Saturday 31 December 2016

Home - Warsan Shire ( b;1/8/88)



The following powerful poem which brings home the stark reality of the horrifying decisions refugee parents must make, is from the Kenyan-born Somali poet Warsan Shire who emigrated to the United Kingdom at the age of one. She became London’s  first ever Young Poet Laureate, and became a voice for its marginalised people. Her verse forms the backbone of  queen of pop Beyoncé’s  recent album Lemonade.
I hope that  2017 will be a year of justice, a year of change, and that humanity keeps giving a warm welcome to all people depicted in the following poem. Let us not forget the many millions displaced, either as refugees, asylum seekers, migrants or internally displaced persons whose  daily existence is one of struggle. Remember no one chooses the country they are born in to and no one deserves to be persecuted because of it, especially if the country they happen to be born into has been torn apart and become unsafe to live in  because of war that is funded by our own governments.
As another year turns and the refugee crisis and this human tragedy continues unabated, let's keep commemorating the strength, courage and resilience of millions of refugees the world over.

Home

no one leaves home unless
home is the mouth of a shark
you only run for the border
when you see the whole city running as well


your neighbors running faster than you
breath bloody in their throats
the boy you went to school with
who kissed you dizzy behind the old tin factory
is holding a gun bigger than his body
you only leave home
when home won’t let you stay

no one leaves home unless home chases you
fire under feet
hot blood in your belly
it’s not something you ever thought of doing
until the blade burnt threats into
your neck
and even then you carried the anthem under
your breath
only tearing up your passport in an airport toilets
sobbing as each mouthful of paper
made it clear that you wouldn’t be going back

you have to understand,
that no one puts their children in a boat
unless the water is safer than the land
no one burns their palms
under trains
beneath carriages
no one spends days and nights in the stomach of a truck
feeding on newspaper unless the miles travelled
means something more than journey.
no one crawls under fences
no one wants to be beaten
pitied

no one chooses refugee camps
or strip searches where your
body is left aching
or prison,
because prison is safer
than a city of fire
and one prison guard
in the night
is better than a truckload
of men who look like your father
no one could take it
no one could stomach it
no one skin would be tough enough

the
go home blacks
refugees
dirty immigrants
asylum seekers
sucking our country dry
niggers with their hands out
they smell strange
savage
messed up their country and now they want
to mess ours up
how do the words
the dirty looks
roll off your backs
maybe because the blow is softer
than a limb torn off

or the words are more tender
than fourteen men between
your legs
or the insults are easier
to swallow
than rubble
than bone
than your child body
in pieces.
i want to go home,
but home is the mouth of a shark
home is the barrel of the gun
and no one would leave home
unless home chased you to the shore
unless home told you
to quicken your legs
leave your clothes behind
crawl through the desert
wade through the oceans
drown
save
be hunger
beg
forget pride
your survival is more important

no one leaves home until home is a sweaty voice in your ear
saying-
leave,
run away from me now
i dont know what i’ve become
but i know that anywhere
is safer than here

Friday 30 December 2016

“A human being is a part of the whole called by us universe, a part limited in time and space. " - Albert Einstein (14/3/1879 -18/4/55)




"A human being is a part of the whole called by us universe, a part limited in time and space. He experiences himself, his thoughts and feeling as something separated from the rest, a kind of optical delusion of his consciousness. This delusion is a kind of prison for us, restricting us to our personal desires and to affection for a few persons nearest to us. Our task must be to free ourselves from this prison by widening our circle of compassion to embrace all living creatures and the whole of nature in its beauty.”
- Albert Einstein

As 2016 draws to a close  I feel sadness at the passing of people I didn't know but who made my life brighter. And sadness too for people I didn't know whose awful and undeserved deaths made me question what world we're living in. No human should be bombed or drowned seeking safety.
Ultimately we are all an intrinsic part of this universe. We are all interconnected, and even though each of us separate individuals.We should appreciate the slender threads that hold us together.Through compassion we can share the ultimate and most meaningful embodiment of our emotional maturity. If we stop feeling for strangers we lose the energy to make the world better.
People were created to be loved. Things were created to be used. The reason the world is in chaos, is things are being loved and people are being used.
Happy New Year/flwyddyn newydd da

Tuesday 27 December 2016

Cassetteboy remix the news: 2016 review special


Mashup artist Cassetteboy presents his take on one of the biggest news stories of the year, shining a humorous light on Brexit. The video lampoons a host of Conservative MPs – David Cameron, Boris Johnson, George Osborne, Michael Gove, Theresa May as well as Ukip’s Nigel Farage – all of whom played a major role in the EU referendum.

Monday 26 December 2016

Careless Whispers


( For George, for anyone
an evening doodle. )


We pause, slip and flounder

worry about paradoxical situations

some  of us even  consider turning back

but it's far too late now

eternity's drunken power

keeps on  returning

to sanctify thirsty lips

liberate the throat

circle the pulse of reason

allow careless whispers to ripple

fill the earth with love 

until outstretched fingers

reach their limit

stumble into another  light

stretch out among the stars 

on dance floors of time

where the music never dies.


Sunday 25 December 2016

A Subliminal Christmas Tree


Dear Governments of the world... Your doing a shit fucking job and you should all be disbanded immediately. We are all fed  up of cleaning up your shit and in no other work place should incompetence be rewarded like you reward yourself. Now fuck off.

An injury to one is an injury to all.

Solidarity Greetings, happy holidays.

If we want it

Philosophy Football's 2016 Christmas message.



 

Saturday 24 December 2016

Eek A Mouse - Christmas A Come


Eek A Mouse - Christmas A Come - 12" / Greensleeves Most Wanted - 1981 / 2008 - Produced by: Linval Thompson - Backed by: Roots Radics - Mixed by: Scientist - At: Channel One (Kingston, JA)

The Tories simply have no shame. Hypocrite Theresa May has delivered a Christmas message calling for unity in the UK as the country prepares for Brexit. Invoking her upbringing in a vicarage, the Prime Minister also paid tribute to those with family who are working away from home over the festive period.https://www.facebook.com/notes/theresa-may/wherever-you-are-this-christmas-i-wish-you-joy-and-peace-in-this-season-of-celeb/1548015965215171
Yet the way this government currently treats working people is disgusting, and as for the poor, sick, disabled and unemployed, it's inhuman.Their chosen path of conscious cruelty needs to be stopped.I wish May and all Tory MPs the Christmas they deserve and the same care and compassion they have shown to the homeless, disabled and those living in poverty..
Meanwhile if you find yourself struggling over Christmas you can pick up the phone and speak to people who really care. Ring 116 123. It's free and open 24 hours a day. Alternatively email: jo@samaritans.org.
Wishing each and everyone of you who celebrate, a Merry Christmas/Nadolig Llawen, and a season of good will.  Heddwch/peace.

Friday 23 December 2016

Make Apartheid history


Palestinians should have the same rights and freedoms as anyone else. But right now they don’t.I believe no one should have their rights denied or be treated differently because of their ethnicity or religion. But this is happening to the Palestinian people at the hands of the Israeli government right now.
Currently tens of thousands of Palestinian workers are forced to seek a living by working in Israel due to crippling unemployment in the West Bank, as the growth of an independent Palestinian economy has been stifled under the ongoing Israeli military occupation, according to rights groups.http://www.maannews.com/Content.aspx?id=774222
Israel’s flouting of international law, continued military occupation of Palestine, and systematic discrimination against Palestinians is unacceptable; I believe there can be a peaceful and just end to the decades of occupation and oppression, one that respects the rights and dignity of Palestinians and Israelis. But until this happens, we have a responsibility to stand up for Palestinian rights.Israel has carried out an unprecedented number of demolitions of Palestinian homes and structures in the West Bank this year, leaving entire families facing a cold and uncertain winter. In Gaza the blockade continues to stifle livelihoods and 60,000 remain homeless, still awaiting the reconstruction of homes destroyed in the 2014 attacks.Palestinians also continue to suffer the consequences of Syria’s civil war. Bombs, torture, the besieging of Yarmouk, and perilous migration routes to Europe have claimed over 3,400 Palestinian lives. The tens of thousands who have settled in Lebanon now share the same poverty and exclusion as the country’s existing Palestinian refugee population.Plus Israel  continued the ethnic cleansing of whole Palestinian communities in Jerusalem, the Naqab (Negev) and the Jordan Valley and continued its indiscriminate killing of Palestinians.No surprise then, that international support for the BDS movement is growing in parallel. Students and academics are creating Israeli-apartheid free zones on campuses; and the recent Hewlett Packard Boycott Week of Action saw over 125 actions targeted HP across the globe.
For more information about the success of the BDS movement in 2016, read this brilliant impact round-up https://bdsmovement.net/news/2016-bds-impact-round-up
It’s time to Make Apartheid History once and for all. And to dismantle the walls that maintain it
https://makeapartheidhistory.org/…/apartheid-wall-animation/'


Make Apartheid History
 

O Little town of Bethlehem

O little town of Bethlehem, how still we see thee lie
Above thy deep and restless sleep, a missile glideth by
And over dark streets soundeth the mortar's deadly roar
While children weep in shallow sleep for friends who are no more 


How silently, how silently their hope has gone away
No laughter rings; no choir sings in shepherds' fields this day
The angels in the heavens are hushed in sad lament
Back in exile - the Holy Child - finds Herod won't relent

O Holy Child of Bethlehem, descend on us we pray
Your love bring down on David's town, drive fear and hate away
Awake the ire of nations, let justice be restored
Rebuild the peace in silent streets where once your love was born