Thursday 30 July 2015

Holding on


a poem, written for my wonderful friend, soul mate, partner, Jane, currently seriously ill in hospital.

Holding on

We break, get torn,
 this makes our living spaces so blue,
so we fall apart, to start again,
to shake dark shadows of our skin,
wait for calming thoughts to return,
to burn bright again,
feel the tug of another's heart,
holding on and not letting go,
souls are strong, the wind can't blow them away,
still like air, the morning she rises,
with touch and breath, smiles again,
by moonflowers and sunflowers,
we will continue to walk and talk,
allow our nights and days,
to be imbued with love.




Wednesday 29 July 2015

Jeff Buckley - Hallelujah





" Love is not a victory march, it's cold and it's broken.


Hallelujah."

I have returned sooner than expected, time on my hand's,
for Alison Croydon  ( Ali) my beloved cousin, who  is being  laid to rest today,

aged 58, R.I..P.


Dear soul,

Stonehenge veteran,

intrepid traveller ,

inner and beyond, 
we light a brief candle,

both ends burning,

as we remember,

and her journey continues,
hallelujah


Friday 24 July 2015

No to Beijing 2022


In a weeks time, on July 31, the IOC ( the International Olympics Committee will decide whether to award Beijing a second Olympic games. When China last hosted the Olympics there was a violent crackdown in Tibet and since then the repression  has only worsened. The 2008 Olympics did nothing to alleviate human rights abuses or enhance freedom, in fact since then China has become more aggressive in its attitudes to human rights in Tibet, and less willing to engage in  dialogue regarding a lasting resolution with reports of armed police attacking and beating peaceful protestors and seriously injuring many more, Tibetans imprisoned for simply singing a song, things are significantly worse than they were before. In the last few weeks over 2 human rights lawyers have been jailed in large numbers, many of which are still detained or still missing and entire communities can be punished for the act of one person.
Others too suffering, the arbitrary arrest torture, and disappearance of those they consider a threat, like the Ulghurs, southern Mongolians and Hans Chinese.
More than 175 Tibetan groups  have backed the call  for the IOC to reject China's bid. By granting China these games again, the IOC will be putting their international stamp of approval on China's continuing military occupation of Tibet. Combined with  its continuing restrictions on  civil and  political liberties this surely makes it an  unfit candidate to host these games because of it's clear contempt of human rights.

Please sign and share the following  petition. Tell the IOC that China does not deserve another Olympics


https://www.change.org/p/international-olympic-committee-ioc-don-t-reward-china-s-worsening-oppression-with-another-olympic-games

Wednesday 22 July 2015

A poem for Tony Blair


Mr Blair's heart is running on empty
his soul containing only darkness,
he comes and go's as he pleases
adds nothing of value,no hidden depth
just likes to stir and pontificate
count his stockpiles of cash,
profits soaked in blood and tears
basking again today in the limelight,
showering humanity with his dismal grin
a joke that's beginning to wear very thin,
distracting us, with his vanity and deceit
can't this man be brought to account?
accept some responsibility, for all the lives he wasted
for all the pain and ruins that he created,
continues unrelentling, carries on unashamed
telling us little things,shouting down our cries,
I have become weary and unsympathetic
of this shameless charlatan, power mad junky.



Tuesday 21 July 2015

"I would swim through vomit to vote against this welfare bill - John McDonnell



The Welfare and Work Bill passed its second reading in the House of Commons yesterday by 308 votes to 124, nearly  half  of  the house voting for greater social exclusion and aggressive social cleansing, more homelessness, bigger child poverty, increased attacks on the poor and vulnerable. Sadly most  Labour Party MPs have forgotten that they are supposed to be in opposition, a bunch of gutless spineless individuals, a party fast becoming devoid of principles and integrity.  Only 48 Labour MP's decided to take a stand against austerity though, among them leadership candidate Jeremy Corbyn, who with the above seems to care a lot, keeps showing himself  as a human being, despite the rest of the modern Labour Party acting like traitors to the people they should be representing. But we should not really be handing out congratulations either, surely this is why we have something called  opposition. When we live in a land of no opposition, we live in a scary place indeed.When those inside Westminsters walls carry on not listening, we must outside, carry on fighting and resisting , for the survival of us all.

Monday 20 July 2015

The Queen's embarrasmment at old footage of her giving Nazi salute.


The Queen is said to be furious and embarrassed after footage was released recently by the Sun newspaper, showing her delivering a mock  Nazi salute in 1933. Unfortunately, this is what happens when Royalty tries to bury it's past.
The actions of a naive young girl maybe, aged only 5 or 7, who did not know what she was doing, and the full implications of her actions, under the influence of others So it's a case of blaming the adults I guess. In the black and white film footage she his shown with  her mum, the Queen mother, her Uncle Prince Edward and her younger sister Princess Margaret.
Many will say, it is time to move on, and in the hearts and minds of some of her subjects she will always remain as a dignified role model. But Republic which campaigns for a democratic alternative to the monarchy said the palace should stop  dodging responsibility. Others are saying you cannot bury history, because if you try to do this, it has a habit of coming back to haunt you.
In 1933, the fact is, due to Nazism, anti-semitism was on the rise. Hitler was  already known as  the leader of the National Socialist Working Party (the Nazis) had already started rounding up Communists, Socialists and Liberals, purging as many political opponents as possible - giving him one man dictatorial powers. Already talking of the master race, building roads on the outskirts of towns that would carry millions away to their deaths. Already they saw Jews, Roma (Gypsies) and the handicapped as a serous biological threat to the purity of the German (Aryan) race. Jews became the principal target of Nazi hatred. The Nazi salute, was already seen by many as a symbol of fear.
It could be said that the Queen, was hoodwinked, by her uncle Prince Edward, later Edward V111,  it is known he was a sympathiser of Hitler's Nazi regime, he admired Hitler's economic and social reforms as the Nazis swept to power, and wanted  Britain to offer them their hands of friendship. Later after his abdication, he visited Germany with the idea of discussing becoming a figurehead for an international movement for peace on Hitler's terms. And later on in his life his view of Hitler remained undimmed declaring him to be "not a bad chap."
Thankfully Hitler was defeated, but despite all the vestiges of privilege, this story,  will act not just as  a painful reminder of the historical past. It also serves  as a warning, an echoe to our present times, when the dangers of fascism still lurk, and governments with undemocratic mandates, run amok. Lest us forget either the Nazi sympathetic 'tendencies'  at the heart of the British establishment. At the end of the day this information should have been  in the public domain 50 years  ago, what was to hide, just an innocent secret, an honest simple mistake?

Thursday 16 July 2015

Worthless - Agnes Török



Powerful poem  on the news of a new Conservative budget, based  on the experience of living in Britain under austerity as a young, queer, unemployed female immigrant student - and not taking it any more.
Already gone viral, with thousands already having viewed this three minute call to arms, a blasting riposte to a system that glorifies the rich and its economic policies whilst telling the rest of us we are 'worthless.'




http://agnestorok.org/

Tuesday 14 July 2015

Support your local hunt sabouteurs


Well done to the Scottish National Party Westminster Group who have met and decided to vote against the Governments attempt  to relax ban on fox hunting south of the border in tomorrows vote, they would have collectively voted against the Tory's proposals, so now David Cameron has been forced into a humiliating climbdown, made to delay a vote on crippling the hunting ban, it is so good to see the Tory's outfoxed, you see they can be defeated.
It is clear that the vast majority of the public are against a repeal of the Hunting Act, in both rural and urban areas. Cameron knows this but always likes to push things too far and will attempt to get the act through again, probably in autumn, because Cameron himself is a supporter and lover of this barbaric sport. For years treating animals inhumanely, a matter of course for a man who regularly uses benefit claimants, for his own legal bloodsport of choice. They don't really see a fox, they see a recalcitrant an ungrateful peasant, fox hunting just another way of expression their class rule.
Despite the vote not going ahead, remember too, that ten years after the Hunting Act in February 2005, hunts continue to meet, most notably on the sports big occasion, such as Boxing Day. There are still 189 packs recognised by the Master of Foxhounds Association.
Recently Middleton Hunt were caught with 16 fox cubs in a barn next to their kennels, taken from the wild and separated from their mothers, a clear case of trapping, the cubs to be used as an easy kill for any new hounds the hunts are training for when the hunting season commences again next month.
Thousands of people are still attending organised hunts throughout the winter, in theory hunts are now supposed to practice trail hunting. This allows hunters and riders to follow a scent trail pf fox urine laid out in advance in they are supposed to allow riders the experience of hunting without the climatic act of a fox being ripped apart by dogs. But inevitably and tragically dogs do encounter foxes and do kill, the hunt masters claiming again and again that such kills were purely accidental, which has resulted  in only a handful of hunters being ever convicted of breaking the ban, clamping down on illegal hunting is not seen as a police priority, a case of one law for the rich, and another for the poor.
Despite the ban animals are still being killed. People continue to hunt, illegally, as the law stands now, but  they carry on  regardless, without prosecution, so thank goodness for hunt sabouteurs. They are the only  organisation still taking direct action against the hunters, hunt sabs constantly  out in force trying to stop this cruel practice, I will continue to support people bravely standing up to defend the lives of hunted wildlife from this barbaric tradition and practice.
The hunting Act needs to be strengthened not weakened, because foxes are not the only animals being killed. It must not be returned. We must stay vigilant and constantly oppose this barbarism.


Look up your local  group here, and get involved.

http:www.huntsabs.org.uk/index.php/get-involved/contacts

Sunday 12 July 2015

Disconnect?



" Sometimes you have to disconnect, to stay connected. Remember the old days when you had eye contact during a conversation. When everyone wasn't looking down at a device in their hands? We've become so focussed on that tiny screen, that we forget the big picture, the view right in front of us." - Regina Bret

Disconnect?

She sits on the beach,
but is not really there,
as the surf rages all around,
her vista , is her mobile phone,
no time to gaze at sky,
just presses buttons,
of a self contained prison,
no room for actual conversation,
all the words she needs are in her hands,
to consummate all her desires.

She plugs herself in,
feeling comfortably numb,
in this ritual of abandonment,
day in, day out,
day in, day out,
always the same,
where she plays in her own personal cube,
no room for a view, of real beauty,
she is lost, she is possessed,
she is of this world.





Friday 10 July 2015

Unity



This morning,
looking for hope,
a sea of butterflies,
fluttered down with the wind,
like a picture from heaven.

Flowers blossomed,
to try and encourage waking thought,
to gently distract from crushing blows,
that rumbled in the distance,
a government drunk on power,
that permeated and slid,
in clear sight, out of control.

A lazy sky hung in the air,
released pangs of harmony,
allowed me and friends, 
to gather up some faith,
to carry us into the world afresh.

It is good when it is warm outside,
inside cannot afford to put the heating on,
having endured so much pain before,
survival is the only key we save,
all for one, and one for all,
with our love we will endure.


Wednesday 8 July 2015

Oxi to Osbourne



The Greek people in huge numbers have shown us their opposition to cuts and their refusal to bow down to the undemocratic will of the European financial elites. Across Europe people are rejecting austerity, we can also play our part over here in the UK, saying no to George Osborne's budget and continue to express our opposition to the Tory Government.
Respect to the disabled activists  earlier pelting No 10 and blocking the road outside parliament to protest against further cuts to welfare to Osbornes emergency budget that has recently been announced.
It seems  that a further £12 billion extra welfare spending cuts will be made,  hitting child tax credit, child benefit payments making a huge impact on low income households, so  it will be a case of the unemployed, the disabled and low paid looking forward to some tough times ahead. It seems that George has protected the bankers, and the wealthy elite. Cutting welfare does not help working people but does the opposite by increasing the national debt and causing deflation in the economy. As for rewarding 'hardworking people' in the public sector with a 1% pay rise George is taking the piss, as in reality this is a pay cut, because the cost of living rises above that per year. George said " Britain and left the age off irresponsibility behind" whilst giving with one hand and taking from the other. Lifting taxes such as inheritance tax, allowing homes worth £ 1 million to be passed down tax free.
Already I know of people who are not eating properly because they cannot afford basic necessities. Any further cuts will hit them hard. There certainly will be no ease of pain for many.|
Osbornes emergency budget will not be fit for the future, he is no economist, so have no idea how he qualified for Chancellor of Exchequer as he uses his power to bring further cuts to social security spending and welfare. that will bring misery to many peoples lives.
It seems at the moment that the  rich are getting richer, and the poor , poorer, our debts get higher, as Osborne and his coherts fiddle while the economy burns. As his own family  firm gains tens of thousands of pounds in a property deal between his family firm and developers. But lets not forget that the Tories don't care about ordinary people, they are Tories after all, not caring is their thing. They are cruel as simple as that.
I don't think the government understands that when they continue to hit the poor and working class of any country ( look at Greece) they will fight back
We must keep up our opposition to their ideological driven policies, resist and fight back, and back the demonstrations due  to take place at the Tory Party Conference in Manchester on Sunday 4th October. Balls to George Osbornes budget, balls to Tory fuelled austerity.



Tuesday 7 July 2015

Remembering 51 day bombardment of Gaza, one year on




Today July 7th, 2014 the  51 day Israeli bombardment of Gaza began. The relentless widespread destruction and loss of life shocked the world. We should not  these 51 days of suffering that the people of Gaza had to endure. Today I remember the beginning of this devastating assault and all the Palestinians who were subsequently killed.
Codenamed Operation Protective Edge by the Israeli Defence Force,  between 7th  July and August 26, Israel  carried out  its third major military assault on Gaza in the past 6 years (2008-09; 2012, 2014, respectively). It was to be the most deadly, killing 2,251 Palestinians of which 1,462 were civilians, and included 299 women and 551 children, as well as injuring 11,231, a number  that includes 3,436 children in a bombardment from land, sea and air. In what amounts to nothing lshort than a crime of terror.
The devastation caused by Operation  Protective Edge is said to be greater than that  of the two previous wars. Gaza had been  taken back 1,000 years, but still remained as an open-air prison, where nothing is safe or certain. people still sharing a heavy burden as a consequence of this bombardment.
The Palestinians were left with their hospitals and clinics destroyed and damaged, their one  only power plant destroyed. Electricity only coming on for  about  6 hours per day, with sewage and water systems in tatters. The after effects of this war has taken its toll on all economic sectors. People left living amongst ruins, with  many children living with  the constant feeling of  fear,  left with emotional and psychological  problems. Around 100,000 people in Gaza are still homeless, one year after the  conflict and Israel's illegal blockade continues.
But despite, this, and the terrible tragedy that they had to go through, the Palestinians have reliance in their souls, and despite it all, carry much hope. I remember too, again the continuing plight of the Palestinian. I hope our dedication to ending their occupation, suffering and injustice  continues and is renewed, I remember those that were lost and long and hope that the human rights of the Palestinian people continues to be recognised and respected.
The UK must play its part too by stopping selling Israel arms, that signals it tacit approval, and allows the facilitation of future attacks.


Save The Children : Gaza one year on ; a Living nightmare


http://www.savethechildren.org.uk/sites/default/files/docs/A_Living_Nightmare.pdf


Names of Palestinians killed in war on Gaza since July 8


http://www.imemc.org/article/68429




Scenes earlier this week, across Britain in support of the Palestinian people.











Monday 6 July 2015

Protesters shut down Israeli owned Arms Factories across UK






Respect,  Elbit systems drone factory in Shenstone has been closed for business, currently being blockaded by campaigners from across the UK, Manchester, London, Leeds, Glasgow and more.

Activists are shutting down arm factories around the world today to disrupt the global arms trade which sustains Israeli Apartheid.

The UK continues to be complicit in  Israels crimes against the Palestinian people by issuing export licences  to Israel and hosting Israeli arms manufacturers.
The British  government shamefully continued to approve arms sales totalling £4 million to Israel in the months following the Israeli military's  controversial operation in Gaza last summer.


http://europe.newsweek.com/britain-approved-4m-arms-sales-israel-after-gaza-50-day-war-329739




http://waronwant.org/resources/arming-apartheid

John Lennon - Power To The People



Well done Greece, went to bed last night very happy.
This is not just a victory for the people of Greece , but a victory to the people of Europe. The tide against Austerity has turned. Another Europe is coming!
Greece is the word, better shape up.

Sunday 5 July 2015

Happy birthday NHS


Nye Bevans legacy came into the world 67 years ago this morning,when he opened Park Hospital in Manchester at a time of rationing and shortages, when we were nearly bankrupt, a jewel  that the war generation left us with, a proud legacy, for us to all to continue to share. It offered for the first time a free healthcare system for all, and has since  played a vital role in caring for all aspects of our nations health. My own father served it well for nigh on 40 years.
Remember we paid for it, so it is owned by us, it is our precious commodity, it must suvive, we must tear the vultures hands from it.
As the Tory's and their rotten hearts seek to dismantle it,  we should not forget Nye's words who said ' It will last as long as their are folk with enough faith to fight for it.
We  cannot reach the day again where people make a profit out of our sickness.





Happy birthday Clara Zetkin ( 5/7/1857 -20/6/33) Organiser of the First International Womens Day


Happy Birthday Clara Zetkin, ( nee Eissner), pioneering German Marxist theorist, advocate for womens rights and universal suffrage.Born  on  July 5, 1857, Wiederau, Saxony [Germany,
Clara Eissner was educated at the Leipzig Teachers’ College for Women.
Perhaps influenced by her upbringing and social class, it was during her time there that she became involved with the women’s movement and  in 1878 she joined the Socialist Workers’ Party (SAP), which changes its name to Social Democratic Party of Germany (SPD) in 1890.  In 1878, German chancellor Otto von Bismarck banned all SPD activity in an attempt to curb the party’s power in the government. Following this act, Zetkin and other leading members of the SPD had to leave Germany to avoid persecution and prison. Zetkin migrated first to Zurich, and then to Paris. While in exile, she met her partner Ossip Zetkin. Though they never married, she took his name and together they had two sons. 
She spent most of the 1880s in self-imposed exile in Switzerland and Paris, writing and distributing illegal literature and meeting many leading international Socialists.  After participating in the founding congress of the Second Socialist International (1889), she returned to Germany and from Stuttgart edited the Socialist women’s paper Die Gleichheit (“Equality”) from 1892 to 1917.
In 1907 she was a cofounder of thegal literature and meeting many leading international Socialists.  After participating in the founding congress of the Second Socialist International (1889), she returned to Germany and from Stuttgart edited the Socialist women’s paper Die Gleichheit (“Equality”) from 1892 to 1917.
Zetkin became the leading female theorist of socialist emancipation theory and as such helped to formulate the core ideas of socialist feminism. An important medium for her to spread socialist ideas in circles of working class was the socialist women’s journal of the SPD, Die Gleichheit (Equality). Here and elsewhere she argued that women could only become emancipated if they worked like men and earn their own income, which would made them independent from men and integrated them in society and politics. They should receive the same pay and privileges as men in the workplace. For her wage inequality hurt women and men.  She strongly made this arguments in an article in Die Gleichheit published in December 1893, in which she addressed this issue. 
The article served as a call to action. It  framed women’s economic equality and social emancipation as a matter of class struggle between bourgeoisie and proletariat, only after a socialist revolution women could really become equal as women and as workers. Zetkin argued that wage inequality would hurt both, female workers because the poor wages made it incredibly difficult for women to afford adequate living conditions, and male workers because of the competition of cheap female labor.
 As a result, Zetkin called equal wages and stronger attempts pf the SPD and the trade unions to organize women in the labor movement. Only when women became equal to men at work and, by extension, in the home could they begin working towards class reforms. In addition to promoting socialist feminism, Zetkin provided some much-needed leadership and structure in the German socialist women’s movement. In 1907 she was a cofounder of the International Socialist Women’s Congress.
During the First World War, Zetkin, along with Karl Liebknecht (1871-1919) and her friend Rosa Luxemburg (1871-1919), belonged to the small opposition in the SPD that rejected the party’s policy of Burgfrieden (a truce with the government, promising to refrain from any strikes during the war). Among other anti-war activities, Zetkin organized an International Socialist Women’s  Conference against the war in Bern, in neutral Switzerland, from March 25-28, 1915, to which  all other participants had to travel illegally. 
Despite the danger of imprisonment, 25 women from, Britain, France Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Poland, Russia and Switzerland participated in this first international women’s conference for peace, which ended with a joint resolution.  Because of her anti-war opinions, Zetkin was arrested several times during the war, and in 1916 taken into “protective custody” (from which she was later released on account of illness). 
In 1916 Zetkin was one of the co-founders of the Spartacist League (Spartakusbund), which published  illegal, anti-war pamphlets pseudonymously signed “Spartacus” (after the slave-liberating gladiator who had opposed the Romans). The Spartacus League vehemently rejected the SPD’s war policy and supported the growing number of riots and strikes against the war all over Germany. 
In April 1917 Zetkin joined the Independent Social Democratic Party of Germany (USPD) which had split off from the SPD, in protest at its pro-war stance. In January 1919, after the German Revolution in November 1918 she became a co-founder of the Communist Party of Germany becoming a member of the party’s central committee and got first elected to the Reichstag in 1920, and again  in 1932, at the age of 75, where as the oldest member she was entitled to open the parliaments first session. She took this as  her golden opportunity to make a long speech, denouncing Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party.
She also held the view that still holds much resonance today, that the source of womens oppression was in capitalism, and that any form of liberation, could only be served with the self-emancipation of the working class.
Elected to the presidium of the Third International (1921), she spent more and more of her time in Moscow.  Three volumes of collected works, Ausgewählte Reden und Schriften (“Selected Speeches and Writings”), were published in East Berlin from 1957 to 1960.] She died June 20, 1933, Arkhangelskoye, Russia, U.S.S.R.) aged nearly 76, 
Long may this grandmother of revolution, be recognised and celebrated. Clara Zetkin remains an invaluable fixture in modern feminist movements. Even now, women are still fighting for equal pay in the workplace, and figures such as Zetkin remind modern women that cooperation is of utmost importance, and that perseverance is critical to making progress in the movement for women’s equality. Zetkin’s most lasting legacy however, is her reputation as an organizer and effective leader. It’s no secret that modern politics and social movements are deeply affected by partisanship, so Zetkin is most relevant in that she is an example of what can be achieved with organization and cooperation.

Friday 3 July 2015

In the garden


In  the garden, I steal myself away,
sit and inhale pungent smoke,
watch the grass grow beneath my feet,
as I try to forget the burden that humanity brings,
the shadows lift and the sun comes out.

I escape darkened patterns of thought,
walk barefoot over turf,
water flowers as senses awaken,
scatter seeds for the butterflies and bees,
in my sanctuary of devotion.

Here lies a place of  peace, a pleasant distraction,
a landscape shaped by hand,
in harmony with nature,
enabling magic to grow again,
to release its melding scents.

I could stay here for a while,
but I go and wait for loyal love's return,
and the companionship of friends,
as the earth spins gently by,
and the night sky turns silver.

Wednesday 1 July 2015

Heatwave flashback


Been busy helping someone move today, gosh it was rather sweltering. But if I think its been hot this week, I recall the summer of 1976, the year of the national Eisteddfod coming home to us here in Cardigan/Aberteifi. Throughout the summer the entire country sweltered under the heat, for most of its duration, the therometers tipped 26c,  at least I was not stuck in the confines of school. 
Rivers ground to a trickle, while some even stopped flowing. Without water,  companies were forced to cut the working week, while vans patrolled the streets to make sure the hosepipe bans were strictly enforced. Today at least I had  the relief of a bit of rain, thank goodness for that.Ah days of youthful adventures by the seaside on the West Wales coast, and the dawning of the musical explosion of Punk.



The 1976 Punk explosion