Souled

Hypocrisy is the sign of a soul doubly sold
and similarly divided, of somebody living
'well', but way beyond their means.
Every act hypocrisy inspires
is paid for with world resources
that the soul, if it is real, can't own.
Though it aspires beyond this life
to be owned and kept by itself,
it never realises that the self belief
of the soul is definitive proof of hubris.

Second Hand Happiness

was the joy that I settled with best
when I was free of care enough to be young.
It never gave me the surety of status
I saw in others which I might have liked,
but later it saved me from a lot of anxiety.

So what if it left me
at the bottom of the heap?
So what if I was the scrap
against which others saw
themselves to be 'worth more' ?

I was in an uneasy peace
when they were in open war.

This Is Not My Darkness, It Is Yours

This monkey is traveling by Air France/KLM to be used on it's arrival
 for testing the toxicity of gases. It will die of being poisoned.
 It's body will be of more value dead to scientists
than its life was to itself alive. The experiment will not even
 be that accurate,  the anxiety the monkey experiences
 as it dies will seriously limit the value of any
 scientific result from examining the monkey's corpse.
  Better results would have been got from testing the bodies
 of jews and homosexuals etc in the death camps-
 they were not expecting to die of Zyclon B in the showers.
 here is where to find the petition against Air France
/KLM carrying monkeys for experimentation.

 

The Landscape Of Earthly Delights

This is the most sensual and yet tasteful
film poster I have ever seen. I saw the film
'In the realm of the senses'  when the
british film censors, the BBFC, relented
to release it with nearly no edits for sex
or violence in 1992, after it was practically
refused BBFC certificate in 1976, when
instead the censors encouraged it to be
shown in private cinema clubs only.... 

Unpossessive Attentiveness

is a virtue I have often found in others
and dimly seen in myself.
Whilst when small I wished to be lightly held,
shared, and even dandled on the knees of relatives
my ache to be hugged and wanted was to be my darkness.

The family phrase that froze me was ''I want' never gets'.
I was there to say 'Please' and to receive what others
wanted for me. I was their accessory.
In middle age my gloom lost its edge.
'I want' has got me some things I liked.
Fresh space, time and distance have erased
old wants, and finally turned what seemed
irreversable losses into something usable.

But still I seek that mix of distance,
lightness and immediacy.
The gift for others of unpossessive
attentiveness still eludes me.

My First Christmas Card Of 2012

Comfortably Numb

'How nice to feel nothing and still get
the full credit for being alive'.- Kurt Vonnegut