Day: May 29, 2017

Writer’s block

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I have never had this until lately.I used to write limericks but my mood was not fitted for those.I read an article about Stoicism and discovered the same man wrote a book about Insults.So by reading in a different field, I got some new ideas.I also said to myself since I am unwell maybe I should stop writing.It is like exercise in that it takes a time to get going.So the first things we write may be rubbish.
I wrote about Insults and never knew before it was “jumping on someone”

Stay thy Brexit tweets for shame,

And Wilt thou Leave me Thus?

 Original BY SIR THOMAS WYATT
And wilt thou believe we’re cursed
Stay thy Brexit tweets for shame,
To give  the electors  blame
For all those  stifled groans;
And tilt thou our scales so thus?
Say Europe, oh,goodbye
And wilt thou believe we are missed,
That the French   we flee now sing
In stealth and woe tis wrong
And is  Magna Carta flung
So to deceive all thus?
Say, why was it done by us?
And will we leave the Fuss
That hath given humans bad hearts
Never  thought we’d  depart,
Neither a gain nor smart;
And wilt thou leave Europe thus?
Say nay, say nay!
And will we leave Europa thus
And have no more pity
On the countries that loved us?
What chops, what cruelty!
And wilt we leave all Europe thus?
Stay, oh stay ,
Ok, beggar off

Sometimes they filed their briefs inside my Aga

 Apologies to SIR THOMAS WYATT
Pray, please, for me, you  who my cooker  broke
With faked food,  hot frying in my chamber.
I have seen them griddle, flame, and smoke
That now are  cold and do a  lamb dismember
Sometimes they  filed  their briefs  inside my Aga
And  flaked bread  on my hand; whereon  sheep tgraze;
Busily baking  buns with  a  new range
Spanked by government  fools so  very wise
Twenty more times cooked on ribboned  lace
On these thin oven trays, we twinkled ice
When my denim apron from her neck did fall,
She  caught  a fish  for me in her arms thrall;
Therewithall  while sweetly  we drank Kirsch
She softly asked, “How do you  like your flesh?”
It was no dream: my bread unruly baking.
But all is  bleak now, as I ‘m cooker-les
Entering a  strange new future of uncreating
 Yet I have  all this sweet new yeast to raise  and bless
And she  promises to use  fat cookery books much less
But since that I so kindly am  now served
I ache to know what special meal she loved

What is an insult?

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https://en.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/insult

“Origin

Mid 16th century (as a verb in the sense ‘exult, act arrogantly’): from Latin insultare ‘jump or trample on’, from in- ‘on’ + saltare, from salire ‘to leap’. The noun (in the early 17th century denoting an attack) is from French insulte or ecclesiastical Latin insultus. The main current senses date from the 17th century, the medical use dating from the early 20th century.”

Humid days

The sun is gone, the sky is dull and grey
The air with heavy moisture is oppressed
When sad, I lose my feeling for the day
The sun is gone, the sky is dull and grey
The heat is cruel as on my skin it plays
I feel as if my heart is put to test
Why cannot from me the grief go stray?
Why am I forbidden to take rest?
The cloud is gone, the sky is full of prayer
The air with baptismal water is  now blessed

Discovering Tillich

Tillich 1You know this experience, sometimes when you are browsing in a bookshop you come across a book with a wonderful title. This happened to me as a  student when I saw a book with this title:

“The courage to be ”

by Paul Tillich

I was going through a hard time and just the title alone helped me as no one I knew had ever said it takes courage to live well.So I bought this book and dipped in. I found it interesting and thoughtful.Sometimes I would just look at the front cover and repeat the title.I had discovered mantra meditation.in a sense.

One morning I was listening to a radio programme about poetry in England and tidying up. Suddenly my old battered copy  of “The Courage to Be” fell out of a shelf and into my hand.And I said, thank you. Because I had lost this companion and now it’s restored to me when I need again to say the words to help me in a personal crisis.

The Courage to Be

And to recognise the power of words on the human mind and thus to take care of self and others and what we say to them for they too are struggling humans as we ourselves are.

And to discover virtue is not faux piety which suddenly reminded me that Tillich had a weakness for women. He was no plaster saint.

Had he stayed in Germany he would no doubt have been imprisoned even killed like Dietrich Bonhoeffer.He would not have been silent

Books… they save lives. I was so grateful and still am for education, books, people who talk to me .Had I lived a few years earlier it would have been different.

http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/595850/Paul-Tillich/7266/Development-of-his-philosophy

Tillich was expelled from Germany in 1933, the first non-Jewish theologian to have this honor bestowed on him.I never saw him but I love him for his writing.

Loneliness expresses the pain of being alone and solitude expresses the glory of being alone.
Paul Tillich
Read more at http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/authors/p/paul_tillich.html#y15kkZigwdviBd76.99

Remembering Paul Tillich

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Paul Tillich gave our spirit proper place.
He showed us courage as a  space to dwell.
He wrote for us and left us with   his  grace
With his hope, he might both speak and tell.

So many people ignored Fascist speech
And lived with minds cut off from  their own soul
With pen in hand, he wrote, inspired to reach
And touch us as we work towards the whole.

Expelled from his own country, he wrote on
Continuing during  tortuous war long years
He lived, he loved, he wrote, he died and then
His books continue to dispatch our fears.

Though many folk have lived and have destroyed.
Paul Tillich showed  us how to face the  void

When red sun drops and the black night rolls in

When red sun  drops and  cooling night  rolls in
Darkness masks both danger and our vision
Ancient minds fear   day won’t come again
Courage for the  delicate   seems thin
As we  wrestle  with  our indecision
When  sun  drops and  darkest night  rolls in
But now, new stricken by   a dread of sin
Who shall argue with the soul’s  derision?
The  ancient mind fears   day won’t come again
Yet when  we sleep we’re entertained within
Deft dreams will  squander all  illusion
When red sun  drops and a  black night  rolls in
In reverie, we’re loved  and  so  open
Then  fancy turns to full communion
While ancient minds fear   day won’t come again
And so  it was that our own life began
When sperm leaped up in proud confusion.
When  deep sun  dropped and  black  night  rolled in
Then  ancient  hearts cried  “Day  shall come again”