I wish I were on Hutton Roof again The limestone and the little open flowers The sea at Arnside like a distant gem The spaciousness, like days with far more hours
I wish I were as agile now as then I’d climb the mountains, hills,the little lanes
Windermere below still winding on The handsome Lake the old man, Coniston
I wish I were in Dent, the curious shapes The hills and their deep mystery engross The height, the little river, the mistakes The lost loved man alive, to hold me closeI
I yearn to be on Hutton Roof today The holy smell of grass, the feel of air
I see a conservative MP is calling for us to pay for a visit to A&E or a doctor I wonder what will happen to someone having a heart attack who has no money? Will they have to turn them away? That’s what’s happening in the United States. Someone I know was having a miscarriage while she was on a long journey and she had to go to 3 hospitals before being admitted. She lost the baby
Who commands these viruses like flu? Consternation makes our hearts feel blue Do we have a lifeboat or an Ark? The situation does feel rather stark
Who decided we could work while sick? Our energy depleted , brains feel think Decisions so important need clear minds Not one both unravelling and blind
We travel round the globe, a virus ride Our garments are as louche as fratricide We snap some photos of the Golden Dome Then jump on a plane and turn to Rome
Why not stay in Britain or in France? The piper plays but only demons dance
We are in this boat together Sailing across the bay. Some have an easy voyage, The wind is blowing their way I wish I could always be sailing Across an ocean with you And never reach the other side though it may be in view. I want to see the sunrise Across the dappled sea. The ripples of the water Reveal a new world to me. One day this boat will reach the shore Unless destroyed by storm And I shall have to leave your arms Where I have been so warm. So just before we get there I wanted you to know That I shall always love you Wherever you may go.
Stan and Annie have been having such a lovely time since Mary went off ona 6 month lecture tour in Australia.
Stan has quite given up his addiction to microfiber cloths and polishing the windows.He and Annie can now make love at night and go out for trips in the day time.
Emile’s diary is getting quite full although he is worried he may be banned from sleeping on the foot of the bed soon as
he may be in their way.How will he know what they get up to?
Luckily there is a gap at the bottom of the door so he should be able to see them in the mirror opposite the bed.They usually light the bedside lamp so as to see into each other’s eyes.
Annie is a very bold,confident woman.Despite being rather plumper than is medically advised she loves her body and lives happily in it now she has true love.
One morning Stan goes down to make some tea whilst
Annie comes to.
“Stan,come here quickly!”
“What’s wrong,my little lamb chop?”
“I feel sick!”
“Was it those old sausages we ate up last night?”
“No,it’s a different sort of sick!”
“You don’t mean………..?”
“Yes,Stan,I’m afraid a miracle has happened!”
“But you are 55 and I’m 90.Surely we can’t have a baby!”
“Well,the ways of God are strange.” she murmured.
“I don’t want to bring God into it.” he riposted.
“Are you not pleased we are still fertile?” she asked him humorously.
“Well,in the abstract I might be but in the concrete it ould be Awkward.” he said furtively
“What do you mean?”
“Well,Mary will be coming back in a couple of months,you know”
“We don’t have to tell her you are the father.I could pretend it was the new Vicar at St Andrew’s”
“But he’s gay!”
“Not many men are able to resist my charms and skills.”
“I can believe that,”Stan answered lubriciously.
“But will you have to seduce him soon before he notices you are pregnant>”
“I wasn’t thinking of actually going to bed with him,”said Annie with a smile.
“Oh,dear.I was looking forward to that,”Emile murmured under his breath.”That would have made my diary into a best seller.Gay vicar seduces middle aged harlot who is now expecting.”
It sounds a bit like the old Bible stories except they had no vicars in those days.But miracles like older women bearing children did happen so…who knows?
Stan and Annie got dressed and went into the kitchen.
They were both looking confused.
“You don’t want an abortion do you?” he enquired tenderly.
“No way.” she replied softly. “I love you so much,I could not wish for more than to bear your child.~”
“In that case,I’ll tell Mary.She is a very wise woman in many ways,though a bit lacking in the earthier side life.She has not slept with me for thirty years or “Perhaps she thought you were too old?” said Annie.
“No,she never enjoyed it.She just put up with it as she wanted a baby.”
“Maybe you did not turn her on!”
“I did my best,but she preferred reading Proust and Wittgenstein.”
“I wonder of she has Asperger’s syndrome?”
“Well,they do find social life trying but I suppose she can’t blame you for loving another?”
“No,she’s very broadminded.I’ll suggest we all move in together.I’ll divorce her but she can have the big bedroom and we’ll have the guest room with the en suite.”
“I think this will be fun.”
“Well,not all of it but it will be intriguing,”
“So no need to seduce the Vicar,then?”
“We’ll leave him out of it.He might fall in love with you and then what would happen?”
“God only knows,”She answered humorously as she went into the kitchen to make a cup of coffee.
After church on Sunday Mary wanted to visit Stan , her dyint husband in the Rehabilitation Unit where he had been sent recently by a strange physiotherapist [instead of to a hospice?) He was unhappy as the diuretics made him pee even more often than he used to do and he got very worried about it because his bad heart made it extremely hard for him to walk. When she went into the 4 bed ward she saw Stan sitting on his chair without any pyjama trousers on even though it was visiting time from 3 to 8 pm. Why has he no trousers on? Mary asked a nurse angrily, her blue eyes full of glistening tears which almost washed off her turquoise mascara and made runnels in her honey beige foundation by Rommel of London ,Paris and Auschwitz He keeps wanting to go to the toilet so it’s easier for us all if he has no pants on,the nurse told her haughtily.He’s on diuretics,you see as he has water in his lungs and other inner organs and the water has to be removed from his body I know that
What about the lack of dignity in baring him to the world,Mary enquired softly yet piercingly her eyes dripping tears again. Dignity,what’s that? the nurse said insolently.It’s out of date like suits for men He is just a pest. And old men don’t deserve any attention.We are tired of them.They should all die now.That’s government policy too. Emile who had hidden in Mary’s old,but good olive green Radley leather handbag let out a sound like a banshee in Cork or a demon in a nightmare. The nurse looked as frightened as a gypsy in a train to Poland in 1941 What’s tha noiset? she whispered to Mary behind her hand. It’s probably Satan coming to say ” hello” to you as you seem very wicked to me. Mary informed her politely yet honestly in her Northern way. Oh my,what shall I do? the nurse asked in a trembling voice.I am so upset now. You could try reading the Ten Commandments,Mary riposted jocosely… if it’s not too late. Or recalling the Golden Rule……… I’ve never heard of the golden rule,said the nurse.Is it a measuring instrument of some unusual type? Yes,in a sense it is,Mary said.It measures us by our compassion towards others.And you seem to have none for Stan.Can you not imagine what it’s like being a man sitting half naked in a public room with no recourse? What’s a recourse,Sheila, the nurse, asked her thoughtfully,Is it a garment like a dressing gown? No,it’s a a source of help in a difficult situation.It’s a remedy or an option I have a higher degree in nursing,Sheila boasted stupidly. I don’t care if you have ten doctorates in nursing and philosophy,Mary cried.It’s what you do and say to the patients that counts.And going to an evening class in English would do you no harm.Your vocabulary is limited,to say the least.Words are useful whatever job you do.Or even if you are unemployed it helps you deal with bureaucrats Oh,dear,said the nurse,I am sorry for being so thoughtless.I am always thinking about sex,love,Putin,my boyfriend and my clothes instead of the patients.I see now I have fallen into evil ways and hope I can improve my behaviour and speech You have been cruel, said Mary.And seeing my aged husband like this is breaking my heart.Although it was cracked already She went over to Stan whose face was almost black, [when he was normally beige] and sat by him.He fell against her bosom hungrily.
Alas it was not for erotic reasons.His blood sugar was only 2 and his BP was 60/40.He was dying there with no trousers on and with no-one but Mary to help him… and Emile, their small intelligent black cat ,of course.Unfortunately Emile’s trousers were too small for Stan
.Mary wrapped a bath towel around Stan and held him in her arms. Stan tried to speak but Mary could not make out what he was saying. Tears ran down her beautiful oval face and dripped onto Stan’s head. I suppose one might say it was a kind of baptism by love. Now Stan will be entering a new dimension and will be given a new and better name by One who cannot be named here.But you catch my drift?
Soon Stan collapsed, his face went even blacker.Only then was he sent to a real hospital with full equipment.He died, looking happy, the next day.His last words “So many lovely friends” Emile was crying on Mary’s lap. Don’t worry Emile.He was very unhappy. So am I, Emile wept Then Mary wept herself. What a pity Emile is a cat and so cannot embrace the person he calls “Mother”
Judgement is mine says the Lord Though He is a total Mystery to Humankind
While the public, private and volunteer sectors in Britain are mobilizing to address loneliness, researchers are deepening their understanding of its biological underpinnings. In a paper published earlier this year in the journal Cell, neuroscientists at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology identified a region of the brain they believe generates feelings of loneliness. The region, known as the dorsal raphe nucleus, or D.R.N., is best known for its link to depression.
Kay M. Tye and her colleagues found that when mice were housed together, dopamine neurons in the D.R.N. were relatively inactive. But after the mice were isolated for a short period, the activity in those neurons surged when those mice were reunited with other mice.
Yet there was no Ukip when Benjamin Disraeli declared that the Irish “hate our order, our civilisation, our enterprising industry, our pure religion. This wild, reckless, indolent, uncertain and superstitious race have no sympathy with the English character.” It was no rotten apple but Winston Churchill, the Tory idol, who as prime minister pronounced: “I hate Indians. They are a beastly people with a beastly religion. The famine was their own fault for breeding like rabbits.” The Bengal famine of 1943 is widely estimated to have killed about 2 million people.
I draw these quotes from a new book, Racism and the Tory Party, by the sociologist Mike Cole. Far from being a mere slip of the tongue, racism, he argues, “has saturated the party from the beginning of the 19th century to the second decade of the 21st”. From Enoch Powell’s “rivers of blood” to Theresa May’s hostile environment, it courses through Tory history. And it is not just words. In its online safety bill, the government wants this week to make illegal any online video of people in small boats that shows such Channel crossing in a “positive light”.
I envy shy black people because they can blush secretly
And I envy Chinese people because they don’t go yellow when they feel sick
I envy Jewish people because they enjoy arguments.Yes that is too general a statement but don’t let’s argue about it. Unless you are Jesus Christ. Did Jesus
argue? Get the Bibles out.
I envy philosophers because they know what distinguishes an argument from a quarrel
I don’t want to be a Catholic because they believe in hell. Can you still go to hell even if you don’t believe in it
Why does nobody mention limbo anymore?
Why do I have to ask questions when other people know by intuition?
The gift of speech, so centrally employed, has been elaborated as much for the purpose of concealing thought by dissimulation and lying as for the purpose of elucidating and communicating thought.
Everything I break brings thoughts of you
And when I write, I wonder what you’d think
No-one else will criticise my work
And into the quicksands I seem to sink
I burned ten pans and broke a dozen plates
I even broke a vase in the cafe
I think of phrases subtle,erudite
Then lose them in the maelstrom of the day
I will learn to live with broken heart
As humans are not born with such spare parts
So my copse has ripened to a wood How many living creatures dwell within? The shades of green, the sunshine, and the Good
Once we had three apple trees,a glut Today, too old to fruit, they stand there still My copse has turned into a little wood
Neighbours hint that I get my trees cut Yet these leaves of green make my heart full The shades of green, the sun the wind ,the gods
Once we read there was a total Flood Now we have the bush fires and their will Still, my copse has turned into a wood
Trees have their green sap where we have blood They will never wound, will never kill The shades of green, the sun the wind ,the gods
Just like Eve and Adam we may sin The maple waves away my mental pain My copse has turned into my private wood The shades of green, the long path.Come, my Love.
Picasso: Got bored by a bull.
Elizabeth 1st:Died owing to not breathing any more
Monet:went dotty and fell into a deep bed of poppy seeds
Cezanne:Ate the wrong apple.
Mary Queen of Scots: lost her head.
Henry Moore:Got trapped in the Underground.
Michaelangelo:Fell of his ladder.
Manet:got confused with Monet and fell off his chair.
Kierkegaard:Trembled too much.
Bertrand Russell:Got stuck in a layer cake.
The White Queen:went grey and died of depression.
Pascal:His heart had too many reasons.
Descartes:He just stopped thinking one day.
Plato:The cave entrance got blocked by spammers .
Socrates:He tried to dial Ogg thrice and the phone box caved in.
Wittgenstein:Became too late for his own good
The Siren:replaced by a foghorn and died of boredom and rage
Salome:Her head fell into the washing up bowl
Delilah: was strangled by Samson’s hair.
Some evidence suggests that sensory nerves in and around the chest respond to the expansion of our lungs when we breathe and synchronise with brainwaves that help us to relax. But how slow to go? Most adults breathe normally at a rate of 12-16 breaths per minute, but researchers have suggested slowing to a frequency of around six exhalations per minute for restorative benefits.
As Mary got ready to go out,she realised she had not combed her hair.Where were the 24 combs she had bought from Amazon?Not in her delightful red and purple shoulder bag.She pondered over what to d0 1 Use the clothes brush 2.Try a nailbrush 3 Use her toothbrush 4.Look on the floor 5.Look in all the drawers in the house In the end she decided to pour some water over her head, put on some oil , then push her hair into the direction she wanted She put on her red dress with a pattern of little books all over, a favourite of Stan, her late husband.Her shoes were peach coloured in homage to some artist who liked clashing colours.He was not good as an artist except for this ability to find the worst possible colours to put together.So he is known as Ned the Red and Purple Suddenly the doorbell rang like a burglar alarm on heat.She opened the door and Dave the paramedic ran in What’s wrong,Dave, she asked I am being chased by a big Siamese cat,he replied. I can’t see any cats, she said in a kindly tone.Never mind,let me make you some coffee Before she could close the door a big and lovely cat ran in Who are you,Mary asked him? I am called Jeb, he told her.I like that man in the dress so I want to ask him to adopt me. OK said Dave.My cat died and I’ve been too sad to get another one.Are you able to sleep by me in bed Definitely, said Jeb.It hs been my life time desire All three sat down in the small but delightful orange and lime kitchen watching Emile climb a tree. I haven’t seen you lately,Dave said gently to Mary No,I went to the hairdresser and my hair is so short it looks as if I am having chemotherapy.Still it was nice to be cossetted and it won’t need much arranging or blow-drying. I suppose you could let the back grow before the winter,Dave told her Yes, at least my head is cooler for the summer.It was hot when I went there so I assumed that would carry on.But now it is colder. How about wearing a hat? Yes,I’ll ask Annie about that as she knows more about clothes than I ever shall The phone rang startling Jeb who had been living in a field Hello, this is Sister Mayflower from the bereavement group. Hello,Sister.How are you? I am worried because the other women were so unwelcoming.I have taken it over recently and recognise they are a closed group and it is 20 years since most of them were bereaved so they don’t want anyone to distress them by actually feeling sad. Don’t worry about me.I only came because Annie my neighbour saw an advert for it and I did it to please her. I see ,said Sr Mayflower.You can come to the Convent if you like.Just say Mayflower. Thank you very much.Bye , bye, said Mary Who was that, a nun? said Dave.Don’t tell me.I can guess,Several patients we’ve had have been there and were disappointed.They should call it tea and chat except they don’t want any one new to join even in that.Odd as it is a Church based on the teachings of Jesus.Love one another. Loving others may be harder than it sound,Mary mused dreamily i feel much better , she said.I am playing the piano every day.I met 3 friends for coffee and then went to the bookshop.I love sitting there looking at new books.And it’s nice not to have to cook every night Mary got up ;oh dear, her trousers fell down Good grief,Dave cried.You have lost weight and you are wearing red knickers!What next? Yes, said Mary.Don’t you like them? I am unsure.Shall I get some? Just get 1 pair and see how you feel.I got mine in the Market.Otherwise Marks do purple and green ones,Mary murmured Imagine all the old folk wondering around the town might be wearing purple and green knickers. said Dave.It must make washing hard as you can’t put them in the 60 degree wash. I never thought of that, cried Mary, her blue mascara running down her face. I’ve read some women wear a pair once and then throw them out Well, they could cut them up and use them as dusters,Dave mused. Why not just buy dusters and wear white or beige knickers? Life is hard enought without worrying about such trivia My mascara is melting because my eyes keep watering. Go and sit by the potted plants and let it fall on them,Dave said scientifically Don’t be ridiculous, she said unknowingly.
I think it is hayfever or the pollution in town.The traffic was like a plague of giant houseflies on wheels.All stuck still. Well flies don’t keep still,Dave said.If they did we would kill them I guess there’s an accident ” on the motorway so they send the cars down here.I wish they had kept the railways open as the roads are frightening with those big lorries with cars on the back.I used to be afraid one might fall off on us,Mary remininisced, when Stan drove me to the coast The door opened and in dashed Annie from next door.She wore a dark wine track suit with a pale pink T shirt matching her lipstick from Yves de Beauvoir McMorris of Paris and Wigan. Hi Dave she said.I love that dress,Is it from Marks? Yes, he answered.I like these cotton maxi dresses in hot weather. I can understand that ,she whispered.Trousers are hot and if you wash them they need ironing.People forget we sweat more in the heat That’s fortunate,Mary said.Otherwise we would die And so cry all of us except Jeb.Jeb never cries
My polyester trench coat looks real swell But inside it, I feel as hot as hell. And when the storm hit, I found out It is no raincoat, I have no more doubts.
Which of us desires to dress for war This is what the trench coat was made for. British soldiers on the battlefields Died in mud locked trenches for what yield?
Do we want to know the Middle East Was divided by the conquerors at their feast France and Britain split the old Empire We see from that the rise of Herr Hitler.
The war to end all wars is on stage yet. Go hang these trench coats round the scapegoat’s neck
How my heart speaks 