You know the widow’s sad and can mourn and grieve all day But the anger and the hatred,she’s not supposed to say She can cry upon the duvet, she can moan under the stairs But the rage and irritation are not to be declared She can order man size tissues in boxes multiplied But the venomous ,vindictiveness imply that love had died She can be dissociated, she can be without affect But if she says how well she hated him, everybody’s vexed Who can live so closely for forty and five years Without needing a dressmaker to sew up all the tears? Who can be accepting when money and time’s scarce There’s a war inside the heart of us everybody hears Scratched and bitten daily, struck by falling stars Who can come to help us from our warring hearts?
You stabbed my heart when I was left alone Telling me my writing was like porn Now you give me nightmares, be my pest We all need one or two,and you confessed
My writing is so bad, you envy not Did I hit you on a painful spot? If others have a gift, that is their call You have yours , get out a net and trawl
Ambivalent in love which turns to hate We wound ourselves in making this our fate Talking overmuch lets such thoughts out As tea will pour down from a tilted spout
The ancient virtues,patience and restraint Shall be our wise protectors when distraught
My room is warm and comforting and light This feels like kindness , brings my skin delight I remember being held in loving arms And soothed by songs as sweet as any balms Let the lamplight run across the eyes Let them soften to a wider gaze Let the hair be free from sprays too strong Let the skin enclose us softly like a song We can’t deny the skin is often pricked Or beaten by a parent who’s too strict More fragile than a leaf from any tree This frail membrane is our boundary Floating into sleep in reverie I lose myself while God imagines me
Your eyes are sharp as razors boiled in wrath It’s easy to provoke but less to soothe My hair is protein, do not rip it off
You think you are above us yet we laugh Your hair curls tightly. men don’t like it smooth Your eyes are sharp as razors boiled in wrath
Though my hair is tangled I’ve no moths I have no lice, nor eggs,so do not brood My hair is protein, do not cut it off
You’ll catch nineteen germs if someone coughs Stay in Lockdown, banish those who feud Your eyes are sharp as needles boiled in wrath
,
Take your steely look and make it love Our eyes can with such kindness be imbued My hair is protein,I must be a Goth
Life is wasted when we start to feud Or stick like needles in the rounded gtoove Your eyes are sharp as hawks sent up in wrath O tragic world,men hate more than they love
There is at least one kind of utility that a poem can embody: ambiguity. Ambiguity is not what school or society wants to instill. You don’t want an ambiguous answer as to which side of the road you should drive on, or whether or not pilots should put down the flaps before take-off. That said, day-to-day living—unlike sentence-to-sentence reading—is filled with ambiguity: Does she love me enough to marry? Should I have sex with him one more time before I dump him?
But such observations still don’t tell us much about what a poem really is. Try crowd-sourcing for an answer. If you search Wikipedia for “poem,” it redirects to “poetry”: “a form of literary art which uses aesthetic and rhythmic qualities of language—such as phonoaesthetics, sound symbolism, etc.” Fine English-professor speak, but it belies the origins of the word. “Poem” comes from the Greek poíēma, meaning a “thing made,” and a poet is defined in ancient terms as “a maker of things.” So if a poem is a thing made, what kind of thing is it?
Mary was sitting in her coral and teal kitchen wondering if she needed some new clothes.The weather had been unusually warm and she had forgotten where she had put her summer dresses.A “special place” is easily forgotten A crash in the hall meant the post had come.Here was Lands End sale catalogue Mary began to look through it though there not many summer clothes and shorts did not suit her Then she found a lovely blue dress with a draped front Annie, her neighbour, tapped on the door and came in, a very lovely sight in her orange striped shift dress with matching lipstick and shoes Hey, Annie, what do you think of this blue dress? Annie had lost her contact lenses so she peered at the description
Elegant 3/4 sleeve dress with Exposed statement back zip
1The zip sounds weird,hard for a woman to so up,Annie said Is it to attract men, she coninued? Well, if a man undid it while I was at a dinner party I would be embarrassed,Mary cried So would the man,said Annie, when he saw you were not wearing a camisole nor a bra I suppose it’s a kind of flirting or teasing. Mary murmured softly. She was ignorant of such things since studying Schrodinger’s equation and his dog. But it’s not an invitation to bare me to the four winds Well, this is the problem,Annie enthused.To some men it would be preciely that.Not to mention gay women The most odd thing is that Lands End sell more sporty casual clothes If it were made of towelling you could swim in the river and then put it on, Annie rambled like an old lady who drank too much brandy I could put it on anyway but would you like a zip on your naked flesh, asked Mary in her jocose yet feminine way? No,I like soft fluffy things on my naked flesh Well, please don’t mate with a rabbit,Mary ordered I only want a merino wool or cashmere cardigan and I can’t mate with that. Don’t you know I am 103? No, you are 73, Mary said correctly.I think we should call 999 and see what Dave the skilfull paramedic thinks about the dress What a waste,mewed Emile who was hiding inside a large copper pan.With so many people ill it would be wrong. Since when have you studied Ethics,Annie asked him You don’t need to go to Magdalen College to know wasting NHS money is wrong Well, he keeps us sane and that saves money, she retorted. You can’t grumble, the vet is expensive and he doesn’t call to make us tea, Nor does he drive to Barnard Castle to test his hearing aids. So true Soon Dave ran in wearing a new sundress made of gingham That looks stunning,Annie told him I made it myself, he said, smiling Well,we would like some.Mary haa mislaid all her dresses. I’ll bring some patterns round.Dave answered shyly Maybe when Boris Johnson resigns We can’t wait.Look at this dress Lands End are selling It looks uncomfortable Dave repied.Why not wear a sheet with a leather belt to keep it secure? Why not indeed? You may get complaints from the neighbours And so say all of
The music is the waves as they run high Across the pebbly sands onto the road Then groaning of the shingle as waves die
The fish that dwell deep in the dark, dark brine The flow within as outer waters flow The music of the waves as they run high
The moon reflects sun’s light to other eyes Above the seas which rise up to its goad. Then groans the shingle as the steep waves die
The sea holds hidden goods where we can’t pry In the deep the heavy water moulds The music of the waves as they run high
All the day and all of the black night The seas and oceans change from high to low Ah, groans the earth as each wave has to die
Re-hear these sounds, are they a sacred code? As angels wrestled, Jacob feared the Lord His music is the waves as they run high His groaning is the shingle as waves die
The guardian newspaper has now entered the realms of ridiculous fashion.
Three different outfits in case you’re invited to lunch by the opposite sex or the same sex are carefully drawn and pictured sovthat for me to meet you for lunch next Monday it will be £750 pounds for me to get the right outfit to wear. It’s not just for clothes it’s the jewelry and the shoes as well.
If I had 750 pounds to spend on clothes I would spend a major part of it on getting a very very warm woolen coat. Then I would spend less on getting some skirts or trousers or jumpers..
We are recommended to buy a winter coat for £167 but it is not wool I think it’s partly or largely man-made fibers and they are not warm. This is quite stylish but surely warmth is the priority for most of us. I was being a very bad temper if I met you wearing that coat and not my ancient woolen coat or even my down coat from a sale which is very very warm indeed.
It’s like being several different plays in one day for which we have to have different costumes and I don’t know how many of the population have enough money to even buy one outfit for the winter let alone a different one for lunch for dinner for going to work for going to church to the synagogue or the mosque. Don’t forget the temple and don’t forget that most people in England do not go to worship on Sunday morning or any other time.
I feel as if it’s like the Titanic that we’re all madly invited to wear all sorts of different outfits as we lead the frenzied dancing into hell.
On Saturday afternoon after luncb ,or midday dinner as we said up north Mary began to feel very nervous, as she was going to the hospital with Stan on Monday for his next appointment with Dr.Range Rover. Mary was puzzled.She felt almost happy last week about seeing this kind hearted and gracious well dressed female doctor.However she had been shunted sideways onto a male doctor who was almost totally silent.. so much so that he seemd to absorb Mary’s questions into his sponge of a brain without feeling the need to respond,just like many British husbands do… and it may be a universal trait in men world wide if they had a British style education Why do I feel so apprehensive this week? Mary asked her dear black cat Emile. After all.I was happy to see her or to even have a biopsy last weekend.Why have I changed in my feelings so much in a week? Does it matter? purred Emile. Maybe your mood is affected by something else.. like fatigue or housework or the ravages of age… [he was well read] We don’t always know why we feel a certain way but I feel it’s good if we are willing to accept these negative moods.Even I have my moods when the fish you get me is not the right sort and you don’t give me my cat’s handkerchief neatly ironed. You are so wise,Emile,especially as,being a cat,you never have to endure these interviews with consultants in horrible outpatients clinics.So you must have a wonderful empathy for humans This lady doctor tomorrow is exciting me,cried Emile loudly.May I come in your Grace Kelly handbag. What’s wrong with my shopping bag?Good grammar,by the way.. Well,she wil be surprised if you take a heavy shopping bag even if it has a Mondrian design on it… she may get suspicious.. even paranoid.If I am in your handbag she will not realise. Not unless you miaow,mused Mary benignly as she smiled down at him her singular eyes gleaming like the headlamps on a Roller. I like to know the reason for things,she continued somewhat frantically.I think therefore I might be eventually.I am not yet,for sure. Does everything have a reason,shouted Stan querulously from the hall… Wel ,it does,but it might be beyond human understanding like the Burning Bush.. We can only perceive what our language permits unless we are poets,mystics or artists and even then it’s tough to venture into the unknown,unthought or unknowable;languages develop in societies and learning your language embeds you in many cultural assumptions without you ever realising it.You think it’s reality when it is just one perspective. How true,screeched Annie their neighbour from outside the open patio door.She stopped there in her teal velour tracksuit with matching eyeshadow and trainers. You seem to be overthinking,she said to Mary.Are you sickening with the heat?It’s like loving too much, which may be co-dependency. That’s a very silly pc word,said Stan rudely.We are all dependent but men can hide it until their wives run away with the milkman and they get a shock not knowing how much they’d miss her changing the sheets and buying their underpants and socks.And ironing their hankies Surely that’s not the main reason a man might miss his wife,cried Mary as she carried in the tea tray with a big white insulated teapot. Well,you can go on the web and find a virtual sex partner or even buy a dummy woman. but it’s tough to find a devoted woman who knows what you need to function. Why don’t you buy your own underwear and use tissues?,asked Emile Well,Emile,I put out the rubbish and wash the heavy Le Creuset pot.I see to the car and bikes.I paint the fence and even bake cakes. Mary washes the clothes and changes the sheets unless she has an idea to write down.She kindly does all the worrying for both of us and I remain calm like a lighthouse.We complement each other ideally.. and we love each other and a few others as well..without giving away our secrets That’s one waay of describing it,thought Mary without commenting out loud Anyway,I am still wondering why I feel nervous about Dr Range Rover…. If you accepted the nervusness it might ease,said Annie wisely in her high voice like a car siren going off at night Just then the doorbell rang.It was Dave the bisexual transvestite paramedic. Emile phoned 999 saying Mary was having kittens, he said rapidly.This really must stop;inter species sex is not allowed here unlike most sexual activity He was speaking metaphorically or is it metonymically,Stan groaned. Now you are here go and make us a fresh pot of tea and admire my new tea caddy.I bought it for Mary last week in that new shop in town. At your service,sir,Dave said politely,his flowered dress waving in the breeze. Do you know anything about Dr Range Rover,Dave? Annie murmured What is her reputation etc Some people like her, Dave said,Usually men.she’s not so good with women.. Well it’s too late to change thought Mary so I shall have to willingly endure the agony of meeting her again as I cannot leave Stan on his own with her… why who knows what might happen? She might become his mistress as he likes several nowadays. despite nearly being too thin to live… God only knows, a little voice said. Hello,said Mary.I’ve not heard from you lately. Well,I am still here looking after you Thank you, Lord,I love you, Mary shouted joyfully to the surprise of Stan and Annie, not to mention the cat Emile who was unlearned in the religion of his owners. I thought you were an atheist,Annie said with horror. I am an atheist and I believe in God.It’s what we call a paradox..Mary cried graciously…. What would Wittgenstein have said? Whereof one cannot understand,therof one must be patient and tolerant,. Why does Mary need to understand all her feelings…Stan wondered When it’s raining she doesn’t spend hours wondering why and similarly if it’s raining in her heart she must take it like parched grass…she thinks too much. Too much for what? Her sanity perhaps which has at times been doubtful but that has made her very understanding to those who find life hard.Everyone has value,even oveweight nervous half blind, supersensitive, vulnerable,stout arthritic female mathematical geniuses like Mary.She enriches the tapestry of life in a very real sense as someone once said And so say all of us:she’s a jolly good Fellow of All Proles College,Oxenford..you know how famous it is in Wonderland
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 We wrestle with our indecision When low sun drops and the night rolls in But now , new stricken by the dread of sin Who protects us from derision? Our ancient mind fears day won’t come again When we sleep we’re entertained within Bold dreams squander all illusion When sun drops the darkest night rolls in In reverie we’re loved and hearts open Then fancy turns to full communion The ancient mind fears day won’t come again Yet despite fear, our sacred life began When sperm leaped up in proud confusion. When deep sun dropped and a new night rolled in All human hearts cried,Day shall come again”
Our life is like a shell upon the shore, tossed up by squally,salty,shivering sea To shrink inside is safe,yet we want more, To make,to love,to see,at last to be. A shell, though tough, is made to open out; To give the living core its chance to grow Towards the new we each must shed our doubt. Every myth and story say it’s so.. Impregnable,that home had seemed to be To the tiny creature growing in its heart#. Yet thrown by winds across the rolling sea The slender cage must open and let part. Protection can be prison to the soul. So we crack our outgrown shells, desiring all
Across the road I see a Tudor wall In its cracks defiant flowers grow The modern traffic sounds out a loud wail From the East a freezing wind still blows
In between the natural world and man The space provides a habitat,retreat Ancient yew trees grow without a plan And in each little bird a heart still beats
Concentrating on the green and ancient views Ignoring the red buses as they pass Ignoring strident music , find the clues Down comes peace and joy, our Holy Mass
Reversal of the figure and the ground Brings out a new world where love is found
When love is nothing but a word, When our deep feelings can’t be shared. When joy and woe unwoven lie When we can’t speak, except to sigh….. When we are lost behind the glass, When burdened feelings never pass, When noone is a trusted friend When we are scared but cannot bend. When love embodied goes away When we are numbed but cannot say. When we are rigid with the strain. When life has little but such pain We suffer as our will has gone And we’ve no task to lure us on. We need to know we’re not alone That love can penetrate a stone. That like the Christ we rise to life When we endure with will its strife. When we accept that all is lost, But wish to live despite the cost. Then we are saved as are the flowers Which decorate the fields and bowers Though all shall crumble into dust, While we’re alive we’ll slake our lust.
We drove across the Pennines East to West Hoping to extend our holiday Snow fell down till once black crags were dressed
Imagination should foresee such tests Fierce as polar storms ,as mad as prayer w drove across the Pennines East to West
We passed through Bakewell did not stop to rest Buxton was far worse with snow like may Snow fell strongly ,oh wild crags were dressed
See these visions, travel if you must See the sea freeze .see ice in Lyme Bay We drove across Great Britain East to West
Now it’s North to South as Brexit asked Hear the people swear and curse and bray Snow fell till the people lost all zest
Now my love has gone, the car’s not here Crushed to a flat metal I can’t steer We drove across the Pennines and we laughed The sheep stared out, the crows cawed at half mast
Pray Father give me your blessing
Good grief, a real Catholic at last
Why, are there artificial ones?
No they just have terrible memories
Of trauma?
No, they don’t know what a sacrament is.
But surely how we act is more vital
I don’t know, it’s so long since I was in the cemetery
Do you mean the cement factory?
Why would I mean that?
Don’t ask me,I’m just a human being
I mean the seminary, of course.I remember now.
Do you know the seven deadly sins?
Not biblically
They are in the Bible… murder.envy, hatred
Yes, I was joking.I am celibate officially.
But what are you really?
I am asexual.
Do you have no desire?
I love people but I have no need to go to bed with them
No, we do it on the floor at home
Are you married?
Yes,definitely.She is a red head.
I thought you might say Red Indian
We have very few living in Stoke on Trent.
Where is that?
On the river Trent.
But that goes through Nottingham
So?
I thought Stoke was West of the Pennines
Yes, the Trent flows up one side and down the other.
That is a lie
Thank you.
Since my last Confession I have lied twice
What was the other lie?
I am not a Catholic
So why come here?
I am lonely and it’s bad for me so I thought Saturday night Catholics go to Confession
It’s not exactly fun.Why not go to the pub and pick up a woman?
Are you really a priest?
No,I was feeling lonely too
What a pity we are not bisexual
Well, we could learn
I thought it was genetic?
Do you mean generic
I don’t know.You mean like,buy paracetomol not panadol?
Genetic is totally different.
Am I a generic human or a dressed up, artificial and stunning person?
Why artificial?
I can’t act natural.
Try!
But if I try it’s not natural.
Was that my penance listening to you?
It could have been.Say a little prayer for me as well
So you do believe?
Why not? It’s better than dying of meaninglessness
You so seem very clever
How kind.
I’ll see you next week.
Hennetwistle has a railway stop The name is Viking now it’s usually spelled Entwistle, where reservoirs fill up Manchester wants water, here it’s held
Too Thirlmere is an artificial lake For tea in Manchester, those thirsty folk How much more d’ye think that they will take? Hamlets drowned, dull cypress trees that cloak
I once passed through Darwen on a train On the way to Ilkley with my aunt No memory of bliss with me remains Except the flowers so wild, their ghosts still haunt
Yet nowhere else gives me the feel of home This landscape is my body and my soul
The north is a closely knit, indigenous, industrial society,” he said. “A homogeneous cultural group with a good record for music, theatre, literature and newspapers, not found elsewhere in this island, except perhaps in Scotland.” He added, with a wry smile, “And, of course, if you look at a map of the concentration of population in the north and a rainfall map, you will see that the north is an ideal place for television.”
Rivington Pike Tower. Photograph: Alamy
The mast is only a little higher than three older landmarks. Most walkers catch their breath at the Grade II-listed Rivington Pike Tower, built as a hunting lodge in 1733 on the site of an older beacon. Another focal point, a little further down, is the Pigeon Tower – built by William Hesketh Lever (aka Lord Leverhulme) as a birthday present to his wife, Ellen. The tower and the terraced gardens it overlooks were part of Lever’s private estate, landscaped by Thomas Mawson between 1905 and 1925.
The third landmark, the Two Lads Cairn, is a pile of stones on Crooked Edge Hill, large enough to resemble a tower from certain angles. Conflicting legends say the lads were two Saxon princes, two sons of a bishop, or two children employed at a mill.
If the summits of our more celebrated peaks have a generally middle-class atmosphere – the technical gear, the smart gizmos, the “hydration” drinks – the top of Winter Hill felt everyday, multi-generational, multi-ethnic and communal. This was especially fitting, given the hill’s role in our nation’s rambling history.Pigeon Tower, which was built by William Hesketh Lever (aka Lord Leverhulme). Photograph: Ruaux/Alamy
In August 1896, Colonel Richard Henry Ainsworth, scion of a wealthy family that had made its fortune in the bleaching trade and resident of Smithills Hall, decided to close a well-used track that crossed his land on the south-east slope of Winter Hill. His business’s reliance on the hill’s watercourses had perhaps given him a proprietorial outlook. Moreover, he regarded walkers – whether tramping to work or heading up there for a breath of clean air after a week’s slog in factory, mine or mill – as unwanted intruders on land he used for grouse-shooting. He had his gamekeepers turn people back and build a gate on Coalpit Road to show the way was closed. A melee ensued, but the colonel’s private army was no match for the great mass of demonstrators
Local people took umbrage at Ainsworth’s decision. Cobbler Joe Shufflebotham, secretary of Bolton Social Democratic Foundation, advertised a march up the disputed road, which won support from journalist and Liberal party radical Solomon Partington. On Sunday 6 September 1896, about 10,000 people joined in the march as it progressed along Halliwell Road through a densely populated working-class district, and up the hill track. A handful of police and gamekeepers were waiting for them at the new gate. A melee ensued, but the colonel’s private army was no match for the great mass of demonstrators; the gate was smashed and the procession continued. When the victorious party arrived at their destination, Belmont, on the north side of Winter Hill, they drank the hostelries dry.
The Bolton Journal reported that “the multitude far exceeded what had been anticipated … the road was literally a sea of faces and the multitude comprised thousands of persons of all ages and descriptions”. During that fervid September, there were three weekend marches and one on a Wednesday, the only day shopworkers were free to join. There was a further march on Christmas Day.
Despite the numerical success of the popular uprising, Ainsworth had writs issued against Shufflebotham, Partington and others. The marches were stopped while the case was heard in court. The colonel won, leaving the marchers to bear the costs. The tail of the trial was long: though locals were able to use the path from the 1930s, it wasn’t until 1996 that public access was formally secured.
The massed march (the walkers wouldn’t have thought of it as a “trespass”) of 1896 has never been accorded anything like the attention given to the 1932 march up Kinder Scout, led by Manchester communist Benny Rothman, which is usually credited with leading to the creation of the UK’s national parks.
“Although the march was a massive event, it was very local, only involving people who lived within two or three miles,” says Bolton-based historian and author Paul Salveson, an expert on the Winter Hill events. “That, and the fact they lost the case, might explain why it’s not better known, though it did lead to greater awareness about rights of way in the Bolton area. The first world war led to the slaughter of many of the participants and brought the curtain down on so many working-class activities. When I met Benny [Rothman] for the Kinder Scout 50th anniversary in 1982 he had never heard of Winter Hill.”
View of landscape around Rivington Pike. Photograph: Alamy
Paul has written a book about the march and was involved in commissioning a play for the first commemoration, back in 1982. His most recent publication, Moorlands, Memories and Reflections, celebrates the countryside writing of dialect writer and radical thinker Allen Clarke, who wrote about the march and penned the stirring song about the Winter Hill protest, Will Yo’ Come O’ Sunday Mornin’?
A memorial stone to the marchers stands on Coalpit Lane. But, unless you go looking for it, you could walk for miles around without seeing any record of the historic clash. Just as most drivers ignore Winter Hill, so many walkers miss the glorious story of their recreational space.
This year – the 125th anniversary of the march – things might at last be about to change. Bolton Socialist Club, the Ramblers, the Woodland Trust, housing association charity Bolton at Home and other community organisations and unions have joined forces for a commemorative march along the original route for the weekend of 6 September. Folk singer Johnny Campbell is releasing a single for the occasion. There’s even talk of a new memorial, to be built by a local quarrying company.
“The events of 1896 showed how important the countryside was to working-class people in the north,” says Salveson. “It still is. This year’s celebration of those momentous events 125 years ago isn’t just a reminder of Britain’s biggest-ever rights of way demonstration. It’s intended to be a rallying call that the countryside is still under threat, with rights of way being eroded and inappropriate development threatening the landscape.”
• Join in the 125th anniversary events via Facebook
How my heart sings 