We were watching Skyfall, latest James Bond,
in the comfort of our new picture house,
when the person behind us started to annoy
eating popcorn like a fidgety mouse.
Scritching and scratching, rustling and munching,
especially in the quietish bits,
as the film progressed my hackles were raised,
this guy was getting on my tits.
I hadn't the guts to tell him to ssssshhhh
but had a thought during a rather loud gulp,
if only James Bond would leap from the screen
to beat this irritating git to a pulp.
But double-o-seven was busy enough,
juggling wit and love and stunt,
too busy to help me in my hour of need
to deal with this.....(now I'm struggling to find the right rhyme to end this.......!)
Saturday, 10 November 2012
Thursday, 8 November 2012
ENNISKILLEN, 1987
A panel on the cenotaph in Enniskillen reads:
"In remembrance of eleven of our neighbours who were killed by a terrorist bomb at this site on Remembrance Sunday 8 November 1987.
"Edward Armstrong, Wesley and Bertha Armstrong, Samuel Gault, Kitchener and Jessie Johnston, William and Agnes Mullan, Johnny Megaw, Albertha Quinton, and Marie Wilson."
A 12th victim, headteacher Ronnie Hill, died after 13 years in a coma.Another bomb in a history of bombs,
where did it get us,
where did it get us?
Another mindless, evil crime,
where did it get us,
where did it get us?
Another tragic list of names,
where did it get us,
where did it get us?
Another reminder of unanswered questions,
where did it get us,
where did it get us?
It got us to suffering, it got us to grief,
it got us to tears and pain,
it got us to courage, to resolve, to prayer
that it would never happen again.
It got us to think of humanity
in times of hopeless dread,
but we hold on to the blessed belief
that inhumanity is always outweighed.
It got us to wondering when
all this mindlessness will ever cease,
it got us to always remember
those gone, may they still rest in peace.
Wednesday, 7 November 2012
POTUS
From rhetoric to reality,
from pie in the sky
to feet on the ground,
from platitudes to practicalities,
on life's not so merry-go-round.
Millions vote, billions spent
to decide who'll be the President,
money is tight, not that you'd notice
in the extravagant campaigns
to choose the POTUS.
from pie in the sky
to feet on the ground,
from platitudes to practicalities,
on life's not so merry-go-round.
Millions vote, billions spent
to decide who'll be the President,
money is tight, not that you'd notice
in the extravagant campaigns
to choose the POTUS.
Monday, 5 November 2012
KISS & TELL & QUIRKS
Christmas is coming,
and do you know how I know,
celeb books are being flogged
on nearly every TV show.
All the starry listers,
from A right through to Zed
hope we'll spend our hard-earned cash
and hang on every word we've read.
Some reinvent their childhoods
to get the sympathy buy,
some fill 300 pages
with a mix of truth and lie.
Some get confused assuming
that we really give a toss
about shallow lives and woe-is-me
amid glittery showbiz gloss.
Amongst the crud and crappy books,
a few seem worth a read
but only when the price is right
will I pay them any heed.
Here's my plan to be selective,
with the kiss and tell and quirks,
I'll wait for the bargain season,
in January at The Works.
and do you know how I know,
celeb books are being flogged
on nearly every TV show.
All the starry listers,
from A right through to Zed
hope we'll spend our hard-earned cash
and hang on every word we've read.
Some reinvent their childhoods
to get the sympathy buy,
some fill 300 pages
with a mix of truth and lie.
Some get confused assuming
that we really give a toss
about shallow lives and woe-is-me
amid glittery showbiz gloss.
Amongst the crud and crappy books,
a few seem worth a read
but only when the price is right
will I pay them any heed.
Here's my plan to be selective,
with the kiss and tell and quirks,
I'll wait for the bargain season,
in January at The Works.
Sunday, 4 November 2012
MOST VIEWED POSTS IN PAST 7 DAYS TO 03.11.12
Here are the links to the most viewed posts on this blog in the past 7 days - just click to read:
Saturday, 3 November 2012
TWO NEW POETRY BOOKS
Coming very soon, hopefully in the next couple of weeks, two new poetry books:
and a biography of a film star
Also in production, a business book and another book of poems - A Belfast Kid - coming in 2013.
and a biography of a film star
Also in production, a business book and another book of poems - A Belfast Kid - coming in 2013.
Friday, 2 November 2012
THE POEMS OF WILFRID OWEN
THE POEMS OF WILFRID OWEN
Wordsworth Poetry Library Wordsworth Editions
£3.99
"Dulce et decorum est pro patria mori" - "It is sweet and right to die for your country". In my opinion, the strongest contender for the greatest war or anti-war poem ever is the powerful "Dulce et Decorum Est" by Wilfrid Owen. I have read it many, many times over the years and it packs a considerable punch every time. If only politicians who decide on starting wars would read this poem aloud to themselves and their advisors, they might think twice about sending men and women, boys and girls into harm's way. The descriptions in the poem bring home the filth and futility of the whole damn business. Owen, dead at 25, wrote about the reality of trench and gas warfare, the death, the wounds, the torture, the blood and guts that he saw with his own eyes. Not for him the sugary sentimentality of heroic poetry in the name of patriotism. "To children ardent for some desperate glory/the old Lie: Dulce et decorum est/pro patria mori." Politicians can walk away after a term in office. Not all soldiers have the same luxury.
"The Poems of Wilfrid Owen", collected in this fine Wordsworth Edition at just £3.99, fill about 100 pages. His death at a young age robbed us of a remarkable writer but what he did write should be studied and kept alive forever more.
From "Anthem For Doomed Youth" - "What passing-bells for these who die as cattle?/Only the monstrous anger of the guns./Only the stuttering rifles' rapid rattle/Can patter out their hasty orisons."
Doomed youth, indeed!
From "Asleep" - "Under his helmet, up against his pack/after so many days of work and waking/sleep took him by the brow and laid him back./There, in the happy no-time of his sleeping/death took him by the heart."
From "Exposure" - "Our brains ache, in the merciless iced east winds that knife us .../
wearied we keep awake because the night is silent .../low drooping flares confuse our memory of the salient .../worried by silence, sentries whisper, curious, nervous,/but nothing happens."
On and on he writes, telling us the truth of war in stunning detail. Wilfrid Owen is not for the faint-hearted. He wasn't in it for the glory. He wasn't in it for long, but he left a legacy that we should cherish not only as great literature but also as practical advice before declarations of war are even drafted.
On 4th November 1918 he was shot and killed near the village of Ors in northern France. It is said that news of his death reached his parents home as the Armistice bells were ringing on 11 November.
I'll leave it there, but I encourage you to buy this slim volume and to take the time to read it, absorb it and share it. The next time our leaders rattle their sabres and talk tough, read Wilfrid Owen's poetry, for that is where the honesty is.
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