Dad loved to grow things. He like me, loved wild birdsong. He loved the clear blue horizon and always said that the air off North Pier was worth a pound a bucketful. Perhaps it was the time of uncertainty during the war that instilled his joie de vivre. I have never been to war but I traveled to South Africa in 2000 with my children and saw poverty. I took them to Egypt in 2002 and saw the effect of no public health service, passing a man in the street who was covered from head to toe in his own excrement. I haven’t taken them into a war zone but I was working in Boots 1600 in The Arndale Centre only months before it was bombed by the IRA.
I can say, especially during these weeks of pre-election furore, that I have lived a secure, comfortable and peaceful life. I have no need to complain. I live happily in a country that has always helped the poor, provided excellent health care and the best possible national security. Those are the continuing values that I will be aiming for when I draw my cross on Thursday 7th May. I hope that you will too.
Out of a Clear Blue Sky
They cover
their faces,
balaclava
their crime,
features
blurred
in streaks of
primary emulsion
to soothe the
burning of impending lime.Fun from the rear of the … One shrouded face SHOUTS … Remote detonation.
Run from fear … Uhuh uhuh uhuh. RUN FROM FEAR
Time suspends, turns retrograde as hands and limbs dissemble, scarred with spattered shrapnel blood leaking onto hot blue tarmac, fired in the oven of a sun-soaked afternoon, and dripping into veins through pop-up Red Cross lines, like glasses of full-bodied wine.
Time is stilled in frantic motion, exploded in a mid-week market square. A bus was passing by, In the windows, people reading, children chatting, dreamers staring at a wistful cloud, out of a clear blue sky. Adele V. Robinson Thanks for reading.
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