a one hundred and thirty sixth poem ... 'sins'

Peter was punished for sins in a past life

And returned reincarnated as cheese.

He was squeezed, sliced and grated

Before (and this was the part he truly hated)

Being melted into a meat pie and 

Gobbled up greedily by

Glen Hoddle.

a one hundred and thirty fifth poem ... 'daily mail pride of britain awards'

In the midst of afternoon tea

The Queen

Had heard and then seen

A commotion outside

Buckingham palace, furious

She threw down her golden

Tea chalice and with a look of

Dark, imperial malice screamed at

Her Aide-de-camp to fetch the

Royal horse. Of course, he

Obliged and hurried away, while

The Queen returned to the palace

Window to watch her prey.

Then, when her aide returned

Her majesty went outside, and greatly peeved

Mounted her tall and trusty

Steed, Von Ribbentrop,

Stopped to adjust the saddle before she

Dug her jack boots into

The animal’s guts and,

Together, they charged at the

White canvas huts

Filled with revellers, all jodhpured

With booze, light headed, confused -

She was among them in a flash, with

Slash after slash of her antique cavalry swords

The headline next day read:

Carnage at the Daily Mail Pride of Britain Awards.

Piers Morgan was dead, Elizabeth 2

Had cut off his head, Beckham’s

Panama suit was turned blood red,

The Queen stabbed through the neck

First Ant and then Dec, before

Scalping that bloke who played Capt. Kirk in Star Trek.

When the news crews arrived

Mary Berry was being revived ...

But it was too late for Phil Collins
Who'd been flayed alive.

a one hundred and thirty first poem ... 'liverpool football club'

Liverpool football club

Blub blub blub!

We haven’t won in years

And it’s all about the tears.

Man U have all the money,

Chelsea their pot of honey

We’re just bloody broke

Even worse than fucking Stoke.

Liverpool football club

Blub blub blub!

Last time we won a throw in

We still had Michael Owen.

These days Spurs can even beat us

And ever since I was a foetus

I can’t recall an era

Where the price of success seemed dearer.

Liverpool football club

Blub blub blub!

We can’t defend for toffee

And for all the Everton mints and Irish coffee

Why did we put a German

In charge? I’ll spare the sermon,

Save to say we let in three v Watford

… We let in three v Watford.

Liverpool football club

Blub blub blub!

So, we haven’t won in years

And it’s all about the tears,

The glory days of Shankly

Souness, Paisley, frankly

Have turned to dust, now we stare

Into the abyss, blankly.

a one hundred and thirtieth poem ... 'diana memorial day'

Diana memorial day:

Rivers of tiny tears

Flowing away

To the still grey sea

And mean sky above

August thirty one ‘nine-seven

The moment L O V E

Died 

in man, woman

Child and creature

The moment the mawkish

Mail on Sunday 

Soupy-eye feature

Was born. 

Thirds: Time, Senseless Things and Waiting in the Wings.

Hard times breed strong men and women. Strong men and women make good times. Good times begat weak men and women. So the narrative goes.

Today, we’ve gone from living in ‘good times’ to live in hard times, or at least interesting times – it seems the Western world is divided. Even Dear Old Blighty is in a state of dislocation and it might be said that weak men and women are part of the reason – either through their action or inaction. Government has of late too often pandered to rich elites in banking/finance, big media and multinational corporations while ignoring the concerns of those in society struggling to come to terms with or keep up with life in modern Britain; while government opposition has fallen into civil war, losing touch with the mood of the nation. The relatively affluent middle class, meanwhile, has become complacent and/or ineffective as a political movement against injustice. Cue Brexit. Cue Trump and the differing reactions to his election in the UK.

But what about class? Although class remains a thing in Britain today, as well as in the US - and the confusion and dissatisfaction around Brexit and the Presidential Elections we’ve seen in 2016 can be considered on class terms - class has also proved a reasonably shiftless, immovable ideology for centuries that is not perhaps most useful in providing a medium through which to discuss how the divisions clearly present in the UK, US and indeed beyond can be overcome. Overcoming and closing the gaps between the so called and/or self-styled ‘haves’ or ‘have nots’ has to be the order of the day.

Age has and is proving a major factor in explaining the tensions that exist in 2016 Britain and the US.
 

People are living longer – there are lots of elderly people. In the UK this not only puts added pressure on social services and the beleaguered NHS - already struggling in face of austerity measures, from the capitalist ideology of speed/efficiency over quality of care, as well as (arguably) immigration – but importantly creates a sizeable group in society that are simply not comfortable with modernity and the frantic pace of change both in the workplace and in the cultural/social sphere.

Technology and its sudden ubiquity has seen jobs requiring manual skills eroded, it has changed the way work is organised, in many instances undermining job security; for those out of work, technology has added yet another element of complexity to the chaotic benefits system (you have to know IT to negotiate the benefits system in the UK at any rate).

At the same time, technology has facilitated the spread of new ideas about race, sex and gender (among others), all with a particular vocabulary (or political correctness), ideas that have penetrated into nearly all walks of life regardless of how they are communicated. And then there are new ways of paying for things, and the increasingly depersonalized aspects of how we live out and administer our daily lives. What to believe and what not to? How does this work? Can anybody help?

Many people of the generation that grew up before the Second World War, during it or in the decade or two afterwards are struggling to come to terms with modernity. Government isn’t helping them. But these people make up a sizeable enough group in the UK/US today to be influenced and thus to be influential. The alt right succeed in reaching out to / exciting these people – cynically and clinically. The left has to learn. It has to start listening.

But the young are also struggling to keep up with modern Britain, so too in the US. Again technology, while in many ways a great accompaniment and sometime facilitator in the lives of young people, is also the source of consternation and confusion, not to mention the platform for bullying and related crises in self-confidence.  What is true? What isn’t? Who/what is real? Where is something I can trust/believe in?

Again, the influencers in society need to listen.

Brexit (and Trump's success) were cries of 'stop!', 'things have gone too far!', 'pay us attention!', pleas for some kind of order.

To me – generally speaking – one of the things people of all ages seem increasingly useless at is in understanding and best utilising their freedom: the nature and parameters of it in 2016 Britain/USA. It may be too far to claim that technology and its binary impositions/inability to account for 3/5ths of reality is a straightjacket on freedom and independence of thought, but it isn’t a stretch to say it engenders a muddying of the waters when it comes to information and to understanding what is reliable/relevant and what is not.

Social media which, it seems, in part accounted for the election of Donald Trump (see Brietbart News’ propaganda and the fact Steve Bannon will be in the White House from Jan 21), earlier in the year proved a strong influencer in the Brexit referendum. There is simply too much information on Twitter and Facebook for one person, young or old, to absorb, so people search out one or two news havens and largely accept what they are fed (the same goes for print media, including newspapers, it is true).

But it shouldn’t be too much to except for people to be able to understand the inherent bias in what they are reading, and to recognise they are being fed not feeding/nourishing themselves.

In his 1997 song ‘Law’, David Bowie intoned: ‘I don’t want knowledge, I want certainty.’  He was satirising intellectual culture (curiosity or lack of it). Nineteen years on it’s a lyric that belies an attitude that seems relevant to both Right and Left in the context of a fractious 2016. Most of us would prefer certainty, and on the eve of Brexit and the US presidential elections there was plenty of it around, when we should really have been/be thirsting for knowledge over and above straightforward (and with the internet – vitriolic and potentially never ending) confirmation of our views  - especially at the time of writing.

Of course, education is key here.

In a modern world driven ever onwards at increasing speeds by the advance of technology and all that it manifests from one week to another, perhaps (in the UK at least) we place too much emphasis on educating people to fulfil a very narrow remit in the early stages of their development and indeed in further/adult education (rigid curriculums, empirical testing, overly specific training for the very few employment opportunities available). Modernity wants order and simultaneously wishes to limit or put controls on freedom. Capitalism, in the context of globalisation, is where speed/efficiency rules, divides and subjugates. And if you can’t keep up as a pupil-in-class-then-school-leaver, a graduate, someone trying to change career, or as some poor soul trying to get back into the world of work, you are worthless and surplus since binary targets and money/profit rules.

Careerism does not go hand in hand with individualism.

This said, the UK (with the US) is also one of the world’s leading nations for start-up businesses. There is an entrepreneurial spirit around which presumably stems from a certain freedom/flexibility of thought and a desire to create something new and something better than that currently in existence/on the market (this aside from low corporation taxes!). Where does this entrepreneurial spirit arise and how is it fostered by education? This seems an important question to answer and to learn from. We all can benefit from entertaining better (with due consideration and discernment) a wide variety of ideas and options for improving the common good (as well as our own!).

But not everyone is predisposed to being this way, encouragement is needed.

For starters - and to make possible encouragement - the barriers to entry to becoming an educator/involved in education (overly long and sometimes expensive training) and the lack of incentives for staying in the profession need to be addressed with sufficient vision, courage and investment once and for all.

Educators are currently rushed off their feet, indeed, everyone is struggling or failing to keep up – governments, opposition, pollsters, commentators, young, old, straight, queer, left and right. Before the next general election, before Trump’s inauguration in mid-January, maybe we should be telling and teaching ourselves initially to slow down, log off/step away from the havoc of 2016, the forward march of modernity and the determinist idea that 2017 will be ‘dark’ and consider how/where the light can get in to our dim and cracked heads. There, almost invariably, is another way. I say: ‘be free’ – entertain other ways. Then come back to the air.

Seconds: Deep In Your Room – Hurting Through The Gloom.

Caleb finishes his desk job for the day at A1 design offices around 5.30pm. He cycles home and chains his steel frame bike to a lamppost outside. The first thing he does when through the door of his two bedroom maisonette, bought with help from his parents, is walk into the living room and boot up his MacBook Air. Then he turns on the house lights, takes off his rucksack, removes his shoes and puts the kettle on before settling down in front of his Apple to catch up on the day’s news.

He revisits his favourite Twitter accounts and from there hyperlinks to a selection of articles that have been shared and ‘liked’ over the last 12 hours, including The Guardian, New Yorker and a BBC website feature (as well as a YouTube video of a rare David Bowie interview which he streams in the background). His eyes settle on the opening paragraph of the first article he chooses to read, then his gaze follows the first line of the next paragraph and the next for more pertinent information; he half reads the whole of paragraph four before scrolling to the comment section at the bottom – what am I supposed to think? The pattern is repeated for each of the three articles he mulls over.

After checking his personal emails, deciding he can’t go at short notice to the Momentum organised march to emphasise the need for safeguarding the NHS over the coming weekend (he has casual family commitments), he gets up from the sofa somewhat discombobulated and prepares dinner in the adjacent kitchen - leftover Saag Aloo from Sunday night takeaway. He warms it up and while on the stove uses his iPhone to air a podcast to accompany his eating. Saag Aloo tastes even better the following day – and what was that about deforestation in the Amazon... ? Later the same night he'll fall asleep to Newsnight and the bleating of Evan Davis (or two hundred unaccounted for sheep).

By day, Caleb presents himself as a conscientious Millennial. He works in a creative environment where ideas bounce around, some of them political. His carbon foot print is good, he recycles at home and work (although he buys branded bottled water at lunch). He cares about the environment, likes the outdoors. To him it 'matters' what happens to society and he engages in political conversations – he’s even a paid-up Labour member (£5 per month). He likes Corbyn, doesn’t understand Tories, shares views with both Liberal Democrats and Greens, is depressed by UKIP followers and Brexiteers. He thinks Trump is a looney and America has lost its shit.

‘Be cool’ is one of his mantras. On the outside he observes and contemplates life from a cool distance. On the inside he wants to improve it for himself and everyone else but can’t make sense of the various 'liberal'/'progressive' propaganda (calls to arms?) he reads, is offended by the ‘right’ or ‘alt right’, and does not prioritise politics or social action. Reading, thinking, watching and playing football is how he likes to spend his weekends. He values 'Me Time' and yet he excuses himself from getting out there politically speaking on the basis of time, or the lack of it, because he’s not even vaguely sure of how he might be of use to someone less fortunate than him, God forbid somebody in any kind of dire situation. He won’t volunteer and while he feels a nagging but easily ignored guilt, to feel aggrieved or to feel anger and to be motivated by injustice is not in his make up – he won’t claim or entertain outrage. In quiet moments alone he idly reflects: What in the world can I do? What difference would it make?

Movements that might define themselves as ‘progressive’ and/or broadly speaking of the ‘left’ – which emphasise the need for a (sometimes) radical rethink of the way society works and advocate for change from the bottom up, with people coming together as agents – in the last decade or two, at least, generally get stuck when it comes to inspiring, motivating, even getting an email response from individuals such as Caleb, whether or not Caleb-types feel they have already done enough (e.g. set up a direct debit to a 'progressive' political organisation). Caleb may RT or comment on FB but he won’t go any further. Again, his concern is genuine on one level (he cried at I, Daniel Blake even if guilt at his own privelege was the main reason for his tears) but on other levels the nature of his concern remains largely unexplored and seldom acted on (save at the time of a general election or referendum – he will at least vote). Ultimately, Caleb is comfortable deep in his room, dimly hurting through the gloom at the injustice of the world or observing passively from behind double glazing as is, in truth, very much his preference.

In the wake of Brexit, Trump and the resurgence of the right, in reply somehow progressives/the left need to galvanise Caleb-types to give priority to politics/social action in their lives, to work it into their daily or weekly remit, get them to engage with other real people either in debate (sometimes with those from the other side of the political spectrum) or in helping people in need – the poor, disenfranchised, the illiterate. Calebs need to become the voice, personification or embodiment of the left out there, at large in situations of all kinds.

Still, it’s hard to do when the middle class, generally speaking, remains (for the time being) reasonably well off and relatively unscarred by the various machinations of government, stagnant or declining real pay, rising rents, ill health and immigration.

But what if the advance of technology and dominant narrative espoused by the rampant strain of capitalism sweeping the UK – that values efficiency above all (save time/money to create more time/money to do more things) – were to take Caleb’s job away from him at A1 design? Sure as eggs are eggs there is a computer already in existence that can do his design work better than him and in a nanosecond of the time. How would he feel then? What then would he do? What difference could it then make?

Struggle against adversity is something that progressive/left-leaning movements of the past have nearly always associated with political action and struggle as being a necessary element in any success, especially in a country such as the United Kingdom which might be described as conservative with a small ‘c’ (even if behind closed doors it can be anything but). In the UK today there remains adversity, indeed a widening gap in some (if not all) areas of the country between rich and poor – and the poor suffer from government austerity measures, an outdated benefits system and unstable working patterns. There is reason to struggle whether affected directly or otherwise. Society as a whole does not benefit from inequality. Caleb needs to be made to see this much and that his fate is linked with those who will or are losing out. Calebs need to represent to others Freedom -  in their independence and the sheer will power of their thoughts and actions.

If, for instance, Jeremy Corbyn’s vision of a more inclusive, compassionate politics is to occur where people are ‘not left behind’ and the left is going to succeed in bridging the perceived gap to them (some of whom are the UKIP vote) then Caleb-types are essential as the agents of change. Not for their money (though this certainly helps), not simply to march or protest (when their diaries allow), but principally for their education, energy, communication skills (at least in IT), and their time - to help organise social wellbeing and cohesion in areas where support is lacking (to run foodbanks, help people fill in benefit forms, help others recognise and articulate their employment rights, and so on). Time is money and money is something even Labour doesn’t have a huge amount of. Rekindle the voluntary spirit among the middle classes that in part characterised Victorian Britain, even the Britain that existed pre-Thatcher and the state endorsed rise of individualism, and things may begin to get better for the poor and Caleb-types may come to realise their purpose.

Time, thanks to technology, capitalism and the dominant idea of efficiency, may soon be something all of us Caleb-types can spare more of and we should use it creatively and unselfishly. Until then even if we can only get involved in small ways, we should aim to make our involvement regular and consistent.

Reconciling 2016: Beginnings - Always Crashing in the Same Car?

We should have understood that when The Starman returned to the celestial heavens earlier this year, on January 11, the world - as we have known it - would come crashing down around us...

David Bowie, as much as any public figure (in Britain at any rate), represented an avatar for the liberal intelligentsia, the quixotic suburban populous and the artisanal working class. He was a source of life, solace; for some a prophet of the future. Perhaps he was also a harbinger of doom!?

Planet Earth in 2016, so we might be inclined to believe from what we see on television news, read online or in the daily rags, has become a Blackstar.

Bowie’s death was followed by Brexit was followed by Trump becoming President Elect, and in between there was turmoil in the markets, natural disasters and a spate of terror attacks in Brussels, Nice, Lahore and Istanbul. People in Canada have even started to dig their own graves.

Hmm.

2016 has been a momentous year and one in which many events transpired against received opinion or upset the odds. Aside from Leicester City winning the Premier League very few of these events has been stuff of fairy tales. But it’s probably fair to say that many of my ‘kind’ - I write as someone of the liberal or left-leaning, British middle class* – have been living in some version of a fairy tale for several decades. Little Wonder (?).

For ‘us’ it’s been a confusing and confounding year. Many of my ‘kind’ are scratching heads or soul-searching. How could ‘we’ have messed up the middle east so badly fundamentalist elements are now out to kill us off? How could ‘we’ have lost the Brexit vote? How could our ‘fellow’ Americans allow Donald Trump into the White House? Where’s Bowie when you need him? Oh no! Boo hoo!

It’s the year hatred may well have become neutral, fascism: ‘alt right’, lying: ‘post-truth’ but in ‘liberal’ echelons/on the left, debating circles have turned into echo chambers, places for people to argue amongst themselves. The conversation has occurred largely online and away from the mainstream press (where opinions are still formed/interpreted and given a/most voice) or, indeed, via protest after-the-fact (see Pro-EU marches in London post-Brexit and consider how many of the thousands who turned out to wave placards and pose in blue and yellow T-shirts actively campaigned for the EU cause beforehand).

We can criticise the political elite for sleepwalking into this mess. Although we elected and kept many of the same myopic/complacent neo-liberal politicians in power, and in the case of the US, our ‘fellow’ Americans didn’t knock on enough doors – either through Clinton apathy or just apathy.

We can say these politicians should have paid more attention to the blue collar working class over the years (when we also assumed the blue collar working class no longer was swayed by the Tabloids, was essentially apolitical, too overweight or drunk to mobilise or be mobilised).

We can blame capitalism – and not realise it is stampeding over our livelihoods too (for example, 80,000 white collar civil service jobs have been cut without even so much as a whisper since 2010 in the UK).

We can say the alt right fly in the face of facts (when we are lost in a maelstrom of them and unable to pick one to reply with).

We can say these people are racists, and slur them with various ists and isms and sometimes with good reason, but other times (when we're being lazy... perhaps too often) we are only contributing to the Us vs. Them narrative which fuels all of this.

We can be dour and become cynical, and while it is our right to be angry, anger needs a channel and it needs a positive kind of energy to channel it best (however you look at it we can't do anger like the alt right - not only because we eschew the rhetoric, but because the blood simply won't boil).

We need to remain outward looking and optimistic, even if it is optimism with a small ‘o’, and bargain with good faith that there is still common decency in society (the UK, America, the middle east etc).

We need to stand up to any of the injustices if/as/when they happen, better still pre-empt them. And to do so we have to drop the bad attitude – stop bickering amongst ourselves or indulging in some navel-gazing, reflexive narrative and learn from Brexit and Trump in particular that the values of ‘liberal’ society and/or the left need to have a more direct and emotive appeal.

We need to supress for now the ists and isms, nefarious factoids, all the cappuccino chatter and define what liberal/left values really stand for - let's say: Truth, Justice and Equality. Three straightforward words understood by everyone but all too often not utilised with sufficient rigour.

And we also need unity. The right, especially the 'alt right' is beginning to homogenise and thus is fast becoming the dominant voice in society and in politics. The left has to get over it's own peculiarities and forget pedantry.  While we can be civil in private when expressing our views, the uncomfortable truth for some (including me) is that we will probably have to shout them (in unison) in public to avoid being drowned out. And, perhaps most importantly, make sacrifices to time and properly engage in social action.

Meantime, the trove of Bowie’s music, his concerts, television appearances and interviews will still be there waiting, at least in one internet galaxy or another, when we’re done trying (or hoarse from shouting).

*using class in somewhat general terms here for purposes of this short piece