The Faith.
an excerpt

THE FAITH.

1/ You will not deviate from Mission parameters.

2/ You will ALWAYS stay on the Path – ALWAYS follow the Trail Markers and Indicators.

3/ You will arrive as you left - one if one, many if many – not more not less.

4/ Mission Central is the voice of the Council – none can supercede their directions whilst in Harbour.

5/ Only the Rescue Squads can order a change whilst enroute.

6/ You will keep the Faith until the End of Time.

Inside the Faith :

- Get a grip on the job: never discuss it with anyone outside the group – if you are traveling alone, you will know not to discuss it with anyone at all.
- Do the job, and only the job.
- Keep to the Path whatever you do; Hunters will not push you aside no matter what their bravado may indicate.
- They are your only friends, and you theirs.
- Remember you are in charge during the job
- Take it all on the chin.
- Stay together . You must arrive as you departed: in one piece. Remember you may have spent days or weeks – but Harbour is only minutes away.
- Listen to the Harbourmaster always, This is the ultimate authority before and after the job.
- Never talk to the Wobblies: there is nothing to say.
- Keep the Faith.

In order to preserve the Time-line as we know it, it has been necessary to intrude into the Past.
The Time – Council was set up when it was proven that certain events in the Past
were, in fact, the results of tampering as opposed to natural development ( for whatever that’s worth .)

The operatives who travel thru’ Time call themselves various things, Plumbers or Skaters, among other names.
They have their own peculiar language, like many groups who work in strange and untenable situations.

Contains copious swearing.

It's an odd thing, the way we use certain concepts to denote emphasis. Take the way someone will say they've had a HELL of a day, and you get an idea of maybe their age or socio-economic background, but not really how bad their day really HAS been.

Or you hear someone say the some such is just fucked ....if it's an older person, with tattoos, it sounds serious ; a young thing with braces on her teeth and a cute pink dress just sounds silly.

Like a puppy growling.

Even the word itself has various meanings, depending on context and manner.
Someone I knew awhile back used to talk this way quite a lot : like, everything's fucking fucked, you know ? Fuck that, that's just fucking around, oh, him, he's a fucker....and so on. She was an interesting lady, allright.

No shit.

Some of her pronouncements were amazing in their complexity.
I remember her waxing irate about someone expecting her to be sycopanthic : Fuck that, that's fucked-up - I'm not kissing some cunt's arse ......

After that mindboggling image, it was impossible for her to outdo herself - yet she did.

I ran into her in the street recently, and she was a bit irate about her six year-old nephew..you know what he did ? she wanted to know.

That little dickhead, he fucking swore at me.........

Some people, just have NO respect.

The single silliest thing I've read about the Virginia Tech shootings was an article the Globe locally reprinted from a John O'Sullivan piece in National Review. This one tried to winkle out of the shootings an instance of 'radical evil'--that is to say a positive embrace of evil that moves outside the scope of normal human wickedness--as exemplified by, let's say, Hitler--who apart from his monomania about the Jews showed no ther signs of mental illness.

Who showed no other what? Hitler created the Nazi party in his own image--an intricate philosophy and programme of life whose tenets, first to last, top to bottom, core to periphery, are criminally delusive. If he showed no signs of mental illness, what could possibly be counted as signs?

The chief problem with Hitler (or Stalin, who's the other example this article cites) as examples of radical evil--that is, a type of evil totally outside the scope of common humanity--is that neither could have carried out their agendas without the active assent of ordinary people, literally millions of them. They certainly represented an extreme on the human scale, but if they'd run clear off it how would they have found so many merely human collaborators?

As for the Virginia Tech shooter--who it would be worthwhile not naming in any reports where that could be avoided, so's not to encourage the Erostratus syndrome--his story as it unfolds is, sad to say, ridiculously true to type. Bullied, isolated, rage simmering continually at a low boil--"God's lonely man." It's impossisble to know how much will of any kind he had at the end of his life, but quite certainly he hadn't remotely strength of will enough to declare: "Evil, be thou my good."Making that kind of inverted hero out of him is positively silly.

What makes the idea of radical evil not only wrongheaded but dangerous is that Hitler certainly, and Stalin most probably, believed in it--and wiped out whole populations with the idea that nothing else could eradicate its spread.

ivan gabriel rehorek bio Apr 22 2007 12:05AM

RE: Martin Heavisides

The big difference between the youmg shooter and the gentlemen in question is partly that of history and use of other's will, partly that of opportunity.

The young shooter had all the opportunities to make his way, yet was not mentally equipped for the task. I don't know the verbiage, but mentally ill seems to be enough to cover it. He did show signs of being seriously disturbed, yet no-one picked it up.

Young Schicklegruber was impoverished from the outset, a child of the late 19th century decaying German monarchy, a sidelined and disenfranchised person. His army buddies from WW 1 remember him as a strange sort, sitting there thinking long and hard, finally coming up with some pronouncement about the superiority of the Aryan race that was only remrkable by its slithering idiocy.

Young Djugashvilli was actually being trained for priesthood, when he apparently ran off with a bar-maid.

Perhaps if there had been proper screening processes from the authorities at the time...but the young man from V. Tech slipped thru' just the same, didn't he ?

Otside the positive scope of human wickedness...hoo boy.
That sounds suspiciously like the very crapols the abovementioned twosome would have come up with....or had someone else write for them.

Calpurnia was a strange, solitary world – a single planet with a breathable atmosphere orbiting a binary star. Apparently, something not really possible, according to the scientific types – but there it was, an only child of two titan suns, eternally locked in conflict.
It is not on record what name the Calpurnians used for themselves – nor what wag named the planet after Julius Caesar’s second wife – but there it also was, an obdurate oddity.

The planet itself was a paradise, beautiful and restful were words that did not do it justice. Imagine a pristine land, all dancing forests and mountains to the north, laughing jungles to the south, and various mellow savannahs in between. There were no violent cataclysms, no extremes of weather, no toxic environments, no steaming, deadly hellholes or frozen wastes.
Calpurnia was all harmony, all peaceful co-existence ; which made no sense at all, since there were several hundred quite different biotas to be found, illogically, all over the surface of the planet.

In between these areas are strange, anomalous zones, out of time and out of space – they are full of fluid, evershifting colours and shapes. These ‘tweenzones are a clue as to the real function of Calpurnia.

Some of the Earthies have come close to figuring this out.

The few natives in evidence, solitary, morose individuals, were often seen sitting, overlooking a particular vista. They appeared disinclined to any communication, even with each other, preferring to spend their time appearing to count the clouds, or fossick in the multicoloured sands of the eternal coastline.

It turned out the Calpurnians were a vastly advanced species, and their real world was inside the planet itself : a cold, mechanical existence, joyless and monotonous.
For though machines do not break down and die, Calpurnians do. And the only thing they have to look forward to is their regular holiday topside, where they can simply wander and play….these were, then , the reasons for the incredible array of biotas – playthings for the Calpurnians, during their holidays, or downtimes.

Apparently, in their language, a single word could express an entire planet, from its beginning to its end.
Another word was used for the civilizations thereupon, from their inception to their demise – and it was a word not dissimilar to infection…..our own puny human brains could not hold onto such a concept in its totality and complexity, they would simply burst at the seams.

Even the Calpurninans needed their downtimes, for such thoughts could produce the most diabolical of headaches….

So this was that the first landings of the Solar Confederacy ( aka the Earthies ) came upon.
Not unlike their distant colonizing forbears, they also had little conception what they came across.

After the bulldozers and earth-moving equipment, the soldiers and their clanking armour, the scientists and their boxes of equipment, the administrators and their coffee-urns, came the real hardcore operators.

These were the well-meaning educators and sentient being rights advocates – and they were there to lock horns and debate endlessly on which direction to take.

They had no idea that whatever they had to offer the Calpurnians was on par with a dim three-year old child showing Rembrandt one of its scrawls.
You'd have thought the Earthies would have got the idea after the first film footage of the Calpurnians was shownEarthside, and was completely blank...they simply did not wish to be filmed, or photographed.

And it was the arrival of Captain Nedloh, the main headkicker from the Earth Confederacy, that put the cherry on top.

The eventual scandal was a beaut - and that's what this story is really about.

#1.

Captain Nedloh was a smooth, handsome jaguar of a man. The only other thing that mattered to him more than his immaculate appearance was his career in the Confederacy.

He had risen from a humble clerking position, thru’ middle management and eventually gaining his Active Duty badge ( the real truth was that he made sure his name was on the right lists, and his face in the right photographs ), he managed to be given command of a ship.

It was actually a First lieutenant who ran the ship, an experienced professional who would shrug and sigh, and take what action was really necessary.
Having almost no actual experience in combat, Nedloh almost lost the aforesaid ship on manoeuvres – a secret only known by him and one other – since such a thing was almost impossible, central command did not believe someone could be so incompetent.
Nedloh simply panicked, and gave contrary orders – and the ship came within inches of being pulled into the Asteroid Field, and battered to bits…

Plus the aforementioned right lists and photographs were a help– our hero was safe from prosecution. Just the same, he made sure of the demise of the career of a certain First lieutenant – a simple matter of a faulty stopcock on a spacesuit – and appearing distraught at the funeral afterwards.

Our hero always liked overkill – and in time, would learn more and more subtle methods.

So it was Captain Nedloh stepping off the gangplank, into what he considered to be a plum assignment : terraform this place Calpurnia, collect the reward due, plus a nice fat promotion. For in the dark of night, he often paraded in an Admiral’s uniform, just him and the mirror mirror on the wall.

The hefty reward would be for going ahead of schedule, and he had ideas there, my word, he had ideas.
So he stood on the gangplank, surveying his world. He allowed himself a smile as he slowly pulled off his gloves, for it was growing a little too warm for full-dress uniform.

“Watch it with those cases ! “ he barked at the menials as they unloaded his cargo. His admiral’s uniform was in one of them.
“ Honestly ,” he shook his head ruefully ‘ If you don’t know your own job…” and he strode down the gangplank to look over his new fiefdom.

The first thing to take care of would be the internal workings – any opposition would be identified, exposed, and dealt with.

And he would deal with it, my word, he would….

The main staging area doubled as the canteen, and he could see there was already some kind of culture in place – the worker-ants like it that way, it made them think there was something that was their own here.He looked briefly at the displays and flags of a dozen terraforming expeditions, and moved on.So they were a professional bunch, at least.

But they had some odd ideas about who was in charge.

They would soon find out.

So Nedloh strode into the admin block, surprising a sleepy –looking clerk and a couple of lounging tech supporters.

“ You ! “ he barked again at the clerk “ name and rank ! “

“ Er er, Ahamey…doctor Ahamey, cultural advisor…I don’t really have a rank…”

This was going well, thought Nedloh. He’s not even a clerical, and …

” Doctor, eh ? What’s your speciality ? “

“ Uh, actually, it’s the collation of syntagmatic approaches to cultural events within the story-telling nexus…”

“ Huh ? What is that, exactly ? Oh, wait, you’re not even a medic, are you ? “

Nedloh turned and strode away at this point - no reason to spend anymore time with unimportant staff anyhow.

……

Nedloh leaned across the table and surveyed the gathered staff. Most of them met his gaze, a few fidgeted, and the head of security smiled enigmatically.
" So, " Nedloh began with a dramatic flourish " here we are then. I won't mess about, I'll come straight to the point, for such is my way. I am a simple military man, and I will turn this facility around.
And if ANYONE...( he paused to hunch menacingly here ) ANYONE wants to lock horns with me on my methods, then be warned !!
I take no prisoners, and see things thru' to the end ! My word, I do !

Now, let's take a closer look at some of these more questionable practices - it is very inefficient to collect images by painting and drawing them - when you have digi-cameras at your disposal, use the bloody things. No, I cannot believe they don't work !
We have a unique opportunity here, and must not miss out.But we are still dependent on the goodwill of Earthside, and so have to play our cards right.
Some of you may not widh to participate in this new direction - you are free to get up and walk away...NOW.

Nobody ?

All right, since nobody has moved, I must assume that we are all on the same page here. We are all of us singing from the same songsheet, and so we shall move forward together.

Now, it has come to my attention that for too long the contractors here have been setting the agenda, rather than the Earthside officials.

This is why we are in the position we are in - there must be a change. And I will have my way on this, my word I will !! "

There were a few sidelong glances around the room.

They didn't like this overmuch, Nedloh thought with a hidden smirk. Good, time for more then, and they will all follow orders soon enough.
" So - who wants to give up their commission ? Nobody ? Who wants to take a voluntary separation from here ? Nobody.

I thought so. But we have to do something, because as you know, there's not enough funds coming in, and too much demand on the administration here...."

" All right, then. All right." It was an unwelcome interruption, but Nedloh was ready for anything. He turned to face this..
It was some large specimen from the crowd that took him on - Kurt Cam.
" You say that it is an inefficient method to paint and draw - well, we cannot literally make the cameras work, and you can believe it or not, as you like....

" It is you who has led us up the garden path, you, Cap'n Nedloh, who has lied, connived and turned one against another. No, I will speak ! Shut that mouth of yours, enough has come out of it already !!
Your ambition has taken over any good sense you may have once had, and you have turned into a creature who craves power and more power above all.
You plot and sneak and tell contrary stories - you promise the same thing to five or six people, and then let them tear each other apart in the race. And you watch with utter DELIGHT, you total unrequited swine !!
NO more.
We have all decided, and you will stand down as of now - clear your junk out of your office, and be on the shuttle in ten minutes. Your Admiral's uniform had been impounded - it is illegal and you are not entitled to it......."

Nedloh managed to slip away in the enuing uproar, ducking low under the tables and sliding out of an open air vent.
This was all that Ahamey's fault, and he would pay for this.

Nedloh gritted his teeth.

And then, he would call down the orbiting troop ship, and take care of these pesky terraformers. By flame and sword, yes indeed.

He dodged around the back of the offices, and lay low in the dark awhile.
There were voices raised, a sound of breaking glass, and running feet.

" You lot look over there, and we'll meet you round the back. He can't have gone too far !!"

Nedloh sat quiet.
..............
As Nedloh shook his head clear and crawled out of the debris, a surprise awaited him.
It was the immense silence, everything had stopped breathing, as if something of great importance was about to happen….

“ Well, you really made a mess of things, didn’t you ? “

The voice was so familiar, yet….Nedloh goggled, and fell backwards at the sight. It was Ahamey, complete with a neat set of laser-burns and gaping hole in his chest.
Behind him, a strange fog swirled and danced.

“ Huh…whaaa….but you….” was all Nedloh could manage, scrabbling about in the dirt.

“ No, you’re quite right, cap’n – you really DID kill me – but that doesn’t matter now.
What does is the fact the Calpurnians are most pissed off with you – there hasn’t been a forced death here…oh, for several millennia."

Oh shit.

Nedloh's mind cleared as he took this in. The Calpurnians weren't the passive logs he'd mistakenly thought them to be.
They were, in fact, the powers he should have dealt with in the first place.

" No point in adjusting your horizons, Cap'n. The Calpurninans are not interested in your plans.And you have managed to turn all the others against you as well...tsk tsk. Well, there's really just one more thing...'

" Hang on " Nedloh rallied once more " this can't be happening - you're dead, so I must be imagining you ! "

" Whatever you like . But it doesn't alter facts : you killed me because you wanted to keep your little secret safe - interestingly enough, I have NO idea of it, so the whole thing was pointless - and you killed an innocent man for no reason at all ." Ahamay flicked irritably at the ragged edges of his wound.

" Oh, and you were starting to annoy the Terraformers something chronic - they don't like admin types, and they definitely don't have any time for YOU . "

" I ...only tried to...' Nedloh was conscious of the fog closing in, and he struggled to keep his train of thought going .
" So, they're going to do ...what exactly ? " He felt a surge of his old confidence coming back : " Are these wonderful Calpurnians goping to punish me ?
How, exactly ? By sending spooks or something ?

Are they hoping I'll change my ways, or what ?! "

He even managed a chuckle, a ghostly sounding wheeze.

Ahamay shook his head sadly.

" You just aren't with the programme, are you ? It's not one of your strengths, actually..."

"OK OK cut the shit already ! " Nedloh was back in form : " I want to talk to them direct, not thru' some ectoplasmic mediary ! What the hell is this, a seance or something ?! "

That told them - they wanna see what they're dealing with. I'm not just some diddledick..........a vast wall of sound blew him off his feet, spinning and turning like a leaf in the wind. He was conscious only of an immense, towering darkness, a howling abbyss...." AAAAAAAHHHHH !!!!!!!! " he screamed until his jaw was almost dislocated.

The blessed silence covered him like a blanket.

He lay on his side, blubbering and weeping like a baby.

" Wha...whaaa wuzzat ? waz that my punushment ? " he managed at last. Because it was an absolute beaut. He shook his head and sat up like a whipped dog.

" No. That was what the Calpurnians sound like, only a million times million millions softer. I shielded you as much as possible. They are just...beyond us in so many ways. "

Yeah, you and your pals, though Nedloh. But he dared not say anything out loud.
" No " said Ahamay, " not my pals at all. They're just using me as a mouthpiece - you had to go and attract their attention, didn't you ?

Well, they are going to do a number on you, cap, that's for sure. They're really going to do a number on you...."

Nedloh didn't like the sound of this, not in the least bit. But he really had no idea just what the Calpurnians were capable of, their incredible sublety and ultimate cruelty. He had a lot to learn from them, to be sure.

" Right. " Ahamay turned around, looking down at him. " Looks like we are ready then. Stand up, cap'n . "
" All right, then " and Nedloh stood tall. " I'm not afraid. I'm good and ready. Just a pity they confiscated my admiral's uniform, heh. ..."

" No, you're not going to be ready for ....THIS ." and Ahamay's voice faded in and out as strange lights played and twirled, dancing and flicking about.

Nedloh almost laughed out loud. What the hell was this ?! Some kind of.....he was bowled over once more, but this time it was utter unending grief, misery of the blackest mire, sticking and gripping his throat like death itself.......he gurgled and fell to his knees, reaching at Ahamey, flailing as he toppled face-first.

And the last he heard of Ahamey's voice, far far above him, were the words burned into his memory : " I told you, didn't I, you had no idea of what they can do ?
Where I'm going, won't matter - so the Calpurninans are giving you a conscience, my conscience. Hope it serves you well, as it did me. And I part with an old Calpurnian greeting : Good luck with the rest of your existence. "

Epilogue.

Well, there you have it, as far as I know the story about Nedloh and the Calpurnians. The place is still on the maps, and has a small presence of Earthies - an unimportant base that does not really produce anything much. The Calpurnians seem to have accepted us as another odd biota, and left it at that.

Nedloh has vanished someplace, and has not been heard of since.
The Universe is a very,very big place.

And now, I must confine these writings to the fire, for I have finished with them.

Just one last thing I must not forget before.....
* *
A recent thread in a private office, about the nature of Poetry, one of
my mistresses. So I play around a lot.

One day, Puppetry and Dance, the original art forms, had a child. She
has long black hair, bright blue eyes, and sometimes will not answer
when spoken to. They had a lot of fun with her as she was growing up,
for she kept changing her mind about things. And she could talk the hind
leg of a horse !
She is perfidious, forgiving, cantankerous, loving, rowdy,
thoughtful...you know her, I'm sure - her name is Poetry.

The ancient people knew her well, for she helped them remember their
stories - the words without melodies that are her speciality - and some
would straightjacket into scansion.Soldiers would speak to her as they
marched into battle, pharaohs and kings ( the wise ones ) would often
have words of her carved into stone, for us to read, many centuries later.

King Solomon conversed with her, and the results were beatiful. King
Assurbanipal dedicated whole sections of his library to her.

The Greek philosophers discoursed with her, arguing all about passion
and structure, as if she'd choose between the two.
The Romans were also aware of her, exiles like Ovid crying his heart out
with her for his only company......Chinese emperors and scholars poured
tea for her, and designed elaborate calligraphy for her pleasure. The
Church Fathers greeted her with cries of recognition, and people sang
her praises in the marketplaces. Courtiers made obeisances to her, and
peasants drank her health and recited for her.
Conquistadors had little time for her, as did the stern Savanarola, but
she did not care.
There would always be the wonder and the glory of the language, and as
the centuries rolled on, more and more dedicated themselves to her.
She sat with queens and tzars, shoguns and sultans, danced with the
shamans and touched lightly the tongues of babes.
From Byron to Tennyson, from Yeats to Prevert , from Thomas to Cohen,
and even now, she still stays with us, mysteriously smiling as we chew
on our pens, trying to come up with the next line......

Poetry is the damnedest thing, when you look at it. Why else would you
attempt to describe the indescribable, and make it memorable ?
Unless you were a bit mad, perhaps.

The whole notion of what is and what isn't sane....mmm, there's a topic
already, almost ready made.
" If they give you a piece of paper with lines, write across them. "

This could almost be poetry - as with the famous primitives in one of
Jorge Louis Borge's tales : " ....they were proscribed from ever looking
at the sky - and every now and again, one of them would utter a string
of words that had no real meaning ; and if it moved the others, they
would stone the poet to death.
...these were the remnants of a once-great civillization, now sunk
lower than animals..."

The imagery Borges uses is of a peculiarly evocative sort, one that
stays on the mind for many years, turning the thought over and over like
a grain of sand - perhaps it may become a pearl, with time.

A typical conceit, the mixing up of concrete image and metaphor, and
something She dearly loves.

Let's say hello to Her, then.
If we create three or so lines, we may repeat them, with variations, and
find ourselves speaking very clearly on several levels.
I like the notion of the pantoum, a form of community sing along, which
repeats lines in a certain order - usually 1,2,3,4, then 5,2,6,7 then
8,3,9,10 and 11,4,12,1.
Just means it takes on a life of its own.....

Take a couple of lines, and play on - like this maybe :

The sun that comes up swims around
over the laughing morning river
some will take the bridge
others prefer to pay the boatman

but the trees and clouds they whisper
over the laughing morning river
telling stories of what always was
like the stars the moon and Love's first kiss

there are whirlpools of talk
for some will take the bridge
throwing words and pebbles and thoughts
splashing and wheeling all day long

but let us take the water, dearest
let others pay the boatman
enter the river just the once
like the sun that comes up swims around.
Now, about the use of metaphor and meter.

These two terms may seem opposed at first, but as we shall see, they are
more like the two mainstays of poetry.

Metaphor is one of those words that gets misused a lot, in vaguely
comical ways ( It was a metaphor, you fool ! roared the heavyweight
champion as he battered his opponent into submission ) but as my example
shows, you had to be there at the time.
It really is a way of following a thought to a conclusion, logical or
not. Mixed metaphors often wind up being very funny , intentionally or
not ( Why did the writer jump off the cliff ? He wanted to jump to a
conclusion...) and can be used in poetry.
It's a deeply personal thing, ultimately.
" Some songs will die before morning and they will be sung only the once
but never again, others will be like riddles, each time they are sung a
new level of meaning will be revealed, a new ring of
understanding....and some of them are just like old pictures with big
ears, out of focus, all taped together, some are footprints or birdbaths
or just scratches on a new car...." Charles Schwab, liner notes on Used
Songs, a compilation of Tom Waits.

Stream of cosciousness is like the border between prose and poetry - it
can be very refreshing if done the right way - just like a well-made
martini.
The other aspect of poetry, apart of its emotinal content, is the
rhytmic, or metric considerations.

A good poem has to be memorable, and in order to do so, it has to slip
off the tongue easily, make friends and mix with the crowd as it were.

Remember all those skipping rhymes at school ?

My old man's a Dutchman,
he wears a Dutchman's hat
one day he farted thru a keyhole.....
aaand the keyhole farted back
aaaand he had a heart attack
aaaand his pants they all turned black

Don't ask me WHY I recall that one.
But that must be the point- it's so easy to remember.
Not unlike mnemonics and suchlike ( Every Good Boy Deserves Fruit, and
other beasties ) we fill our heads with strange shapes in the hope we
might remember things more easily.
And Poetry just smiles, and turns it all upside down. And puts it to
rhyme, and we cannot get it out of our heads.

There are times when the imagery is so spare, so clean...

A naked lunch is natural to us
we eat reality sandwiches
But allegories are so much lettuce.
Don't hide the madness.

So even "non-metric" verse has its own power, a fresh approach that
makes us smile just the same.
The whole argument about rhyming and non-rhyming verse...it's rather
silly, really. We no longer worry about such meta-narratives - kind of
like the whole thing about poets who are either naive or sentimental,
according to Schiller's estimations.
Naive means naturist, only being able to describe, whereas sentimental
means formal and idealist...but this was a consideration way back in the
late eighteenth century, and ultimately winds up being just words that
have lost their meaning.

We used to have to get up in front of the class when I was about six,
and recite pieces of poetry. And I always enjoyed myself hugely, for I
knew She was nearby.

A panther is just like a leopard
except he hasn't been peppered
should you see a panther crouch
prepare to say ouch
best yet, when called by a panther....
don't anther.

There's a whole world of such gems out there, for all sorts of reasons
and seasons, for the child who cries as well as smiles shall see
rainbows with his eyes. I appear to be quoting endlessly today, but
then, that would be the point - it's so much easier to remember things
metric and rhytmic.

I hope to see you all over in the Poetry wing, even for a visit, come
and see the regular flash event too.
Who knows, perhaps She will smile on you too. She's grinning like a bear
right now.
I finish off with an old favourite of mine, sing along if you know this
one :

Ring the bells that still can ring
forget your perfect offering
there is a crack in everything
that's how the light gets in.

* with thanks to Leonard Cohen, Tom Waits, Alan Ginsburg, William Blake,
Alfred Lord Tennyson, Eleanor Farjeon, and many others.

The one time my mother really put her foot down was over a writing contest, back in the old country. The Communist regime, although it claime otherwise, was not particularly fond of intelligent, educated, young females.

And my mother, having just finished her Dramaturgy degree, longed to get her teeth into something.

So it was decreed that she was to judge the nationwide playwriting contest, Children's section, just her speciality.
Take this opportunity, comrade, and show the other comrade workers just what you have learnt, and guide them in the production of a new, true proletarian theatre...my word.

She rolled her eyes inwardly, and got on with the job.
There were plays from truck-drivers, waiters, bricklayers, army clarks, postal office officials...but the most incredible was a production from a retired railways sanitation employee ( aka station toilet attendant ) who actually copied out a rather well-known children's story about a little bear and his mother - we all grew up with it, it was actually a beloved tale by a famous artist ( who incidentally, pipped Disney out of the very first Cannes Film Festival, in the short animated films section.....but that's another story ).

She sent it back with a sharp comment about stealing someone else's material, and gave the award to someone or other.

The uproar was tremendous.

The said plagiarist was actually a friend of a Party official, and a war hero and and and...my mother was called into the
head office to be reprimanded.
The old fellow was present also, and had plenty to say about the youth of today and their lack of respect....it didn't end in a resolution.
Sufficient to say that there was much shouting and carry-on.

None so outraged as a thief caught in the act.

The prize was awarder to him, and my mother was sharply rebuked. And went home to write a really pointed letter to the Minister of Arts, Culture and Whatever Else.

Ye gods.

She took on the entire Communist party apparatus on a moral issue.

The fact she was right was not relevant to these gentlemen - for several days later, my father intercepted a very anonymous letter inviting my mother to a " little chat " in regards to a small misunderstanding. The address given was a well-known local headquarters of the NKVD, or Secret Police, if you prefer.

The pigs were not pleased, and were going to teach her a lesson.

My father went instead.

Years later he described the situation to me : " There was a big sort of room, mostly dark, lots of tiles. Someone was splashing about in one corner, cleaning something red off one of the walls. In front of me, a table with a low-hanging light and a wooden stool for me to sit on.
Behind the table, an anonymous policeman was shuffling papers, and another one, rather larger one, was standing nearby, just in case.

It was an obvious set-up, really. All I had to do was either be all meek and mild and sign anythingthey put in from, or get all rebellious and get invited to continue the dicussion with the large gentleman, in the corner, possibly with the aid of the said rubber hose.

Well, life's too short anyway - so I invented a third option.
After the copper with the papers read out the charges ( you can well imagine : sedition and the rest ) I had to react somehow.
Even the large copper leaned forward here - obviously, an enthusiast here.

I hit the table with my fist.

" Comrades, I am very unhappy about this here ! " I exclaimed " an' I tell ya whut I'm gonna do - gonna go home and slap that woman of mine - my old man was a sanitation engineer too, y'know !!"

Never mind that I had a University education too, the act worked.

And why not : it worked for the Good Soldier Svejk....I was released to go home and have a word woth the comrade wife......and we both agreed that it was not just the system that was all wrong, but also the people in it....

*

That Dimwit....
( true stories )

The boys were down by the old pier, doing what boys do best : swearing and carrying on like pork chops.
I swept the last of the kitchen floor, and made a start on the dishes.

The rising wind carried the scent of tobacco ( and then other stuff ) as well as the faint stench of cursing. The low rumbling would be Bob-Billy, the more strident voice belonged to Billy-Bob.
They were a pair of prize idiots, them two.

Nukkin, only last week Billy runs in with a bag of yarndi, dives under the bed to hide it, and then races out the back again like his arse was on fire.

I though, oh shit, the cops are after him...but no, it was only that Dimwit from down the street, yelling and screaming how Billy-bob's ripped him off and how he was gonna tear him a new arsehole if he ever caught up with him.....he skated to a halt when he saw me in the doorway.
Oh, sorry Auntie, I wuz....y'know...y'seen Billy-Bob ? It's just that we got some stuff to talk about.....

Just piss off, OK ? I told him, and I'm gunna burn that bag of yarndi, or even smoke it myself.

Bloody runamuck kids, I tell ya.....the other night, I was asleep in my bed, and I feel this hand on my foot. It was a hot old night, so we keep all the windows open, but Bob-Billy riged up a couple tincans near the front door if anyone decided to come in for a visit, like a five-finger discount, y'know ?

So I wake up with this cold hand feeling my foot - what the f.....I been sleeping on my own since Quack's been banged up, he's got another four years to go, the kids were in the next room, and the baby's in her cot nearby.....so I peep over at my foot, real sly way ; and it's some drongo who's gone and cut a hole in the window flyscreen, stuck his hand inside, and is feeling around in the dark.

So I reach over and slam the window down on his little black murra, what you reckon I'm gonna do ?

And then I'm up and I grab the cricket bat and race outside, knockin' over all the tins, and the baby wakes up and Billy-Bob and Bob-Billy are bithe there behind me and all the lights are on and I'm going buntha at the scumbag lying there under the window an' he's crying and howling don't hurt me Auntie iss only me...it's that drongo, Dimwit again, looking for that bag of dope, I bet.

Well we all calm down, Dimwit gets sent home and I pick up the baby. The boys hang round, Billy-Bob wants to explain about the bag of yarndi...it's gone, what you reckon ?

Anyway, later on it turns out that Dimwit falls in with another loser, some guy who's a bit of a safe-cracker ; he's doing a safe at a chemist, it's three in the morning, and Dimwit is supposed to be lookout....anyway, the guy gets the safe open, and there's Dimwit, singin' out to him : hey, bruzz, think ya bedda come out here - I reckon the cops are here....Dimwit was supposed to be watching on the roof, near the skylight where they broke in, only he decided to take a nap- and someone spotted him and called the cops.

Man, what a...Dimwit !

That's how we knew he was a junkie, for sure.

Anyhow, he winds up in jail - next thing we know, there's this BIG escape, a couple of guys put a carpet over the razor wire, and climbed out over the security fence !

Don't know what the guards were doin', having a wank or what.....

Anyway, they got caught again the next day - they were sleeping rough in the scrub,in all that rain and shit and just couldn't stand it anymore and gave themselves up.

I knowed it when Billy -Bob was watching TV, and called me over look look mum, there's Dimwit, on TV !

And there he was, the cops hauling him away like a sack of shit, and him looking all dopey with all them burrs in his hair and plastered with mud...he must think he's a real traditional fella, hey mum, Bob-Billy laughed.

I just don't want youze boys hangin' round with that dickhead, allright ?

And then I went back into the kitchen to put on their tea, having a good chuckle over that fool Dimwit.....
The TV was bleating something about the rising wind and possiblility of evacuation of low-lying areas and shit - like where WE gonna go ?

Better get that bucket emptied, too, the roof's leaking again, what with all this rain..........