How poetry can be of help in this difficult world

In this fast-moving technological world, lines of poetry can be food for the soul and help people with mental illness

Joanna Moorhead

How can learning poetry by heart help us to be more grounded, happy, calm people? “Let me count the ways,” says Rachel Kelly, who has suffered from anxiety. Whenever she’s feeling wobbly, she finds reciting lines of poetry is grounding, validating and connects her to others who have felt as she is feeling in this moment. And it’s something we can all do: poetry we’ve learned to recite means we have another voice inside us that’s always there, a kind of on-board first responder in times of psychological need

Emotional security

Winchcombe

We may sink we will be secure when we are totally self-relian the but t don’t feel secure because of that maybe because it is impossibe as we all depend on many other people in our society but should you try to minimise the number of people you can rely on?

Mostly it is mutual and some will be relying on you.

We generally feel most secure when we have a numbernumber of people with whom we have a mutual friendship whether it’s in the flesh whether it’s people far away but we can phone them or email them. We need other people who will tell us their opinion of what we are doing and who are trustworthy. We might like someone who will accompany us to the hospital or a shopping trip or excursion. If we don’t drive we need a reliable bus service and reliable minicab firm.

When we been hurt by people we might withdraw but it’s best if that’s the temporary because we all need each other.

When red sun drops

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  sun  drops and night  rolls darkly in
But now , new stricken by   a dread of sin
Who shall aid  the souls   derision?
Our  ancient minds fears   day won’t come again
When  we sleep we we’re entertained within
Deft dreams squander all illusion
When the sun  drops and  the night  rolls in
In reverie we’e loved  and  so  open
Then  fancy turns to full communion
While ancient minds fear   day wont come again
And so  it was that our own life began
When sperm leaped up in  proud confusion.
When  deep sun  dropped and  a   new night  rolled in
When  ancient  hearts cried Day  shall come again”

Angina

I have had unstable angina for 16: years

I was resting at 3 pm when the other nurse who is senior burst in so the door to hit the wall shouting

She barged so the door crashed wall and shouted

Where is that GTN spray?

I said in the little bag I wear all day

She asked to see it

Then shouted,so you use this if you feel anxious?

She took the spray saying she would bring it back but she did it not

I had said you use when the pain starts so as to widen the arteries

That would put me at risk of a cardiac arrest.

I was told by the next nurse I could not have it even if I was in severe pain,

They would haave to ring 999

I felt shocked and terrified so much so I couldn’t stop howling

I know the rules

Weirdly the doctor sent a new one and the nurse gave it me on Saturday,

On Monday the cruel one bursts 6in.be shouting and threatening me

I refused to give it back and again I broke down feeling humiliation and and

She came back and shouted stop that

My arms were trembling a lot 

 But I couldn’t stop them.Its the stress hormones

My sister was coming.

She called the Manager who said the doctor had said they should keep it and I should ask if needed

I refused again

Last

Yesterday I had an attack in the night and the nurse was on another floor

My poor sister Her daughter in law has got brain cancer and she only learned on the day before.L only just had breast cancer

Her face looked swollen with tears then they had a. 5 hour hour drive home

Now the interesting part

I phoned the BHF but rang off

But they reported it to the Social Services as they were worried

Somebody has been to talk me

How to Cope When Everything Keeps Changing

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/09/07/smarter-living/how-to-cope-when-everything-keeps-changing.html

But operating from a place of fear doesn’t allow us to tap into our full cognitive abilities, said Margie Warrell, a leadership expert and the author of “You’ve Got This!: The Life-Changing Power of Trusting Yourself.”

Ever Wanted to Get Revenge? Try This Instead

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/07/19/smarter-living/how-to-turn-toxic-emotions-into-positive-actions.amp.html

Retribution ties you back to the person you’re trying to get payback from, instead of turning on your heel and walking away,” Ms. Streep said. “Revenge keeps you focused on the mistreatment and doesn’t allow you to move forward and redirect your life.”

The need for evidence

When I read the newspapers or what’s the television I come across articles that claim large numbers of people are better off on benefits then they are working. And then I go on to say that most people prefer to sit around on their fat bums doing nothing

Why do people believe things and spread these stories without having any evidence? This is one of the main things that is affected society in the last 10 years

. If Facebook says something is true or if your friend next door says it’s true then you don’t feel the need to have any sometimes I am wondering whether people know what evidence is.

One step up from that if to say yes the benefits are not very large but if you were intelligent you will be able to budget properly and maje6 cheat meals from lentils and beans bread breast of lamb pigs feet

Neck of mutton, cheap minced beef etc. Don’t you think that these people will tell everybody else what to do or who believe they can live on fifty pence a day and feed a family of four should find out how much benefit they would get and then try and living on it

I’ve been lucky to have a job but when I was a student I remember being invited out for a meal one evening and it was very good food and after it was over I thought to myself so that’s what was wrong with me I was hungry.

You can lose contact with your body when you can’t afford to eat or drink or have the heating on and then you don’t realise that you need food. I used to have an egg on toast and a carton of yoghurt for my main meal and the Weetabix for breakfast with some milk and probably sugar

The only positive thing about this you don’t put weight on in fact you will lose weight especially if you ride a bicycle.

I do wish that people knew we need for evidence for our beliefs or theories

What is the most unpleasant thing is knowing that your children are hungry and that you haven’t got any more food for them. Or that you can eat something that takes meal but it is not what is best for you especially now that eggs are more expensive than normal and so are dairy products.

Tarmac. cobbles, flat slabs  of grey stone

Did   the earth weep when we paved the streets
Tarmac. cobbles, flat slabs  of  grey stone
Leaving  merely holes for trees long roots?

Covering in our cities all that’s deep
Startling ancient graves and  bits of bone
Did the earth weep when we paved the streets?

Motorways  increased that tarmacked  roof
As we drive  our ruinous cars    alone
Leaving  there no holes for trees long roots

In the hidden depths beneath our feet
Live the riches, seeds  awaiting growth
Did the earth weep when we paved the streets?

As the trees bloom  we see our deceit
We want it all  but do not pay nor mourn
Leaving  there  small holes for trees long roots

Once an orchard, now  so sterile,  torn
The gardens   became car parks  bleak, forlorn
Did   the earth  quake when we paved the streets
Leaving  merely holes for trees long roots?

 

 

 

Anticipatory grief

https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/bb053734-71f2-11eb-bd2f-f33f509764cd?shareToken=e895a944b1abb6f1529f298b5e469ecd

DThe point of Esther Rantzen: Living with Grief was to show that everybody grieves in their own way; the pain is bespoke. As a documentary it was, sadly, perfectly timed. Death has topped the news every day for the past year. “How many dead today?” people are used to asking as if inquiring about the weather. But what of the bereaved relatives left behind when we move on to the next daily statistic? The people who now have grief as a constant pillion passenger and are

Low thyroid affects your mental health

https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/a5296722-ac97-11e9-84cf-31ddba0e0fae?shareToken=3ed82f35f6ae546eacaf7311836b60c5

Many symptoms of psychological dysfunction have been described with hypothyroidism. Those symptoms most commonly related to thyroid deficiency include forgetfulness, fatigue, mental slowness, inattention, and emotional lability. The predomin

Identifying as white

Where is reading about the census of 2021 I noticed it in London

the number identifying as white was quite low

This language wonder weather I I could identify as black although biologically I am white. It is similar to the gender identification where white woman can identify as a white man

Then could they identify as black ?

Q

Love was,oh,so long ago.

 

Waxy flowers poking through
Snow so white
Flowers bright.
Made me think of you.

I see once more yoursweet white hair,
Soft as snow
On pillow.
Now my bed is bleak and bare

,
Face alight,flower to sun,
I loved you.
Love so  true.
Fear by love was overcome.

Cyclamen in  the snow,
Pink and red,
Now frozen,dead.
Love was,oh,so long ago.

But never gone from in my mind.
Thoughts so deep,
Upwards seep.
Love was gentle,love was kind
And always in my mind

Emile sings

Fish,fish wonderful fish…
Nothing so tasty gets onto my dish.
I live on Whiskas and milk and cold tea.
They don’t know I drink it to help me to pee.
Milk, milk,I love it well.
Mother’s was best,but, oh,what the hell!
I drink it at night,to send me to sleep.
I feel so nervous when Stan’s old sheep bleats.
I sleep with Stan and he’s very kind.
I lean on his legs to help me unwind.
When he’s got company, I stay outside.
I look through a mirror and blimey,I spied
Stan was cuddling a lady who was totally nude!
You would not believe the strnge sights I have viewed.
He was quite naked but I’m used to that.
He has no bosom…………..men are quite flat!
Mice, mice, mice are so nice!
Mince the left overs and serve with boiled rice!
Do you need puddings…we never do.
Some cats like chewing their master’s old shoe!
Drink,drink let me imbibe
Nothing quite like it for aiding  the Scribe
Bed,bed,I lie up there
I find beds are better than Mary’s new chairs
Sleep,dream, the angels will care
I do it often, so I shall go there

Susan Neiman

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Susan_Neiman

If you would like to know more start with this Wikipedia entry

Born and raised in Atlanta, Georgia, Neiman dropped out of high school to join the anti-Vietnam War movement. Later she studied philosophy at Harvard University, earning her Ph.D. under the direction of John Rawls and Stanley Cavell. During graduate school, she spent several years of study at the Free University of Berlin. Slow Fire, a memoir about her life as a Jewish woman in 1980s Berlin, appeared in 1992. From 1989 to 1996 she was an assistant and associate professor of philosophy at Yale University, and from 1996 to 2000 she was an associate professor of philosophy at Tel Aviv University. In 2000 she assumed her current position at the Einstein Forum in Potsdam.

What does serious mean?

What do you think of when you hear the word ‘serious’? The dictionaries are double-edged. They list synonyms like stern, unsmiling, grim, dour and humourless, but also earnest, genuine, wholehearted, committed, resolute. ‘Meaning what one says or does’ is one definition; ‘concerned with grave, important or complex matters’ is another”

Susan Neiman

Noise cancelling earbuds

https://quieton.com/noise-cancelling-earbuds/

Studies have shown that constant background noise is one of the most significant factors in stressing us out in the first place. Read into the subject more thoroughly here.

Before tossing the air con out the window or snapping your work mate’s pen in two, you might want to consider calling maintenance and asking nicely. If that doesn’t help, there are other remedies. No matter if your concentration is bugged by apparent noise disturbances or you’re exposed to more subtle yet constant background noise, the question is whether a noise management solution is for you and if so, what kind?

Not yet anyway

The dentist wants to charge in advance in

case I die in the chair

Surely it’s not electric?

Not the first time apparently.

Is it not murder?

I don’t know I’ve never been murdered 

Have you ever committed suicide?

That’s murder too 

So that’s a No?

Yes

A day in the life of Mary

Mary was getting dressed on a wet October morning.The cycling
shorts she had never worn alone made a warm extra layer under her green cotton trousers.On top she wore a red tunic and also some green plastic earrings.

She saw Annie who had just rung the door bell very hard

My goodness,Mary,you look different.Where on earth did you get those earrings? she said enviously

I made them, myself out of the little tops of those plastic milk containers from the supermarket.

I say,you’re not that poor are you?Anne asked her kindly

It’s not what is real,it’s how you feel,Mary replied poetically as she sometimes enjoyed a bit of fun and teasing a friend gently.

No,said Annie it’s It’s not what you feel,it’s what is real.

And how do we know what is real?Mary asked her with deep curiosity her eyes glowing in a deep shade of teal blue as she had drunk some pina colada in the night.

Well,I know you had a moderately good job so you must have more than just your state pension.You may be giving more than a tithe to Charity.Is that wise?

No,Mary cried,but I want to…I like to do it.

Oh,dear,Annie said.By the way you will need a coat,it’s much colder.I hope you’ve not given all your coats to Oxfam like Stan once did with his shoes.

Thanks,Mary smiled with her voice.I still have twenty two coats of all colours,A bit like Joseph in the Bible.

At the bus stop Mary met Tom who lived round the corner in a semi detached villa with a an extension,conservatory and downstairs shower room tiled dark scarlet and mauve..He had fallen over again and bruised his face but still looked handsome with his dark hair and blue and yellow spotted Irish eyes.

Maybe you need to pick up your feet more,Mary whispered to him cautiously
What a strange expression that is,.I wonder who invented it.It’s amazing how wise our ancestors were.They invented writing and cooking and philosophy.We are going backwards.

Thus Mary passed her day,talking to friends and musing on the meaning of words and sentences. and making herself jewellery from mundane objects she noticed on her walks.Not to mention cleaning the front door knob and putting all her old Xmas cards into bags for recycling.

Since from the natural numbers 1,2,3,4,…… we can get to the strange transcendental numbers pi and e and the fact that there are different orders of infinity does that prove God exists,she asked Tom plaintively.Well,not prove,but suggest.

I don’t know what you are on about,honey,he responded.Nobody ever saw pi in a burning bush although I have seen pies burn in a halogen oven more than once
That is a totally different order of reality,she told him sweetly.

Wow,Mary, many men don’t like extremely clever women you know.

Which men are those ? she asked wonderingly, as her peaches and cream complexion glowed with health and beauty like no-one since the Queen of Sheba.

I suppose I don’t mind brilliant womenmyself,he said,.it’s possibly because men need to feel superior otherwise they lose their confidence. and then they are in big trouble.
But what about women’s confidence Tom reflected further to himself

Maybe women don’t need confidence so desperately much,Mary sighed sweetly
They looked at each other and smiled.The sun came out and the
trees were glowing in red and gold as the bus came down the hill looking like some chariot from a myth as the sun hit the windows at an obtuse angle ,as Mary might have said.

If you are English your Northern accent may prevent you from being promoted into the high levels of the civil service and other places too

Since I read this article in the times newspaper I have been wondering how much further ahead I would have gone in my career if I did not have a Lancashire accent.

On reflection it seems a mistake to wonder about what might have happened but instead to concentrate on improving the future

I realise that what I could do do instead of learning the queen’s English I could learn to speak with a foreign accent instead.

I am very fond over the singer and poet Leonard Cohen and I have listen to him for hours and hours since being bereaved. He has a Canadian accent.Since a I love him it will be a tribute. So what I’m hearing him singing I try to to feel in my mouth and throat what he is doing with his.

I have got the accent for a few of the words but it’s taking me a long time, and now I have an accent which is a cross between Northern British, Canadian and Cockney.

It will give some researchers work because I won’t fit into one category,: when I was teaching in a university some people thought I was from the USA, other thought I was Dutch.

My name also causes problems because it’s Danish from the Vikings and it’s very hard for certain people to pronounce it or even try. Unless you’ve been living here only a few years you’ll be very puzzled. Someone who had come here from Eastern Europe asked me where I came from because she was sure my name was not English.She was trying to do some one-upmanship over someone who was less capable of adapting to life in the UK.

Is Boris Johnson English? I don’t think but he went to Eton so he has mixed with the the Royal the aristocats and the wealthy. So that is the accent that has learnt

Shall I keep my accent and it’s mixed sounds or shall I try to become totally Canadian? That does not have an answer but it has made me live longer trying to reconcile these differences and I suppose it would have been easier to go to an efficient teacher and learn to talk with BBC English or received pronunciation. That sounds quite religious as if Boris Johnson had climbed Snowdon and received the tablet from God tell ng him how to pronounce vowels.

Trying to understand

From today’s Times in London

The trick for us, living in an impossibly intricate society, is to distinguish between those with cause for genuine confidence and those charismatics who are just whistling in the wind. Whether we’re voting, investing or making one of life’s big decisions, we have to be on guard against wishful thinking and our evolutionary tendency to be swept up by fashion or enthusiasm. We should confine certainties to what we know and

The cliffa of North Yorkshire

Walking on the beach at Redcar Bay.

The Cleveland hills are not so far away.

The cliffs begin at Saltburn we walk there.

Filling up our lungs with North sea air.

The pier is long whenever is it used?

In my mind’s eye I see it far away

Cliffs begin and seabirds will amuse

The super structures wear into decay.

David Hockney Bridlington

sea views

I walk on this wet sand without my shoes.