I wonder what they are thinking?

The other day my daughter mused as to what it might be like if we knew what people were actually thinking about.  Now as an “old man”

Scones, Soup, Sherry and Flora

Knights-Castille, Bushells Tea, Sweet-Peas these were a few of her favourite things.   Today I reflected on the passing of my mum, 

The truth will set you free (or me anyway)

I recently wrote about prison walls not needing to be made of stone to keep someone incarcerated.  I lived a life in incarceration for many many years, largely based on some fictional representation of myself that I established as a narrative in my life.  I have blogged at length about the reasons for that, largely fear driven and I realise habitual.

Softly Falling

I can touch them,

falling softly from the sky.

Caressing, soothing and renewing,

bringing life and love

Washing over me

 

 

I can feel them

Healing and soothing,

gently warming,

falling,

from your mind.

 

I can hear them,

words of love,

forgiveness, acceptance openness,

falling softly,

on my ears and my heart.

 

I can see them,

tears falling, softly

from your eyes

Falling softly

on my heart,

out there on my sleeve.

Purple Rain

Oh Misery Oh Misery

Rain falling in my heart,

cold, dark, dismal rain.

Soaking through the bindings,

that tied it back together.

A quiet despair, that pervades and infiltrates every nook and cranny.

No hiding from this rain, no place to run or flee.

Sapping the warmth from my heart and reaching into my soul,

this rain. Every where I turn there you are.

What is your name?

Rain falling on my heart, not the rain of spring and life,

no, not the warm gentle summer rain, not the rain of prayers and hope,

not black or grey, not hail or sleet but as cold as charity.

Purple rain falling on me, washing over me drowning my soul.

With you purple rain you have your amigos,

desolation hopelessness, mediocrity, failure.

All along for the ride, come and see what fun we can have.

There it is laid out on the bare hard ground, spilling its life blood,

quickly now while its down, slash a little more, see if the beating will stop.

Teach it a lesson, reckless, forgiving, and hopeful, we can fix that.

Have another dose of reality, have a look at your foolishness, see them

all standing around, “I told you so”, wont you learn?  Why do you bother?

A chorus of disdain and shrill laughter,

shrieking like a polar blast, uprooting and destroying.

Is there any fight in you?

Will you get up again?

Go another round?

Or is that the towel I see thrown in,

bloodied and torn, rent asunder.

Just a useless piece of dirtied rag, fit only to be discarded,

burnt, destroyed turned into ashes.

Oh love you whore, your irresistible siren heart has shown your nature true.

No redemption in you for the shallow man.

What destruction have you unleashed this time,

with your flood of purple rain?

What will be left behind if you ever recede.

Anything worth keeping?

© Paul Cronin 2012

Koru

 

 

Koru

Coiled like a spring you emerge,

just visible above your sisters.

Coil on coil, spiral on spiral.

Embryonic, prehistoric

ancient and wise.

You rest for just a moment,

 biding your time,

waiting and watching,

and then…

You begin.

As if testing the waters of life,

you open your self,

spiral upon spiral,

leaf upon leaf.

Each the same and yet different.

One supporting the other,

perfect harmony and order.

Reaching out and reaching in,

touching and caressing,

like words falling softly.

Ancient wisdom at your centre.

Always the same and yet each frond different.

New narratives unfurling with soft whispers,

Strength and softness,

 constancy and change.

Imagination here, tenderness there.

 Opportunity and hope.

Glorious hope.

Dancing in the dew,

your message draws itself

as if painted on the morning.

New beginnings and old endings.

This too shall pass…

Thus was the sage advice from my sister last week and she is so right.  Unfortunately this too  is still current and whilst  the knowledge that it shall pass is comforting it just seems too far away.  I haven’t posted for a while,but the muse is upon me and if I want to call myself a writer (and I do) then I should write.  I have been deeply angry on a number of levels, for a variety of reasons and whilst have felt the urge to write I was somewhat concerned with the vitriol that was rolling in my head, I didn’t want to write because I had nothing good to say, however there it is, I may still be angry in a week or a month, shall I remain silent for that length of time, those that know me will instantly recognise that as a rhetorical question!

So something positive in amongst this well a couple of things, I celebrate my children, and my nephew who lives with me, that is I am proud of them. Not because of any particular achievement at all but because they are living their lives with passion, and that is absolutely awesome and is comfort to me, so that is one extraordinarily good thing.

The second thing that has occurred is a bit more surprising, those who know me well will tell you that I have a quick mind, a quick  tongue and could even be accused of having a sardonic wit.  Being truly sardonic is an artform to me, it rates well above mere sarcasm, which any amatuer can achieve.  Over the past few weeks I have been presented with golden opportunities to practice the dark art of sardonicism, however I have resisted these opportunities and largely persisted with the firm, (and rather terse) response.  Not as fruitful perhaps as other approaches but more respectful, especially when dealing with minions who have no ability to reply, firstly there is no real challenge in it, a bit like shooting ducks on the water really, secondly it can be extremely hurtful and I don’t want to hurt nobody as Bob Dylan sings.

One of the struggles I am having is around work at the moment.  I have only had one paid day in the last month.  Whist not quite desperate I do need to get some soon, I don’t want to rely on state assistance.  However I will do what I need to do to house, feed and clothe my kin and kith.  But my need to work is deeper than a need to provide, it strikes at my psyche which is a huge difference for me.  Whilst I am an adequate house person, I really find being a stay at home single parent a kind of suffocating, suppurating, scab, that eats at me like some form of gangrene, I feel myself slowly dying a little bit at a time.  However that needs some examination.

People ask me what I do and I describe myself as a writer who teaches for a living.  Blog writing is one form that I express myself in however I am also a poet,, except that I am not writing poetry at the moment, does that make me an ex poet?  One who has a hundred or so poems to his name,I have more blog posts than poems!  Alas I know what is wrong with me, it is not writers block per se as I am able to produce poetry if asked however it is a matter of the heart,  however that will be my next blog post.  I fear that I have lost my ability to love people outside of my immediate family.  More on that later.  For now I am ready to try to sleep.

Take care and live well,

Paul

Maybe just maybe

So the billboard read,” Maybe just maybe Jesus is kinder than you think”

Stone Walls, a prison?

There are many examples through history of people who have been imprisoned, who have not been broken by their physical imprisonment, they speak of many different things that enabled them to endure their incarceration. Above all else they had hope. For the majority of these people the prisons were their not because of there own actions but others, some contemporary examples are,

Rolf Harris and the suffocating silence of sexual abuse.

As the trial of Rolf Harris has progressed I have refrained from offering comment to friends and family about his alleged guilt (or innocence).  My preference is for the law to be in charge of that for without the rule of law we have nothing, but that is an aside.

I read in the Herald this morning of another “victim” of Rolf Harris coming out,
this time it was a well known broadcaster and politician Maggie Barry http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=11287467.  Maggie was groped by Harris during a radio interview whilst in her studio.  My first reaction was to say to myself why did she not speak up?  There it is!  It is often the reaction people have when they hear of past sex crimes that are not reported to the authorities, people say she/he should have said something.

Abusers rely on silence because of their power, position or privilege.  I am referring to people who are known to their victims, the abusers have an instinctive knowledge that they will get away with their crimes .  I cant tell you if that is borne from experience or a cold, calculated, constructed approach that the perpetrators bring.  What I do know is that somewhere someplace the perpetrator has done this once before and got away with it.  Remember that sexual assault is driven and perpetuated by power, so back to the silence.

The silence of victims can be puzzling.  Why do people not say anything after they have been assaulted?  Well the answer to that is obvious in many third world countries, where the punishment for being assaulted can be death, physical or emotional.  Here in New Zealand it is not a lot better.  We have senior officials telling women to dress appropriately, shock jocks muttering stupidly to them selves and others, comments like she was asking for it, boys will be boys.  Who would be brave enough to open themselves to  ridicule, the whole process of notifying a rape or sexual assault claim is invasive and horrid, unfortunately to uphold the rule of law and to rule out false claims it has to be to a certain degree.

Do false claims occur? Absolutely they do. They are a fact of life that some people make up a claim of sexual assault for a variety of reasons, often there will be underlying, unaddressed  psychological issues involved, every time a false allegation occurs it gives ammunition to the misogynistic men who are too afraid and too powerful to be concerned about the reality of  sexual assault.   Make no mistake rape is a societal problem, see my blog here for a further discussion of that issue, https://kiwipaulspoetry.wordpress.com/2013/11/10/roast-busters-a-society-problem/.

A societal issue demands a societal answer, Society is made up of individuals and we know that for evil to flourish it takes good people to do nothing.  I hear misogyny and sexism most days that I am in the classroom.  I confront it, I confront it when I hear it uttered by my boys, I tell my girls it is unacceptable and I hope that I don’t model tolerance of this sickness in any manner or form.  What we need is a united approach to this kind of behaviour .  Women are dehumanised, demeaned, and demonised, it is not acceptable.  That starts with us.

There are usually warning signs when it comes to abuse, sometimes it is only intuition but I have learnt to trust my intuition.  It is informed by experience, knowledge and I guess spirituality, you meet someone for the first time and you have an instinctive dislike of them and a gut feeling about them.  My advice is to follow that until proven otherwise.  If you see something that walks, looks and quacks like a duck it is unlikely to be a pigeon. I imagine that there are a lot of people out there asking themselves what it I had stood up and said something?

Perhaps Rolf Harris may have been brought to book and stopped a lot earlier.  Make no mistake here, the cult of personality prevailed, experienced child abuse practitioners encountered and disliked Harris.  No body stopped him until a brave woman stood up and said enough.  I really want to say  shame on those who did not speak up when as adults they encountered the octopus.  Rolf Harris like all sex offenders has lost the right to live as a free man in society and society needs to be protected.  I  do not feel relief at his conviction just a profound sadness that he got away with this  for so long and that his victims have been scarred by this abomination..  As always I want to say, if you need help there are lots of places  to get it.  If you need to find help then contact me, I will assist you in any way I can.

Paul