THE CORONATION PENCIL CASE

By Peter Woodgate 

To celebrate the coronation

Of our presently reigning queen

I received a pretty pencil case

It showed that very scene.

The gold coach and the horses

Came alive on that box of tin

And when opened up, a three-penny bit

Was waiting there within.

My immediate thought was that odd-shaped coin

And the sweets that I could now buy

The pencil case, a novelty,

Very soon it said goodbye.

As years rolled on I, often wondered,

Where that case might be

I regretted not keeping it somewhere safe

As now it’s antiquity.

But I have a feeling, we’ll meet again,

Only a dream then, until,

We find each other at the “order of the boot”

The case, at “a fair,” and I, at “the hill”.

Copyright Peter Woodgate

The DNA Factory: 09

 Homo-sapiens ~ DNA Factories

By Barefoot Medic

I recently listened to the book “A short history of nearly everything” by Bill Bryson.

Belatedly, on Disks 13 & 14 of 15, he turned everything on its head by suggesting that we are DNA factories.   I’m still coming to terms with his assertion that we exist to create DNA.   We are in the service of our genes, not the other way round!?   The reality of this chills me…

This puts all those sudden & unexplained cravings into perspective.   An extreme example would be the strange illogical cravings experienced by women during pregnancy.   The body is undergoing changes that require different building materials so, cram in the pickled onions, and swallow Vaseline by the jarful or whatever else your genes demand in order to create a new DNA factory.   

 

We didn’t invent DNA!  DNA was created at the dawn of time it is the same in humans as in insects & cabbages and has never varied since the creation of life.   DNA is not alive and yet all our energies seem to be concentrated on perpetuating its continued existence.

 Convo with my trouble & strife: 

By Len Morgan

"You lazy bastard, you got up at 10:00am & what have you done other than writing for that stupid writer's group blog and play on that silly bloody computer."
"But, I got up, got dressed, did the washing up, made tea, fed the dogs, picked up and flushed away poop in the garden, washed shaved & put my teeth in. It's now 10:35am, but you're still in bed reading on your I-phone.  What have you done?"
"I do everything! I cook our meals..."
"If you like I could cook once in a while..."
"I don't want to eat the shit you would serve up!"
"I could..."
"I don't like spaghetti bolognese, or boiled eggs & soldiers, or eggs & chips, Chilli Con Carne, shepherds pie or sausage & mash..."
"But they are all the things that I like!"
"Well, you're not getting em cos I won't cook em!"
"Then I could..."
"I've told you before, keep out of my kitchen! Except for doing the washing up, I can't do everything. That's an end to it!"  Storms out.

BURIED IN OUR THOUGHTS

By Rosemary Clarke

Imagine you're a Wega person
Having to exist from day to day
While you all are raped and tortured
The smile on your face must stay.
No one's helping Wega people
They're all concerned with cash and wars
But..what if they all KNEW that person
Say he or she was ONE OF YOURS.
Would YOU, in all kinds of fairness
Let it happen every day
WRITE TO YOUR MP about them
TELL THEM THAT IT'S NOT OK!

Copyright Rosemary Clarke

  

Chance passing?

Chance passing?

By Len Morgan

I inhabited a park bench where few choose to sit, he occupied its opposite end.  A boy of eight or nine, grubby face, scuffed shoes with unkempt hair, and a threadbare coat, inappropriate for December.  He shivered and cried.

"What grief besets you boy?"

"My mother is...dying," he rubbed his reddened eyes.

"That is sad boy, what ails her?"

"Cholera sir."

"There is a vaccine..."

"Too late."

"Can I help in any way?"

"You are kind, but her die is cast."

"What is your name boy, and where will you go?"

"My name is Arthur.  Where I go should not overly concern you.  I am here to await her final demise and bear her up to heaven."

"If you are so certain of her salvation why do you weep?"

"I weep for another.  One who has strayed from the path and is endangering his immortal soul.  I seek to turn him to the right path before his end becomes inevitable.  He has lost his faith and is in dire need of guidance."

"Can I aid you in your quest?"

"You can sir."

"Then tell me what I must do; if it is within my power it shall be done!"

"Your word sir?"

"You have it!"

The boy smiled, "father, return home bury your wife and renew your faith."

I moved closer that I might better see his face, could it be?  "Arthur my son, how could I not recognize you?   I buried you just nine months past.  The Scarlett fever that stole you from me, stole all purpose from my life." 

"My two sisters have need of a father.  Take care of the living; let me attend to mothers passing soul."  He smiled, and paled becoming ethereal, "By your own word, we will meet again.  Farewell, father."

 Copyright Len Morgan

DAWN CHORUS

 DAWN CHORUS ~ (OVER SOUTH WOODHAM FERRERS)

By Peter Woodgate 

Oh no, not another “lovey-dovey” (excuse the pun) description of birdsong in the morning, I bet your thinking.

Well, you would be wrong. 

I am going to tell you about the awful cacophony emanating from those little feathered creatures that repeatedly defecate over my freshly cleaned car, and, by flying at an approach angle of exactly 45 degrees, manage to splatter my nice clean windows and frames. 

I set my alarm clock early these days so as not to miss a word they are tweeting.

Yes, that’s right, Words. Over the last two years I have managed to decipher all those tweets, trills, coos and chirps and, consequently, now understand exactly what they are planning. Only yesterday I heard them discussing the day’s strategy.

I remember, clearly, it was the Wood Pigeons that started the ball rolling closely followed by the Magpies and Starlings. The Collared Doves took a back perch whilst the Robins, Tits and Finches had no issues and went their separate ways.

I listened, carefully, as the following plan was agreed.

No 1 Ashman Row

Their car had just been cleaned at the manual car wash, this was considered a waste of water which could endanger the bird population.

The punishment would be two pass-overs with random splatter.

No 15 Ashman Row

3 cats residing at this address, they are called Mangler, Killer and Mugsy. “be careful here comrades,” one of the pigeons piped up, “when their keepers call them in for tea they become Ginger, Fluffy and tiddles.”

“Thanks for that,” the head pigeon went on, “but whatever their names it appears they have been terrorizing the chicks that have recently left the nest.”

“The punishment is to be a repeated flyover of the shed (their favourite sleeping place) this should ensure that they all take unwanted additives back to their Master and Mistress, (house proud, you know).”

No 16 Asman Row

The indiscriminate cutting down of two Leylandi, thus destroying five nests.

Capital punishment was requested here, or at least, the pecking out of eyes.

However, they settled for the lesser option of storing up with berries of a nice dark blue or black colouring. They would then pepper the new white car and recently installed double-glazed frames.

No 17 Ashman Row (oh that’s me)

Failure to refill the feeder with expensive wild bird food used some cheap old stuff from Asda’s.

The punishment, (I held my breath here)

Repeated flyover of freshly oiled wooden garden furniture.

I leapt out of bed, went out in the garden and covered it up. I made the mistake, however, of looking up as I gave them a V sign, haven’t been able to see out of that eye since.

So, there it is, I lay in bed in the mornings listening to the prophets of gloom.

I should, of course, look to get my own back on these foul fowls but I am a softy when it comes to our little feathered friends and would not wish to harm them in any way.

I struggle to suppress a smile however, as I pass my neighbour’s doorstep and spot a pile of freshly chewed feathers.

Copyright Peter Woodgate  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 ROCKETMAN

by Richard Banks    

On my final day at school, the ritual of the school leavers’ assembly was held, certificates of one kind or another were handed out and the headmaster addressed the impatient escapees with an inspirational message that would have been better directed at zealot missionaries about to convert the heathen. I still remember his assertion that our school days were just the beginning of our education which would continue throughout our lives. I think he must have been referring to the university of life, to the life experiences that steadily and imperceptibly add to our knowledge of the world and its people. At the time I thought he was extolling the virtues of lifelong evening classes and the words, ‘you must be kidding mate’ flittered across my mind. What flittered through it next I don’t recall, but thoughts of evening classes were not to return for another four years. When they did it was because I had come to realise that learning was only a chore if you were required to do it.

      My voluntary return to formal education occurred when a local Institute advertised a new course in the history of London - the City of London to be precise. It rang all the right bells, appealing to my lifelong interest in English history and my recently acquired fascination with the City, where I now worked. I enrolled, and in the course of some thirty sessions, an engaging panorama of London life unfolded. Its success prompted the College to run a follow-up course on Georgian London, after which our tutor departed and a new man, Professor Troutman, took his place. The Professor was engaged to be our guide through Victorian London. To the disappointment of those attending, the Professor’s geographic concept of London stretched no further west than Aldgate Pump, while his idea of the average Londoner comprised a long list of socialist revolutionaries who had at some point sought refuge in the East End. Having failed to convert us to the revolutionary cause, he too departed, to later appear on the nation’s TV screens as a historical pundit. The college, noting the declining numbers attending his lectures, decided to run no further courses on the Capital’s history.

      This left me with the dilemma of what to do next. By now I had become an evening class junky and was prepared to try any subject in order to get my fix. After closely examining the college prospectus I decided to enrol on a course entitled, ‘The Asian World of Meditation and Levitation’. I suppose it would never have occurred to me to do so had it not been for the Beatle’s flirtation with transcendental meditation under the Maharishi Mahesh Yogi. For a few months everything Indian was in vogue and the first session of the course was attended by over thirty persons seeking the inner light that apparently came after many hours of sitting cross-legged on the floor.

     The tutor selected to take us on this spiritual journey was the Maharishi Matatashe, otherwise known to the local populace as Mr Singh of the Bombay Tandoori in Walthamstow High Street. At the beginning of each session, he would hand out fliers for his restaurant and then instruct us to contemplate various objects in the classroom as they might appear in orbit around the moon. To facilitate our meditative state he would strum a sitar, chanting hypnotic mantras in Hindi, which he had written on the blackboard with English subtitles. After six weeks, several students complained that they wanted to travel around a more interesting planet. Mr Singh, sensing that he was beginning to lose his audience, wisely decided that our meditational skills were sufficiently developed for us to move on to levitation.

      The first session was curiously like the meditation, in that we were required to visualise objects in space, but this time we were to imagine that we were travelling towards them. In order to achieve the intense mental effort that was needed to thrust ourselves upwards, we were told to shut our eyes and maintain complete silence at all times. Mr Singh began each levitational ascent, as he called it, by slamming the door of the classroom and ending it an hour or so later by slamming it a second time. Those students of a cynical disposition later expressed doubts as to whether Mr Singh was actually in the room between the slamming of doors. He was certainly very quiet, but I prefer to believe that he was in the sixth stage of inner karma, known as Karmadowna. My faith in our tutor was confirmed three weeks later when I saw him levitating several feet above the blackboard, although I can not discount the possibility that I may have been asleep. By the tenth session, I felt the weight of gravity slackening and a delighted Mr Singh confirmed that I had risen two centimetres above ground level. His attempts to convince other students that they too had ‘gone solo’ were greeted with scepticism by those less accomplished than myself. Indeed, several of them expressed dissatisfaction with Mr Singh’s teaching methods and threatened to report him to the College Principal.

      Mr Singh’s reputation was vindicated by an event as unexpected as it was dramatic. During the fourteenth session, the collective peace of fifteen persons pursuing various objects through various galaxies was interrupted by a loud thud and a shower of white debris from above. Awoken from our contemplative states, we looked up to see the flailing legs of one Herbie Lechenstein protruding from the ceiling. It later transpired that he had become tired of drifting around in space, and instead visualised himself strapped to the outside of an Apollo moon rocket. He was a keen astronomer and had watched all the space launches broadcast on TV. He knew every stage in the launch process and when he saw the engine ignite and the rocket begins to lift off above a cushion of orange flame he also took off with a sudden velocity that found his upper half peering into the ladies gymnastics class. The ladies were not amused, and neither was the Principal, who threatened to sue Herbie for criminal damage. The class was subsequently terminated and we received a partial refund of our fees. Herbie sustained a severe concussion and to the best of my knowledge never ‘flew’ again. Indeed, I understand that the incident so unnerved him that he could not bring himself to close both eyes for nearly two weeks.

     For my part, I have continued to practice the levitational techniques taught by Mr Singh. Although I have yet to make the breakthrough briefly experienced by Herbie, I consider it my greatest gift that in over forty years I have yet to wear out a single pair of shoes. So much is owed to further education.

                                                                                      Copyright Richard Banks