Clay,
For you will never have a lucky day."

— In 1962, when Ali was still Cassius Clay.

 "Now Clay swings with a right, what a beautiful swing.
And the punch raises the Bear clear out of the ring.
Liston is still rising, and the ref wears a frown.
For he can't start counting 'til Sonny comes down.
Now Liston disappears from view.
The crowd is getting frantic,
But our radar stations have picked him up. He's somewhere over the Atlantic.
Who would have thought when they came to the fight
That they'd witness the launching of a human satellite.
Yes, the crowd did not dream when they lay down their money
That they would see a total eclipse of the Sonny.
I am the greatest."

— Part of a poem before his upset title victory over Sonny Liston Feb. 25, 1964.

"Joe's gonna come out smokin',
But I ain't gonna be jokin'.
This might shock and amaze ya,
But I'm going to destroy Joe Frazier."

— Before losing to Joe Frazier in their first fight March 8, 1971.

 "You think the world was shocked when Nixon resigned?
Wait 'til I whup George Foreman's behind.
Float like a butterfly, sting like a bee.
His hand can't hit what his eyes can't see.
Now you see me, now you don't.
George thinks he will, but I know he won't.
I done wrassled with an alligator, I done tussled with a whale.
Only last week I murdered a rock, injured a stone, hospitalized a brick.
I'm so mean, I make medicine sick."

— Before regaining the title by upsetting George Foreman Oct. 30, 1974.

"I got speed and endurance.
You'd better increase your insurance."
— To Larry Holmes before his one-sided loss in a bid to become a heavyweight champion for the fourth time Oct. 2, 1980.

Then there is this one about his famous rumble in the jungle with George Foreman, Ali and Foreman may have been adversaries in the ring but became firm  friends.

Last night I had a dream - Muhammad Ali

Last night I had a dream, When I got to Africa,
I had one hell of a rumble,
I had to beat Tarzan's behind first,
For claiming to be King of the jungle,
For this fight, I've wrestled with alligators,
I've tussled wih a whale,
I done handcuffed lightning
And throw thunder in jail.
You know I'm bad,
just last week, I murdered a rock,
Injured a stone, Hospitalised a brick,
I'm so mean, I make medicine sick,
I'm so fast man,
I can run through a hurricane and don't get wet.
When George Foreman meets me,
He'll pay his debt,
I can drown the drink of water, and kill a dead tree,
Wait till you see Muhammad Ali.

I'll leave you with this rather nice one :-

He took a few cups of Love - Muhammad Ali

He took a few cups of love,
He took one tablespoon of patience,
One teaspoon of generosity,
One pint of kindness,
He took one quart of laughter,
One pinch of concern,
And then he mixed willingness with happiness,
He added lots of faith,
And he stirred it up well,
Then he spread it over a span of a lifetime,
And he served it to each and every deserving person he met.

“Champions aren’t made in gyms. Champions are made from something they have deep inside them, a desire, a dream, a vision.” - Muhammad Ali

Undoubtedly the greatest, Boxing  poet, and champion of civil rights of our time. 

Rest in Power Muhammad Ali

There's wisdom in her eyes

                       
               ( photo courtesy of Stephanie Burgess, a poem for Jane, the mighty furbster )

There's wisdom in her eyes,
Kindness in her heart,
Laughter and faithfulness,
She carries a familiar strength,
That urges sadness to depart,
Brings me peace and light.
This mighty furbster flower,
Precious loving being,
A dream within a dream,
Encourager and friend.
Dear gentle beautiful soul
Who in life has bought good fortune,
Many blessings delivered to my door,
Taught me how to remain positive,
Filled the days with grace,
Her presence makes the world,
                            a better place,
I will follow forever all her days,
The wisdom of her eyes,
Ever clear, ever sacred, ever bright.

Skanda Vale Hospice Benefit Gig

Looking forward to this Saturday, when a favourite local band of mine, psychedelic troubadours Sendelica will be playing a benefit Gig for Skanda Vale hospice. An amazing place staffed, almost entirely by the most wonderful volunteers from all around the world. They provide care and respite at their beautiful site for people with terminal illnesses. The hospice is run by volunteers with all services being completely free of charge to anyone over the age of 18 diagnosed with a life-threatening illness. It is a true jewel of my local community, a multi-faith monastery that provides, hope, comfort and dignity to people at the end of their lives. Many patients have to travel long distances to get the care they need, this hospice is ideally located, near the borders of Ceredigion, Pembrokeshire and Carmarthenshire to serve a large number of local people.
Please come along on Saturday at Cardigan Pizza tipi, 7.30 pm admittance only a fiver, so please come along and support these amazing people.

 http://skandavalehospice.org

Walt Whitman (31/5/1819 - 26/3/1892) - Poets to Come

Walt Whitman is an arch-figure in any list of great 19^th century writers – original in both form and content, continually surprising in his experimentation, and continually evocative in the sensuality of his words. A master of the love for everyday life. Whitman’s  poetry with its espousal of comradeship  across class lines, and advocacy of a utopian democracy has long inspired, with its interlocking themes of shared values, expressing the divine light in every individual, an almost organic view of society. A big influence on another writer I admire Edward Carpenter. Whitman’s philosophy expressed a divine light in every individual, the value of the individual en masse, can be grabbed for our own times. An early DIY advocate who sold his Leaves of Grass door to door  and self published his own books. A man of deep  deep passion whose birthday I celebrate today. His words still continuing to enrich the earth.

" the earth and sun and the animals, despise riches, give alms to every one that asks, stand up for the stupid and crazy, devote your income and labor to others… re-examine all you have been told at school or church or in any book, dismiss whatever insults your own soul…” - Walt Whitman

Here I offer this poem from his pen :-

Poets to Come

POETS to come! orators, singers, musicians to come!
Not to-day is to justify me, and answer what I am for;
But you, a new brood, native, athletic, continental, greater than
before known,
Arouse! Arouse--for you must justify me--you must answer.

I myself but write one or two indicative words for the future,
I but advance a moment, only to wheel and hurry back in the darkness.

I am a man who, sauntering along, without fully stopping, turns a
casual look upon you, and then averts his face,
Leaving it to you to prove and define it,
Expecting the main things from you.

The importance of another BDS victory

In another blow to the campaign to criminalize Palestine solidarity activism the Irish have joined the Dutch  government in  affirming that the  global boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) movement represents a “legitimate” means of protest “intended to pressure Israel into ending the occupation.
BDS is a nonviolent, Palestinian-led human rights movement for freedom, justice and equality. Anchored in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and international law, BDS upholds the simple principle that Palestinians are entitled to the same rights as the rest of humanity. It aims to end international support for Israel’s regime of apartheid and settler colonialism that began with the Nakba, the ethnic cleansing of 700,000 Palestinians to make way for the state of Israel, in 1948.The statements dealt a serious blow to Israel’s war of repression that has led governments in the UK, France, Canada and state legislatures across the US to introduce anti-democratic legislation and taking other  measures to undermine the BDS movement. Israel has recently admitted that it is using its intelligence services to spy on BDS activists overseas.

It is being hailed  as a victory for the growing BDS movement. It is important to note that this movement is about applying pressure to Israel to change its policies, that Israel is singled out by Palestinians and their supporters because their rights are singled out by Israel for violation. It uses effective but peaceful ways to pressure Israel to end its occupation, ensuring Palestinians have the same rights that we take for granted. In a civil society we should be allowed to hold countries and companies accountable for their actions.
Some people  think that Israeli artists are boycotted and singled out because they are Israeli (they are not). The cultural boycott does not target Israelis, and allows great latitude for cultural engagement. What it targets is institutions that represent and are complicit with state policies in the same way  that international boycott, divestment, and sanctions (BDS) efforts helped topple South Africa’s brutal apartheid regime.

which uses effective-yet-peaceful means to pressure Israel to end the occupation and ensure Palestinians have the rights we take for granted. It is civil society holding countries and companies accountable for their actions. - See more at: http://www.palestinecampaign.org/qa-antisemitism-anti-zionism-bds/#sthash.X26h3fAY.dpuf

I support this campaign  because it  tries to draw awareness of  Israels continuing  occupation, colonization, and apartheid against the Palestinian people. That  points the way forward to a united global civil society movement for freedom, justice, self-determination, and equality for all, I will continue to do so until  Israel abides by international law and basic human rights norms, I feel the BDS movement holds a legitimate political viewpoint  and I do not agree with those who attempt to demonize those who support it's aims.This campaign for Palestinian rights is an anti-racist campaign, and that any attempt to connect or conflate antisemitism with the campaign for the rights of the Palestinian people is wrong, misleading and harmful, a campaign based on the principles of peace, justice and international law.
One could argue about the efficiancy and propriety of certain tactics, and I acknowledge their are those who do not support some or all aspects of boycotts on principle, like the author JK Rowling who stated recently that she supports the cultural engagement with Israel but I stand with those don't agree with this point of view, and will try with reason to argue the importance of standing firm with the oppressed and downtrodden.

It is important that we set out the campaign for Palestinian rights is an anti-racist campaign, and that any attempt to connect or conflate antisemitism with the campaign for the rights of the Palestinian people is wrong, misleading and harmful.
Our aims set out that ours is a campaign based on the principles of peace, justice and international law.
- See more at: http://www.palestinecampaign.org/qa-antisemitism-anti-zionism-bds/#sthash.X26h3fAY.dpuf

With the Netherlands and Ireland now joining Sweden in defending the right to advocate and campaign for Palestinian rights under international law. through BDS, Israels attempts to get BDS outlawed in Europe and to bully its supporters into silence has been dealt a serious blow.
Lets hope that civil societies here in the UK continue to speak out against attacks on  Palestinian solidarity that dehumanises Palestinians, silence Palestinian narratives and repress civil and democratic rights of UK citizens.
This should all be read in relation to the case of Palestinian human rights defender and co-founder of the BDS movement Omar Barghouti who is currently  facing politically motivated repression by Israel. Israel is refusing to renew the travel document of Barghouti, a Palestinian born in the diaspora married to a Palestinian citizen of Israel, despite having lived in Israel for 22 years with no criminal record preventing him from pursuing his campaign work internationally. He has been told that his permanent residency status is being reviewed.Thus the Israeli government’s refusal to allow him to travel is obviously intended to suppress his speech and activism. It is ironic that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was one of the world leaders who traveled last year to Paris to participate in that city’s “free speech rally.”
The human rights groups Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch and Front Line Defenders have all made statements concerning Barghouti’s liberty and safety, with Amnesty and Front Line Defenders designating him a human rights defender. We should remain concerned about wider Israeli attempts to pressure nongovernmental organizations and human rights defenders through legislation and other means to hinder their important work.
In the following video Omar sets out the case for BDS :-

Here is a link to the BDS Movements website :-



https://bdsmovement.net/

Lets not forget Chelsea Manning

Today marks  six years since Chelsea Elizabeth Manning (then known as Bradley Manning) was arrested in Iraq for blowing the whistle on war crimes on suspicion of having passed classified material to WikiLeaks, including videos of the July 12, 2007 Baghdad airstrike and the 2009 Granai airstrike in Afghanistan; 250,000 United States diplomatic cables; and 500,000 army reports that came to be known as the Iraq War logs and Afghan War logs.
It was the largest set of restricted documents ever leaked to the public, exposing imperialist crimes in Iraq, Afghanistan and around the world. As an intelligence analyst for the U.S. Army, Manning saw U.S. war crimes and took the courageous steps necessary to blow the whistle on human rights abuses. Manning was arrested and held in solitary confinement from July 2010 in the Marine Corps Brig, Quantico, Virginia, causing an international outcry. Outrageously, Manning is serving a 35 year prison sentence. This extreme sentence is designed to act as a deterrent to other whistleblowers and journalists. Chelsea Manning is a hero and a whistleblower. We should all be very grateful for her sacrifice but sadly her moral courage is rare today.Chelsea manning has always claimed she acted in the public interest, hoping to spark a meaningful debate on the costs of war, specifically on the conduct of  the US military in Iraq and Afghanistan. However she was not permitted to present this as evidence at her trial, and was only allowed  to explain her motives at the sentencing  phase. Before her conviction, she had already been held for three years in pre-trial detention, including 11 months in conditions which the UN Special Rapporteur on Torture described as cruel and inhumane.
 The US army intelligence analyst, who has appealed to reduce 35-year sentence, has endured the most severe punishment ever given to a whistleblower.
 I am saddened by the persecution and incarceration of such a morally courageous person. Chelsea was born in 1987 in Oklahoma to an American father and a Welsh mother. When her parents divorced at an early age, she moved with her mother to Wales. She moved back to the US to live with her father in 2005, and got a job with a software company in Oklahoma City..She spent her schooldays down the road from me in Pembrokeshire. She went to school in Tasker Milward , Haverfordwest where she is remembered for his integrity and intelligence . His mum, aunts and uncles still live in Pembrokeshire.
Chelsea  is being held in the military brig at Fort Leavenworth. in Kansas, where she is involved in separate legal action relating to her desire to transition as a transgender woman. Transition is another courageous act in its own right in a largely deeply sexist society. Her safety is of of grave concern.Athough her lawyer expects Manning will be released on good behaviour in 7 years, this is a long time for anyone to have to wait to feel complete.To say that Chelsea Manning has a most difficult and dangerous road ahead of her during her time in prison is an understatement.
Here is a transcript of the statement made by PFC. Chelsea Manning as read by David Coombs (her attorney) at a press conference after she was sentenced to 35 years in prison. You can also watch the video of the statement here. It shows an awakening and a decision to act.
Chelsea Manning:

“The decisions that I made in 2010 were made out of a concern for my country and the world that we live in. Since the tragic events of 9/11, our country has been at war. We’ve been at war with an enemy that chooses not to meet us on any traditional battlefield, and due to this fact we’ve had to alter our methods of combating the risks posed to us and our way of life.
I initially agreed with these methods and chose to volunteer to help defend my country. It was not until I was in Iraq and reading secret military reports on a daily basis that I started to question the morality of what we were doing. It was at this time I realized in our efforts to meet this risk posed to us by the enemy, we have forgotten our humanity. We consciously elected to devalue human life both in Iraq and Afghanistan. When we engaged those that we perceived were the enemy, we sometimes killed innocent civilians. Whenever we killed innocent civilians, instead of accepting responsibility for our conduct, we elected to hide behind the veil of national security and classified information in order to avoid any public accountability.
In our zeal to kill the enemy, we internally debated the definition of torture. We held individuals at Guantanamo for years without due process. We inexplicably turned a blind eye to torture and executions by the Iraqi government. And we stomached countless other acts in the name of our war on terror.
Patriotism is often the cry extolled when morally questionable acts are advocated by those in power. When these cries of patriotism drown out any logically based intentions [unclear], it is usually an American soldier that is ordered to carry out some ill-conceived mission.
Our nation has had similar dark moments for the virtues of democracy—the Trail of Tears, the Dred Scott decision, McCarthyism, the Japanese-American internment camps—to name a few. I am confident that many of our actions since 9/11 will one day be viewed in a similar light.
As the late Howard Zinn once said, “There is not a flag large enough to cover the shame of killing innocent people.”
I understand that my actions violated the law, and I regret if my actions hurt anyone or harmed the United States. It was never my intention to hurt anyone. I only wanted to help people. When I chose to disclose classified information, I did so out of a love for my country and a sense of duty to others.
If you deny my request for a pardon, I will serve my time knowing that sometimes you have to pay a heavy price to live in a free society. I will gladly pay that price if it means we could have country that is truly conceived in liberty and dedicated to the proposition that all women and men are created equal.”

We simply can't forget this honorable individual.On Monday May 9th, Chelsea Manning was honored for her heroic actions at a London ceremony hosted by Blueprint for Free Speech, a non-profit dedicated to supporting freedom of expression for all individuals and seeking improved government transparency. Chelsea received this year’s Blueprint Enduring Impact Whistleblowing Prize along with fellow whistleblowers John Kiriakou and Dr. Raj Mattu. In times like these we need brave people like Chelsea and others to hold the government accountable for its actions at home and abroad that can give us hope in the possibility of standing up to make the world better, safer, and more just.  The fights for accountability, transparency, and justice continue. Hopefully through Chelsea’s actions and the brave actions of others we can continue to be informed, while individual acts of bravery and defiance can help open eyes and inspire people to follow their own conscience,
We still need to support Chelsea in prison , maximise her voice, and continue the call for a Presidential pardon. 
.

Find more about Chelsea Mannings case here :-

 http://www.chelseamanning.org/

The magical world of Surrealist Leonora Carrington ( 6/4/17 -25/5/11)

 Have written  many times about the lives of the surrealists, one of their number the artist and writer Leonora Carrington died in Mexico on this day in 2011. She was 94, she led an eventful and productive life, from reluctant debutante in England to bohemian in 1930s Paris, from despair in a Spanish asylum to many decades of stable artistic productivity in Mexico City. Though she’s long been celebrated and honoured in Mexico, it’s only quite recently after her death that her reputation has grown on this side of the Atlantic. 

I love the work of Leonora Carrington. It is always strange, often unsettling and unfailingly magicaI, in terms of fame and renown, she’s not as well known as some of her male contemporaries, including her sometime partner Max Ernst, or Salvador Dali, but I believe she should be.
Born into an upper class, reactionary Lancashire family in 1917, she soon discovered the restrictive and mentally stifling penalties that go with the privileges of bourgeois existence. But conformity was not an option. When she was eight her Catholic parents sent her to the Holy Sepulchre convent in Chelmsford, where she refused to do any schoolwork.. Even  as a young girl, Carrington was a non-conformist.She was an individual, unwilling to conform to authoritative, unreasonable rules. Her free-spirit and candid quips resulted in expulsions from at least two schools  “anti-social tendencies and certain supernatural proclivities”. In Florence and Paris she revelled in the arts, but dodged her workload and school regime through running away. In the end, Carrington’s parents capitulated to their wilful debutante daughter when, in her teens, she announced her intention to study at Chelsea School of Art, and become a painter.Her life was to become an amazing journey of change and discovery.

Having seen the work of Max Ernst at a major surrealist exhibition in London, she met him at a dinner party. He was 46 and married for the second time but, almost immediately, they were captivated by one another and ran off together, to Cornwall and then to Paris, where he separated from his wife, and Carrington found herself at the heart of several charmed artistic circles variously including Picasso, Dalí, André Breton, Man Ray, Marcel Duchamp Joan Miró and others. Although she never considered herself a card-carrying surrealist, she embraced the spirit of the movement with theatrical zeal; for example, she reputedly turned up for a party wrapped in a sheet, which she strategically discarded to reveal that she was naked beneath it. She and Ernst were reportedly known to clip the hair of their house guests as they slept, then serve it to them mixed in their breakfast omelettes.  Surrealism has/had a very uneven relationship with women, and  this has been discussed by many scholars throughout the years.'' Andre Breton and many others involved in the movement regarded women to be useful as muses but not seen as artists in their own right. Leonora Carrington was embraced as a femme-enfant by the Surrealists because of her rebelliousness against her upper-class upbringing. However, Carrington did not just rebel against her family, she found ways in which she could rebel against the Surrealists and their limited perspective of women..Surrealism gave her a visual and literary vocabulary to express herself whilst not avoiding limitation.

Then war broke out, the Germans invaded, and in time Ernst was interned by the Vichy administration.for simply being German and then  by invading Nazis because his work was considered decadent and was locked up in an internment camp.. It was the beginning of a profoundly disturbing period for Carrington. She may already have suffered a nervous breakdown, hitched a lift with friends to Spain.

Portrait of Max Ernst

Carrington, understandably, was distraught. She stopped eating, and was in dangerously poor health when she was rescued by some friends, fleeing the Nazis, who drove her to Madrid. She wrote later: “I’d suffered so much when Max was taken away to the camp, I entered a catatonic state, and I was no longer suffering in an ordinary human dimension.”
On the journey to Spain she saw bodies hanging from trucks and corpses on the roads – at least she thought she did, though her traumatised mind wondered if they might actually be delusions. The Spanish authorities certainly thought so when she reported them, and threw her into an asylum in Santander. According to her 1944 memoir, Down Below, she suffered there, subjected to barbiturate and Cardiazol treatment, until her family in England got sufficiently worried about her to send a nanny  to rescue her and take her instead to a hospital in South Africa. In the finest traditions of Surrealist weirdness, Carrington escaped from her minders while they were waiting to board the boat, jumped into a cab and headed straight for the Mexican embassy, immediately entering into a marriage of convenience with a diplomat friend she’d known in Paris. Then they went back to wait for a boat to the USA, joined by a liberated Ernst, his new partner, his ex-wife, and his new partner’s ex-husband. Carrington and Ernst didn’t get back together – he married again, and after a few months Carrington dissolved her own marriage and moved, permanently this time, to Mexico City.

Leoonora Carrington and Max Ernst 

It’s an extraordinary tale of surrealism, love and madness and more, some have claimed that Carrington’s asylum memoir was more fiction than fact. (Interestingly, Amazon classes the book as fiction.) But Anne Hoff of  the University of Alabama wrote  a paper on Down Below in in 2009, concluding that Carrington’s barbaric experience could well have been entirely factual. Clinical descriptions of other people’s treatment with  Cardiazol, a powerful convulsive drug that was a forerunner of ECT, suggest her recollections of seizures, hyper-sexualised thoughts post-treatment and being left to lie in her own faeces (incontinence was a common side-effect) are depressingly accurate. She was also given Luminol, a powerful anti-convulsive. I can imagine it would have been an horrific ordeal that would have bound to leave a mark.In her paintings and writings, she generates a heady fantasy world. It draws on elements of folklore and fairytales, Celtic and other mythologies,  a lot of this gets mixed up  in her work plus elements from  occult mystical  traditions including alchemy. There’s a lot going on, I like them a lot, deep  dreamlike spaces of infinite possibility with a magical poetical quality. Like a magical alchemist she had the ability to smuggle cryptic messages or absurd spells  into her art enabling her to transform the viewers eye. Often there are Gothic undertones, maybe recalling the Lancashire mansion where she  grew up in and longed to escape, she was a rebel who was  twice expelled from school, and was instinctively opposed to her parents’ social aspirations.

The fantasy in her work is sometimes disturbing with a violent, edge. It draws from her own disturbed  personal experience and emotional life, her own and of course many others, in a way that links her to such artists as Louise Bouergois , Paula Rego and Frida Kahlo. In line with the male surrealists’ view of the role of women, she was often assigned the subservient role of muse to Ernst, implicitly diminishing her, even though she remarked that she was far too busy getting on with things to be a muse.

A big influence on her was  Robert Graves’s The White Goddess . Drawing on a range of European mythology, especially the Welsh and Irish traditions, Graves controversially proposed the presence of a consistent, if variously named and depicted, goddess. In doing so he was revealing an alternative, potentially feminist mythological and religious predecessor to familiar, patriarchal models.The White Goddess appears again and again in her work such as Then we saw the daughter of the minotaur (1953) is not to he a relic from a lost religion but to a living (dancing) entity in the present. Add to this influence Carrington’s memories of stories told to her by her mother and her cherished Irish nanny,  Mary Kavanagh and you can begin to see what she’s getting at in her pictures, even if nothing quite prepares us for their edgy strangeness.

                                Then we saw the daughter of the Minotaur

In her painting, 'The Giantess', the guardian of the egg, 1947, and painted for her patron, Edward James, possibly Carrington's most famous work, The Giantess, is dwarfing land and sea, ''drawing out the psychic prowess of the Goddess, her regenerative life-giving properties, and her fertile creative powers. This Goddess-centred spirituality, benevolent and nurturing, emanates from the giantess: the birds flock from her robes, and between her palms she clasps a mysterious black egg, perhaps the source of new life.''
Carrington said, ''The egg is the macrocosm and the microcosm, the dividing line between the Big and the Small which makes it impossible to see the whole.  To possess a telescope without its other essential half – the microscope – seems to me a symbol of the darkest incomprehension. The task of the right eye is to peer into the telescope while the left eye peers into the microscope.''

                                    
                                                       The Giantess , 1950 

Alongside her painting and sculpture she was also a prolific writer prolific writer with many articles, novels, essays, and poems to her name. Apart from the autobiographical Down Below, her most celebrated piece was a dream fairy-tale of 1974, The Hearing Trumpet. Her books are as utterly imaginative as her visual art.In The Hearing Trumpet ( a favourite book of mine), Carrington appears under the alias Marian Leatherby, who is 92 and has a beard. She has no teeth left and has become vegetarian  an elderly woman getting irritated by her patronising family, who think her senile. But the care home that she is carted off to is unlike any establishment of its kind. Marian discovers evidence of mysterious gatherings, disappearances, and hints of the supernatural. Ultimately, all this leads to a total reordering of the terrestrial order: a world "transformed by the snow and ice.” Marian anticipates the day when “the planet is peopled with cats, werewolves, bees, and goats. We all fervently hope that this will be an improvement on humanity. "I'll leave you to discover the pure magical joy of her writing for yourself, I strongly recommend her..Her other notable books were The House of Fear (1938), The Oval Lady (1939), The Stone Door (1976), Pigeon Flies (1986) and The Seventh Horse (1988). She also wrote the plays The Debutante (1937), A Flannel Night-Shirt (1951), Penelope (1957) and The Invention of the Mass (1969).
After her move to Mexico in 1943 a new chapter began. Free of her family and her besieged relationship with Ernst (he married Peggy Guggenheim to escape Europe), she immersed herself in the art world of Mexico City. Steeped in Surrealist ideas and mysticism, she joined a close group of artists and enjoyed much creative experimentation.. Here in Mexico there was Aztec and Mayan culture, Catholicism and Spanish colonialism all mixed together in a vast, steaming cauldron of exotic images. Snakes, saints, candles, life and death, dark and light. Vast brooding volcanoes, huge pyramids, mythical dragons. The young artist from England had found her ‘milieu’. In her novels and her art, Leonora combined her favoured symbols of  folklore with Mexican motifs. El Mundo mágico de los Mayas, 1963-4, was a commission for a new museum, in an area dedicated to the state of Chiapas. She visited the region, attended healing ceremonies in order to get to know the people. Carrington was accepted as someone who spoke for Mexican history as well as engaged with its culture, history and art.  She attempted to study the preconquest outlook of the Chiapas Indians, and in her finished painting shows the way cultures were mixed in the area. The painting is a fairytale of old and new, historical and imagined. Figures walk between Catholic processions and indigenous healings. Mystical animals swirl around a landscape that seems a living creature itself, while her favourite motif, the Irish white horse, sits amidst a carnival of human activity.

                                From El Mundo de Magica Mundos

                                   Who art , though  white face 
 
The student demonstrations of 1968 revealed a further facet of Carrington's personality, her political militancy.In 1969 she continued to make her views heard in a series of public appearances. In particular she championed the newly established women's movement: in the early 1970s she was responsible for co-founding the Women's Liberation Movement in Mexico; she frequently spoke about women's "legendary powers" and the need for women to take back "the rights that belonged to them". Take this wonderful quote from her " it is impossible to understand how millions and millions of people all obey a sickly collection of gentlemen that call themmselves ' Government'! The word I expect frightens people. It is a form of planetary hypnosis and very unhealthy" from 'The Hearing Trumpet'
The  rest of Leonora’s life remained blissfully quiet and stable. Having only married for convenience, Leonora and Leduc split. She met Hungarian photographer, Chiki Weisz and had two boys, Gabriel and Pablo. She planted a tree in her front yard, taped pictures of Queen Elizabeth and Princess Diana on her kitchen cabinets, drank PG tea in the afternoons and tequila at night. She continued to paint and write, building a sizeable repertoire of fantastical surrealist works depicting mythical, made-up creatures representing themes of identity and transformation. She had once again constructed her own lovely little universe where she was bound by no one, free to be and create as she wished. So finally  Leonora Carrington died on this day at the age of 94, after what was a remarkable life. Described as “the last great living surrealist” by the Mexican poet and activist, Homero Aridjis. Her legacy a mighty fine one that was later carried by other female artists, with their own sense of liberation, Frida Kahlo included, who fought for the rightful place of women in arts and in everyday life.

    

                                         Leonora Carrington - self-portrait , 1937

Waiting for Chilcot's judgement to call

The delays in the Chilcot inquiry have for a while moved into farcial terrain, the establishment clearly terrified of any further damaging revelations that will reopen discussions about the tragedy of Irag.Who knows Tony Blair could  face charges over his role in sending British soldiers to the tragedy that was Iraq. A cross-party group of MPs want him prosecuted if the Chilcot report shows he lied to get support. In the meantime I offer you this poem.

Waiting for Chilcot's judgement to call

Sixteen years and still waiting,

The rot and the lies have gone on to long,
Truth twisted and buried at every turn,
We have known for so long who was to blame,
Darkness revealed in sanctimonious smiles,
Tony Blair's conscience flashing in deceit,
Hopefully now he will pay the political price,
When all his excuses are finally discredited,
No mere apology will be enough,
He should be made to pay for his crimes,
That went against international law,
As the silence and agony are abandoned,
The dead unable to testify, finally get justice.

Ken Loach wins Cannes Palm d''Or for his latest powerful film; I, Daniel Blake, about welfare struggle.

 

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He has championed the downtrodden and poor for 50 years, but now Bath film director Ken Loach has returned to make a modern-day version of his breakthrough film Cathy Come Home – a film about the poverty and humiliation inflicted upon them by the welfare state, which left much of the Cannes Film Festival in tears and won him the coveted  Cannes Palm d'Or Prize last night  in an awards ceremony in southern France.
Cathy Come Home shocked a blissfully-unknowing British society of 1966 to the descent of a wife from a normal family home to living on the streets and having her children taken away – all because her husband is injured at work and loses his job.
And now, 50 years on, the 79 year old Bath film director has returned and created something of a remake – but this time exposing the plight of a man left to the uncaring ravages of the benefits system, which looks set to generate the same shock from audiences across Britain.
. Accepting the festival's top prize, Loach attacked the "dangerous project of austerity,".At times of despair the far right take advantage,” the  film-maker said. “And some of us who are old remember what that was like. So we must give a message  of hope, we must say another world is possible," he said."The world we live in is at a dangerous point right now. We are in the grip of a dangerous project of austerity driven by ideas that we call neo-liberalism that have brought us to near catastrophe."
The powerful film  tells the story of  fifty-nine year old British carpenter Daniel Blake's Kafkaesque  journey to get benefits in Britain for the first time in his life after suffering a heart attack and being told by doctors he can no longer work.Turning to the welfare state for assistance, he is confronted with the tragic realities of a modern society bogged down by miles of cold and unfeeling red tape.
Daniel, is just a generous hard-working individual who has simply fallen on hard times,who  embodies the very reason social safety nets are created, yet the system engineered ostensibly to give a much-needed break to such decent men seems more intent on pounding its supposed beneficiaries into submission.This might be a piece of art, but this is a familiar tale to all those trapped in the benefit system , and caught in the barbed wire of bureacracy in Tory Britain.
Because Blake is denied illness benefit and is forced to apply for assistance for unemployment.
That in turn forces him to spend hours hunting for jobs which he has to turn down because he is too sick to work.The movie's writer Paul Laverty has said the research team was stunned at how people with mental health issues and disabilities were targeted by the welfare cuts.He said people interviewed within the Department for Work and Pensions told them "they were humiliated at how they were forced to treat the public. There is nothing accidental about it."
Exasperated at every turn by the almost laughable inefficiencies of a blindingly complicated network, Daniel is bounced from one broken program to the next. Whether they be for employment insurance or a job seeker’s allowance, there are always stupefying catches; ridiculous paperwork; and government employees who appear completely incapable of empathizing with the plight of the unfortunate waiting around the corner.
The actress who plays the young single mother, Katie -- Hayley Squires -- who Daniel's character befiends, recently slammed anti-welfare "propaganda" that she said has turned working class people against each other. "Normal people are led to believe that this amount of people are on benefits and are therefore scroungers, and this amount of people are going to work to pay so that they can scrounge." "They've left us to argue among ourselves so they can keep doing what they are doing."
For the Conservatives, the ideological destruction of peoples lives has always been their clear aim. For them austerity isn't a temporary economic measure, it's a permanent moral imperative. I look forward to the day, when we say enough is enough. In the meantime well done Ken for this award and for continuing to lend the poor and downtrodden a voice,telling real honest stories of lives ruined by a cruel system that  continues to unleash savage attacks on Britain's poor.I  hope that this film and its powerful indictment of life under Tory rule and the austerity myth and all it's savage impacts is seen by many and as the star of the film , stand up comic Dave Johns  recently tweeted, like Cathy Comes home, 50 years previously  "Let's hope it shames those that should be into change.".