31 Wednesday Jan 2018
Tags
Going to do another one, as I think I spoilt this one by using chalk
too vigorously. Saw the originals at The Ashmolean and some
others in Canberra and became fascinated by
petrosomatoglyphs in general.
30 Tuesday Jan 2018
29 Monday Jan 2018
Tags
29 Monday Jan 2018
Posted in Summer 2012
It doesn’t matter
if everything is perfect.
A flower’s bud is lovely,
as well as its bloom.
When you see the blossom fall,
it can seem quite sad,
but the yearning to recall
it in its beauty
can be achingly poignant.
Few people have taste.
One should view things as a whole.
Those who are in love
often realise it when
there is an enforced absence.
28 Sunday Jan 2018
Posted in Summer 2012
Archery tutors
will tell you that two arrows
in your hand merely
make you careless when you draw
the first one. Each shot
should be as if it’s your last.
Students often find
procrastination tempting.
They tell themselves they’ll study
later in the day.
Then they end up wasting time,
when what they should do
is knuckle down right away
and pay their best attention.
27 Saturday Jan 2018
26 Friday Jan 2018
Posted in Philosophy, Poetry, Social Comment, Writing
Uniform bindings
on your books shows lack of taste.
Uniformity
in anything is mundane.
Buddhists, Confucians
often left a chapter out
and some palaces,
by art, were left incomplete.
Three marks: sanboin, mujo, ku
are vital concepts.
Reality shows nothing
lasts; nothing’s finished;
nothing is perfect.
Serenity comes with age
and it is a flawed beauty.
25 Thursday Jan 2018
Tags
dysentry, Isabel of Gloucester, John Lackland, Magna Carta, Newark Gate-House, Pope, Runnymede, Swinehead, treason
An effigy of King John (Worcester Cathedral)
from Samuel R Gardiner’s ‘History of England’
source: Wikipedia
A rhyming romp through a particular period
of history:
Banished from Ireland for a good reason
and then committing an act of treason;
responsible for murders, uprisings;
provoking the Pope’s severe chastisings;
killing sons of the Welsh nobility;
losing French land through incivility;
divorcing Isabel of Gloucester (kin);
calling their bond consanguineous sin.
Duplicitous about Magna Carta;
kidnapping his young enamorata.
North, in Lincolnshire, losing his war chest,
which seems like carelessness, or a poor jest;
contracting vile dysentry at Swinehead:
Runnymede in his system, it’s been said.
Newark Gate-House was as far as he reached.
There he expired, before being impeached.
24 Wednesday Jan 2018
Posted in Summer 2012
My friend suggested that I write a poem addressing the
subject of the women in El Salvador who have been imprisoned
after being accused of self-terminations- sometimes when they
allegedly have just had stillbirths. I was unaware of this until I
researched the topic and discovered material on the group Las 17.
The prison terms are in the region of decades.
MATA NINOS
In El Salvador, there’s an assumption,
in many cases, that a miscarriage
is the consequence of an abortion.
Girls who have been raped can lose their freedom.
A premature, or unviable birth
can result in a forty year sentence.
How can a country of that name sentence
women when it reveres the Assumption
of a Virgin? Supernatural birth
protected Mary from a miscarriage
when she experienced threats to her freedom:
state infanticide, worse than abortion?
Las 17, accused of abortion –
each subjected to a lengthy sentence,
in a land whose motto includes ‘Freedom.’
Youngsters, trafficked, can face an assumption
which might lead to judicial miscarriage,
as ‘Mata Ninos.’ They’re victims from birth.
After civil war there should be re-birth,
with an enlightened view of abortion
and understanding that a miscarriage
is, for women, a kind of life sentence.
And why should the state make an assumption
that stillbirth expresses woman’s freedom?
Accused of homicide, denied freedom,
because of complications to a birth –
to disregard is to make assumption
and logic itself suffers abortion.
The powerful deliver the sentence
and fear itself can induce miscarriage.
There’s no calculation in miscarriage.
It’s spontaneous – there is no freedom
expressed. Those women uttered no sentence:
‘I now intend to sabotage this birth,‘
nor ‘Drinking this will promote abortion.’
Blame’s an ignorant assumption.
Restricting freedom; pronouncing sentence
on those who endure miscarriage, stillbirth:
abortion of innocence assumption.
24 Wednesday Jan 2018
Posted in Architecture, Community, History, Nostalgia, Philosophy, Poetry, Writing
Even The Palace
at Kyogoku and the
Hojo Temple are
fallen into deep decay.
The family of
the Mikado’s guardian
could not preserve them.
Nine images of Buddha
remain, however.
Kaneyuki’s painted door
has somehow survived.
Elsewhere, not even ruins
are able to tell stories.
