Click image to read the thoughts of an egalitarian gum-muncher ...
Sunday, June 17, 2012
Wednesday, May 30, 2012
THIS is a Man's Life? ... Who Knew?!
 |
| "Weasels Ripped My Flesh" |
Well, that certainly goes a fair way towards explaining why I've had such
communication problems in my relationships with male human grownups.
Perhaps, dear reader, this is a rich vein which merits further exploration ...
Sunday, May 27, 2012
Tuesday, May 22, 2012
The Power of Poetry: the Pen and the Sword
“Can we go on bowing and curtseying to people who are just like ourselves?
We begin to wish that the Zoo should be abolished; that the royal animals should be given the run of some wider pasturage – a royal Whipsnade.
Will the British Empire survive? Will Buckingham Palace look as solid in 2034 as it does now?
Words are dangerous things remember.
A Republic might be brought into being by a poem”
- Virginia Woolf in Time and Tide,1st December 1934 (emphasis added)
The video presentation of Heathcote Williams' chillingly eye-opening poem
Royal Babylon, and its preface by the above quotation, are from http://www.royalbabylon.com/Site/Royal_Babylon.html
Royal Babylon, and its preface by the above quotation, are from http://www.royalbabylon.com/Site/Royal_Babylon.html
Friday, April 6, 2012
It's a jungle out there
.. and no I don't say this as a bad thing.
I have laboured to surround my house with jungle and finally - Success! Some snaky friends have given my place the good habitat seal of approval.
Here's the proof!
Yep,they're here alright, as the butcher birds and mickey birds often shout out to me: mooching along the verandah for a bit of gecko-gobbling, dropping unexpectedly from a palm frond, darting away when disturbed while having a sip at the frog pond (or snacking on a froglet?) I LOVE it that I'm not someone who's afraid of snakes and that they've chosen to live here!
Cat and dog are cautious in the garden, but they won't come to harm and nor will the snakes. The carpet python and tree snake that I have met are not poisonous, and my animals are trained to leave them be. They can share the garden as long as they like.
Here's a poem written by D. H. Lawrence on our relationship with snakes:
A snake came to my water-trough
On a hot, hot day, and I in pyjamas for the heat,
To drink there.
I have laboured to surround my house with jungle and finally - Success! Some snaky friends have given my place the good habitat seal of approval.
 |
| Carpet python and carpet - Sussssing out the veranda ... |
Yep,they're here alright, as the butcher birds and mickey birds often shout out to me: mooching along the verandah for a bit of gecko-gobbling, dropping unexpectedly from a palm frond, darting away when disturbed while having a sip at the frog pond (or snacking on a froglet?) I LOVE it that I'm not someone who's afraid of snakes and that they've chosen to live here!
Cat and dog are cautious in the garden, but they won't come to harm and nor will the snakes. The carpet python and tree snake that I have met are not poisonous, and my animals are trained to leave them be. They can share the garden as long as they like.
Here's a poem written by D. H. Lawrence on our relationship with snakes:
Snake
A snake came to my water-trough
On a hot, hot day, and I in pyjamas for the heat,
To drink there.
In the deep, strange-scented shade of the great dark
carob-tree
I came down the steps with my pitcher
And must wait, must stand and wait, for there he was at the trough before me.
I came down the steps with my pitcher
And must wait, must stand and wait, for there he was at the trough before me.
He reached down from a fissure in the earth-wall in the gloom
And trailed his yellow-brown slackness soft-bellied down, over the edge of
the stone trough
And rested his throat upon the stone bottom,
And where the water had dripped from the tap, in a small clearness,
He sipped with his straight mouth,
Softly drank through his straight gums, into his slack long body,
Silently.
And trailed his yellow-brown slackness soft-bellied down, over the edge of
the stone trough
And rested his throat upon the stone bottom,
And where the water had dripped from the tap, in a small clearness,
He sipped with his straight mouth,
Softly drank through his straight gums, into his slack long body,
Silently.
Someone was before me at my water-trough,
And I, like a second comer, waiting.
And I, like a second comer, waiting.
He lifted his head from his drinking, as cattle do,
And looked at me vaguely, as drinking cattle do,
And flickered his two-forked tongue from his lips, and mused a moment,
And stooped and drank a little more,
Being earth-brown, earth-golden from the burning bowels of the earth
On the day of Sicilian July, with Etna smoking.
The voice of my education said to me
He must be killed,
For in Sicily the black, black snakes are innocent, the gold are venomous.
And looked at me vaguely, as drinking cattle do,
And flickered his two-forked tongue from his lips, and mused a moment,
And stooped and drank a little more,
Being earth-brown, earth-golden from the burning bowels of the earth
On the day of Sicilian July, with Etna smoking.
The voice of my education said to me
He must be killed,
For in Sicily the black, black snakes are innocent, the gold are venomous.
And voices in me said, If you were a man
You would take a stick and break him now, and finish him off.
You would take a stick and break him now, and finish him off.
But must I confess how I liked him,
How glad I was he had come like a guest in quiet, to drink at my water-trough
And depart peaceful, pacified, and thankless,
Into the burning bowels of this earth?
How glad I was he had come like a guest in quiet, to drink at my water-trough
And depart peaceful, pacified, and thankless,
Into the burning bowels of this earth?
Was it cowardice, that I dared not kill him? Was it
perversity, that I longed to talk to him?
Was it humility, to feel so honoured?
I felt so honoured.
I felt so honoured.
And yet those voices:
If you were not afraid, you would kill him!
If you were not afraid, you would kill him!
And truly I was afraid, I was most afraid, But even so,
honoured still more
That he should seek my hospitality
From out the dark door of the secret earth.
That he should seek my hospitality
From out the dark door of the secret earth.
He drank enough
And lifted his head, dreamily, as one who has drunken,
And flickered his tongue like a forked night on the air, so black,
Seeming to lick his lips,
And looked around like a god, unseeing, into the air,
And slowly turned his head,
And slowly, very slowly, as if thrice adream,
Proceeded to draw his slow length curving round
And climb again the broken bank of my wall-face.
And lifted his head, dreamily, as one who has drunken,
And flickered his tongue like a forked night on the air, so black,
Seeming to lick his lips,
And looked around like a god, unseeing, into the air,
And slowly turned his head,
And slowly, very slowly, as if thrice adream,
Proceeded to draw his slow length curving round
And climb again the broken bank of my wall-face.
And as he put his head into that dreadful hole,
And as he slowly drew up, snake-easing his shoulders, and entered farther,
A sort of horror, a sort of protest against his withdrawing into that horrid black hole,
Deliberately going into the blackness, and slowly drawing himself after,
Overcame me now his back was turned.
And as he slowly drew up, snake-easing his shoulders, and entered farther,
A sort of horror, a sort of protest against his withdrawing into that horrid black hole,
Deliberately going into the blackness, and slowly drawing himself after,
Overcame me now his back was turned.
I looked round, I put down my pitcher,
I picked up a clumsy log
And threw it at the water-trough with a clatter.
I picked up a clumsy log
And threw it at the water-trough with a clatter.
I think it did not hit him,
But suddenly that part of him that was left behind convulsed in undignified haste.
Writhed like lightning, and was gone
Into the black hole, the earth-lipped fissure in the wall-front,
At which, in the intense still noon, I stared with fascination.
But suddenly that part of him that was left behind convulsed in undignified haste.
Writhed like lightning, and was gone
Into the black hole, the earth-lipped fissure in the wall-front,
At which, in the intense still noon, I stared with fascination.
And immediately I regretted it.
I thought how paltry, how vulgar, what a mean act!
I despised myself and the voices of my accursed human education.
I thought how paltry, how vulgar, what a mean act!
I despised myself and the voices of my accursed human education.
And I thought of the albatross
And I wished he would come back, my snake.
And I wished he would come back, my snake.
For he seemed to me again like a king,
Like a king in exile, uncrowned in the underworld,
Now due to be crowned again.
Like a king in exile, uncrowned in the underworld,
Now due to be crowned again.
And so, I missed my chance with one of the lords
Of life.
And I have something to expiate:
A pettiness.
Of life.
And I have something to expiate:
A pettiness.
Taormina,
1923
Tuesday, March 6, 2012
Quickstep: No. 15 in an Occasional Series entitled 'Harmless Hobbies for Mad Old Bags'
The song and dance just keeps on coming in the all-new revitalised Common Shrew.
Here's my kind of woman. She's not going to sit down and shut up.
Good On You, Mathilda, way to go!
Here's my kind of woman. She's not going to sit down and shut up.
Good On You, Mathilda, way to go!
Monday, February 20, 2012
Tuesday, January 24, 2012
Zumba!
I am feeling extremely virtuous having put phase 1 of The Return in place by going to a 1-hour Zumba class.
I managed to keep up with the class for the entire hour!
The teacher commented that she saw me smiling so she knew I was having fun .... little did she know that as I wiped the sweat out of my eyes and my sight returned I was able to read the sign in multicoloured letters out the front of the hall.... it said
JESUS!
I couldn't have put it better myself.
This is one of the numbers we do and this is what I look like .... not (but watch this space!)
I managed to keep up with the class for the entire hour!
The teacher commented that she saw me smiling so she knew I was having fun .... little did she know that as I wiped the sweat out of my eyes and my sight returned I was able to read the sign in multicoloured letters out the front of the hall.... it said
JESUS!
I couldn't have put it better myself.
This is one of the numbers we do and this is what I look like .... not (but watch this space!)
The Common Shrew: The Return... no more worms. Now where was I?
Yes, Dear Reader, the Shrew has returned!
She has fought bravely back, through rain (leaking roof) and shine (skin cancer), dog attacks and domestic insanity, with all its attendant insomnia and penury, not to mention the compensatory consumption of kilos of The Shingle Inn's excellent White Christmas.
But now be warned!
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