Emotions:

He watched the mushrooms slowly growing,

All those colours, and of glorious hue,

The deadly crop rockets were sowing,

Extirpating all in view.

The species had not chosen to die,

But according to data on the imaged screens

They most surely would, by and by,

And in technicoloured, apocalyptic scenes.

He pondered on, and thus deep in thought,

Almost missed the craft, high above the fray,

The very one, that which he sought,

Its occupants hoping to live another day.

Here he’d find the fool who started it all,

His vaunting ego and sycophantic peers,

All complicit in this decline and fall,

Reinforcing greed’s credo down the years.

He felt his rage rise, as it should not do,

As he considered this disgusting clown,

And the more he suppressed it, the more it grew,

As he thought of all he was pulling down.

So he imaged his sword, mighty and long,

Which reached out to mete harsh punishment,

And in seconds both clown and plane were gone,

Their atoms scattered o’er the firmament.

Then he imaged a clock and, with consummate skill,

Wound back the hands, reversing the scene,

And when satisfied, had local time stand still,

Whilst he dealt with this creature and its egoistic dream.

It lay in its bed, a smug look upon its face,

As he imaged a clamp, and with the greatest finesse,

Slowed down its heart to an untenable pace,

So it died in its sleep, and no one would guess.

He withdrew and imaged the original contract,

Which he’d signed when he took the lease on the place,

And once more felt a fool to be thus trapped,

And yet again had to fight to accept it with grace.

Though the emotions he mined here were sturdy indeed,

And his customers bought them without any quarrel,

He realised his judgement had been influenced by greed,

And he’d ne’er considered this amount of the hassle.

Emotion mining is complex, and a tricky game,

But the rewards could be high, and he found them so,

And over the eons he had made somewhat of a name,

And had many famous clients (though confidential) in tow.

To be fair, these creatures blazed with emotion,

There was killing and loving, murders and great wars,

But they had to be nurtured with such huge devotion,

That the whole bloody place was now a bit of a chore.

He considered then on the other, not far from this place,

Where the creatures were wild in their feelings and thought,

And imaged his way there, through both time and space,

And sought out the intervention he’d so recently wrought.

There in a rough stable a new-born baby lay,

With wise men and shepherds cooing over the child,

And he sighed with relief, knowing that someday,

A new religion would send the population wild.

It was best, he considered, to go for tried and tested ways,

Though the yield might not be high it gave a solid result,

And on this planet with a big moon he’d wait out the days,

Until they were all killing each other for some religious cult.

And he’d mine their emotions, their burning desires,

Their hatred, their love, their every high and every low,

And he’d nudge a little when needed to stoke up the fires,

And no longer take the risks of betting on one throw.

Nobody understood the trials and tribulations

Of an entrepreneurial Fallen Angel on the go. 

He was not evil, indeed kind to both friends and relations,

All he needed was these enterprises to pull in some dough!

My Dears:

If all we have is time, my dears,

And it runs like a gushing stream,

We’d best up off our arses my dears,

And make reality of our dreams.

Let’s build those castles for real, my dears,

Let’s slay dragons and then maidens free,

Let’s fly rockets up to the stars, my dears,

And make worthwhile the clock’s ticking fee.

Let’s take up the stranger’s hand, my dears,

And maybe carry him through the storm,

For its love that makes for life, my dears,

And what you cried out for when you were born.

Let’s make a mark of love, my dears,

Let’s hound the harmers to hell,

And let the meek inherit the lot, my dears,

On a peaceful planet to dwell.

But be ye not meek yourselves, my dears,

Be bold, cry havoc and grasp the day,

And journey you out to those stars, my dears,

You have such a playground in which to play.

Shake green aliens by the tentacles, my dears,

Embrace oozy blobs and learn their ways,

And reach out to infinity and beyond, my dears,

No matter what the philosophers say.

Seek at the last the face of God, my dears,

And touch it in humility and grace,

And thank Her for all the hard work, my dears,

In making this glorious place.

Dear (Dis)United States Of America,

I write to you as a deeply concerned friend.

I am worried that you might start to get used to it and think that what is happening is normal.  It is not, and it never can, or will be. 

Don’t let your desperation allow the occasional right response make you feel relieved and hopeful.  Those occasional right responses are just little rays of sunshine and they do not signify better weather ahead.  Sadly, they are the aberrations; the norm is the storm.

Yes, he did the right thing in going to Houston, pledging a million dollars of his own money and hugging a few of the poor souls.  Then he said to the people as he left,  “Have a good time, everybody.”  That’s the real Trump; that’s the self-absorbed  narcissist showing the true level of his empathy.

Don’t let go of his efforts to cancel ‘Obamacare’ and dump millions into a nightmare world of no medical cover.  Don’t lose sight of his attempts to ban Muslims, his disregard of the plight of refugees and his desire to make the lives of ‘illegals’ (No person, ever, in all of history, has been, or is an ‘illegal’!) even harder than it is already.  Don’t turn your back on attacks on the poor, the vulnerable, the different.  

Hold fast, please dear Americans, to the words of Emma Lazarus, engraved on the Statue Of Liberty:

"Keep, ancient lands, your storied pomp!" cries she
With silent lips. "Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.

Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!"

Those words, that dream, such magnificent ideals, something to truly be proud of!

Keep them close to you, a burning ember in your very soul; a light to send the dark cockroaches of his racism, sexism, xenophobia and contempt for those he pretends to represent, scuttling back into the darkness of your sewer systems and swamps where they belong.

You stand for something, you Americans.  Sure, sometimes we folk from the old countries find you a bit brash and loud, but even then we have known that deep down, where it matters, you have big, warm, welcoming hearts; that your country has encouraged dreams, freedom and democracy.  You have been the ‘melting pot’, not just of peoples but also of hopes and ideals, faiths and ideas.  You have stood by the poets, artists, writers and dissidents that will not bow to tyranny.  You have stood, across the world, for freedom.  My heartfelt thanks for that.

Yes, you’ve sometimes got your own funny ways (Your gun laws are pretty hard for non-Americans to understand, as are fundamentalist churches which don’t open as refuges in a crisis until they’re forced to and, oh yes, good old Westoboro Baptists, how on earth did you let that happen, and what’s with peanut butter and jelly?) but we held you in our hearts because there were so many times when we could see the best of humanity in you, when you have fought and died for freedom, not just yours but also other people’s, and when you have, quite literally, reached out for the stars. 

A plague now sits where all that hope sat, and its shadows threaten the light.  A few rich men, and they are mostly men, and a cruel and uncaring man who would be king, are trying to reshape your country to suit their greedy and selfish desires.  Where JFK reached out to the moon, Trump wants to build a wall;  where President Obama showed true concern for the planet, the poor and oppressed, Trump couldn’t give a damn. 

I could go on, but I won’t.  You can either see what I’m getting at, or you can’t.

My prayer remains the same.  Please, dear, damaged US of A, continue to resist, as so many of you are, and don’t, ever, get used to it.  It isn’t normal.  It isn't democracy.  It isn’t the USA’s way. 

Yours, most sincerely,

An Old Admirer

2.3 billion:

It can be easy, in this time of instant access to information,

To be ground down by the misery in the world.

The oppressed, the starving, the refugees,

The folk caught in natural,

And unnatural, disasters;

Man’s inhumanity to his fellow creatures.

It can seem that there is so much dark,

That it will inevitably continue,

And may someday smother totally the light,

A sort of humanitarian total eclipse.

I came upon this piece of information a couple of days ago,

And I didn’t know where to put it in my heart or mind. 

It didn’t compute;

It is so big,

It is emotionally incomprehensible,

A sort of black hole

With regard to my compassion

Or ability to relate,

But it also made me angry,

Wildly angry in my heart,

Because this should not be!

2.3 billion people in the world,

(That’s around one in three of the world’s population)

Do not have access to a decent toilet. 

289,000 children under 5 die each year

Due to diarrhoeal diseases

Caused by poor water and sanitation.

That's 800 a day,

Or 1 child about every 2 minutes,

All under 5 years old,

Their lives snuffed out,

Before they have really begun.

2.3 billion is a number so large

It is, ironically, meaningless

In terms of comprehensible numeracy,

To me, at least,

But is hugely powerful in

Presenting that which is vast,

Vast beyond my imagining.

It’s like saying,

‘Nearly as many stars as there are in the sky’

Or, ‘Not quite so many as grains of sand in the Sahara.’

  

I needed to find an equivalence. 

It’s almost the same as all the people in:

Europe - 738,849,000

Africa - 1,216,130,000

South America - 422,535,000

Added together.

That equals 2.3 billion plus a few million,

And all these people

Do not have a decent toilet.

Can you imagine all across

Europe,

Africa and

South America

There isn’t a decent toilet anywhere?

There are whole areas of the world,

Massive communities like that. 

All those people are going

To relieve themselves in hedges, woods,

Buckets, holes in the ground. 

And we’ve heard about the young girls who get raped

Because they go to the jungle in the night time to go in private.

How do you fancy that?

You and your kids,

Your grandchildren,

And your grandma?

Now for those 289,000 children under 5 dying each year 

Because they don’t have access to clean water. 

That’s like the entire population of Doncaster

Dying in one year,

But these are all under 5 years old.

800 dying a day is easier,

And I can make it personal,

Personal enough to really hurt me. 

That’s the number of kids

In one of the schools

Where I was headmaster,

All dying in one day -

Except they’re all under 5

And it’s every day,

Day after day after day.

Picture an under 5 year old. 

Picture, if you have one,

Your child as an under 5 year old. 

Imagine now an under 5 year old

Dying every 2 minutes.

Let it be personal. 

Feel the fear. 

Feel the grief. 

Feel the anger. 

Feel the sense of raging inadequacy and impotence. 

Every 2 minutes there are people feeling that, for real – 

Mothers, babes, toddlers, fathers, brothers and sisters.

It’s overwhelming, isn’t it!

Because I saw an appeal from Wateraid, OneDrop,

I was caught now, and went online to look at it further.

They reckon children are dying at the rate of 1 a minute,

Not 1 every 2 minutes. 

Maybe they’re not all Under 5

I don’t know. 

It doesn’t matter. 

It’s totally appalling! 

And when I‘ve thought about this ghastliness

It has seemed to me to be both

An awful, and totally unnecessary, tragic loss of life,

And a huge, intractable problem for anybody to deal with.

These people at Wateraid, though,

Seem to be a little loopy. 

They think they can make a difference.  

They apply to their work, the principle using the,

‘How do you eat an elephant?

One bite at a time’, model. 

You have to admire their excellent madness,

Especially since they’re saving lives, daily.

That would be some job to do,

Going to bed at night knowing

You’ve been saving children’s lives.

And for me,

‘I can’t do anything’

Changes to,

‘I can help them to

Make the difference

That will save lives.’ 

I guess we all could.

If you’re not convinced,

Think about your granny

Having to go out at night

And go to the toilet by some bushes;

Think about that under 5 child as yours.

https://www.onedrop.org/en/campaign/ 

A Break From The Office:

He exited his office, late again, and started to stroll home,

And the last of the Ravens from the Tower, Timothy by name,

Flew down, sat upon his arm, and gently krawed welcome.

Twilight fell across the land.  It was 12.22 p.m. precisely.

A herd of unicorns trotted, in sprightly fashion,

Past Harrods and on down Brompton Road, an elf upon

The first and three minotaurs, herding them on,

Aiming at the last for the docks where they would be

Embarked to establish herds on distant shores,

Where their meat was considered a great delicacy,

And their horns most highly prized as candle holders.

He’d read somewhere that they were so stupid,

If you turned their horn in the direction of the down spiral

It went straight into their tiny brain and they dropped instantly.

He thought them rather beautiful though, and reckoned to

Remain a piscatarian.   You wouldn’t cuddle a fish, but he

Reckoned he'd cuddle a unicorn foal - in total secret!

At the corner of his eye he saw a human, a collar upon its

Scrawny neck, being led by an elegant, bejewelled Pixie.

He didn’t approve, but now they were quite rare in the

Home Realm there was a bit of a fashion for owning them,

And somewhere he had heard, breeding the strange little souls.

This, news did not sit easy with him.  Enough of them still

Leaked through, some causing all sorts of damage

In their rushing about, screaming, and what have you.

He shrugged, turned and hailed a passing rickshaw.

He chatted, then, as was his wont, with its centaur.

As with all such, he had strong views about everything!

Thus he pleasantly whiled away unhurried time

Until they stopped nearby the Teddington Lock.

He gave the centaur a charm, more for the entertainment

Than the speed of the ride. He was getting on a bit, in truth.

Having made then his farewells he strode over to the barge,

His home when in the Home Realm, placing Timothy on his

Perch by the door as he ducked inside.  Esme was not there

But he had guests, it appeared.  Oh joy!  He had other things

In mind, more personal and intimate.  They would have to wait.

It is said that elves drink naught but wine.  Not so.

He passed each of the trio a glass of fresh pressed, chilled

Synsepalum dulcificum[1] juice, the berries for which,

Courtesy of his dear friend the Arch-Mage of Oxbridge,

And then seating himself comfortably, asked them, what news?

Arwen, it was, who took up the answer, her great eyes wide.

There was to be much bloodshed it seemed, in the Old Lands,

Elven folk set against Dwarven folk.

The Species Covenant itself was threatened!

Madness rampaged, so it seemed, and a new territory

Had been declared, centred upon

The Holy City of Jershalom/Jerusalem,

Elven followers of the Mage of El-Shaddai violently

Casting out from the homes many of their rightful owners,

Allowing succour only to others of their exact ilk;

And now a great army of the Dwarven folk

Surrounded the entire city, led by Caldria,

Servant/Priest of Clangeddin Silverbeard,

And she was swearing absolute and total destruction

Of all followers of the mad mage,

Covenant be damned!

Shit, he thought.

.....................................................................................................

The dragon rider hailed him, reached down

And gave him a hoist up.  He settled on his saddle,

Checked Timothy was secure in his carry-bag,

And then prepared for the hop to Heathrow.

It would be faster to use a human transport,

And time was of the essence, if disaster

Was to be avoided – and his Master said it was!

 

A scant handful of minutes were to pass

Before they set down in Terminal 4

Where he swiftly established a Man identity, and then

Jumped to an El Al flight which was currently boarding,

Direct for Ben Gurion International Airport.

He preferred El Al for their paranoia.  Humans

Seemed to have a rash of mad bombers, and El Al

Security systems were very tight.  Since he needed

Not to wait in queues, having switched his mark

Into the Home Realm, he boarded the craft,

Strolled to First Class, and took the seat of,

He glanced at the ticket, a Mr George Granville,

A big wheel, he gathered from the obsequious

Greetings of the stewards.  Sipping champagne -

Humans had some useful skills - he felt a pang of

Remorse regarding Mr Granville who was suffering

The ignominy of flying aback a dragon, stuffed in

A sack.  He would be dropped in front of the

US Embassy, and the blessing he carried,

Good for one trip only, would send him back into his realm.

By the time he managed to establish his authenticity,

The flight would have long landed,

And he would have re-entered the Home Realm.

The flight was uneventful, with lousy food, as usual.

These creatures just didn’t know how to make a curry!

They even thought it was first developed by human minds

In the Octal land they know as India.  His mind briefly

Flitted back to curry eaten at formal dinners in the

Pixie Hold in Slough.  Now, Pixies really knew how

To make curry.  They, after all, invented it and

Had made it for millennia.  How the slosh they called

Curry came about in this realm, he knew not.

Why in the name of the Goddess had he ordered it?

A triumph of optimism over experience - again!

.....................................................................................................

Landing at 2.15 p.m. local time he slipped from

The light and heat of the tarmac in Ben Gurion Int

Into the Home Realm where the sun was rising.

He immediately freed Timothy from his travel bag,

To go and hail a dragon but found it unnecessary

As one dropped down beside him.  He was expected.

He climbed aboard and they made the brief hop to

Bethlem/Bethlehem, where the headquarters of

Caldria and her besieging troops was situated,

Somewhat of a way from the action, he noted wryly.

He landed in Manger Square, close by the

Church Of The Naivety as his folk liked to call it,

Where he was greeted by Caldria herself,

Golden armour plating glittering in the early sunlight.

He was not fooled, knowing under her outer coating

She would be covered in Kevlar, another useful

Invention - Dwarven, he recalled - that somehow humans had

Also got hold of and, as with curry, not completely

Successfully!  The Wise Goddess Danu be praised that

Their fearful weaponry did not function in the Home Realm!

She ushered him into a small, unadorned, private room,

Decorated with but two chairs, a table and two toadstones,

Where serving gnomes brought forth jugs of foaming

Dwarven beer which, praise all, it was obligatory to quaff

Until the jugs were empty before talks could commence.

Regretfully he cast a charm upon his stomach to hold back

The worst (though best) effects, plus any possible poison,

Thus obviating the need to swallow the ghastly toadstone

Which always gave him indigestion, poison or not.

It also made him look as though he trusted her.  He didn't,

But there was, of course, no harm in letting it appear so.

He chugged away contentedly, not prepared to rush.

Goddess, this Dwarven beer was mind-numbingly good and

Made the human brewed 1664 and Duvel seem like bats piss,

Though he conceded it was pretty good quality bats piss,

And in extremis in the Human Realm his bats piss of choice.

He stopped his wool gathering and observed Caldria

As she stroked her beard thoughtfully whilst

Staring deep into his eyes as though seeking answers

That would please her.  She found none there so

She asked if it was true.

His slightest of nods assured her that it was.

She then, in her zealotry, asked how many, as though,

If the odds were right, she might consider taking them on!

He answered very softly that it was three hordes,

Each horde containing one hundred thousand.

The news slipped into her heart like a cold stiletto.

She visibly gulped.  Three hundred thousand orcs!

He nodded slightly again, reading her mind,

And informed her then of the goblins,

A multitude on wyvern back, all armed to flame.

She nodded her understanding and slowly stood,

Shaken ... and beaten ... before she had really started.

If the Master proposed to put those troops into the field

To enforce his will, he was serious.  Very serious.

She bowed low and respectfully, and turned to leave.

He called her back, presenting the rest of his message.

This was not a defeat for her.  He was to visit next

The Mage of El-Shaddai and inform him of the same.

Since she wanted him gone, she should consider it a victory.

Suddenly then she smiled.  He loved those rare dwarf smiles.

They seemed to somehow rise from the heart and burst

From the lips and eyes, a sort of bubbling stream of joy.

....................................................................................................

He returned to his waiting dragon.

It was early, yet, and the twin moons had but risen a tad.

As he climbed aboard once more, informing the

Dragon master of his next port of call, Timothy landed.

He krawed urgently, seeking permission for a linkage.

He nodded and opened his mind, then to receive images

Of a pit full of stakes and heavy oil being camouflaged

Under the dragon landing pad within the Great Sin of Gog,

As the humans didn’t call it.  The Mage of El-Shaddai,

It appeared, thought that destroying the Master’s envoy

Might destroy the consequences of ignoring the message.

This really irritated him, more than a little.  It wouldn’t!

Unsure as to the loyalties of the Dragon Master

He had him put down near the Jay’ffa/Jaffa Gate,

Outside the city walls, and then having walked

From the dragon’s sight, slipped effortlessly, using once

Again his unique skill, into the bustling human realm,

Where he hailed a taxi to take him to the Great Synagogue, 

Feeling a little guilty when on arrival he slipped out without 

Paying.  He didn’t do money.  It was filthy stuff.

He swiftly cast a blessing on the driver, in lieu,

And then joined a group of tourists on a tour.

He lagged behind somewhat, using his blessèd skill

To dip in and out of the Home Realm until he established

Exactly where the Mage of El-Shaddai was standing

By the dragon landing pad, waiting to watch him die.

His timing was immaculate, though he said so himself.

He entered the Home Realm behind the Mage, placing

An arm around his plump neck and a knife against his mouth,

Requesting firmly that he did not wriggle.  It took but seconds

And he dragged the murderous zealot into the Realm Of Man, 

Where he dropped him promptly, with a shove, and swiftly 

Moved away, concealing himself amongst the visiting throngs.

He heard a commotion.  It was unlikely that the Mage

Would handle the situation well.  He would never have

Visited the Human Realm before, would not understand it,

And, of course, would know that he had no way back,

Unless the Master forgave him and sent his Envoy to

Return him to the Home Realm ... an unlikely event made

Even less so when two shots rang out.  Israeli security

Tended to be a little trigger happy when people,

Especially dressed in weird attire, ran amok.

...................................................................................................

He waited for two days, having found a pleasant inn

Within the Home Realm, well stocked with good food

And fine victuals, though, sadly, no Dwarven Ale; but

There was company that pleased, especially that of a

Wandering Mage, a story teller who was accompanied

By a small, Jack Russell which had somehow made it

Through to Home Realm and found itself a fine companion. 

The hours were easily passed there, swapping yarns

And playing cards with a strange trio of friends,

An imp, a knocker and, of all things, a leprechaun,

All on a furlough from the local Thieves Guild.

His sojourn was occasionally interrupted by Timothy,

Reporting on the disposition of the two sets of protagonists

In this particular, tasteless, pathetic and absurd drama.

True to her word, Caldria had marched her troops away

In good order, returning north to the mountains and

Cave communities they loved so dear, assured by him

Of the up-coming neutrality which would once again

Exist in the Eternal City, Jershalom/Jerusalem.

With the lifting of the siege, and the news circulating,

Supplied by eyewitness accounts, of what had happened

To the Mage of El-Shaddai, why, by who, and on whose order, 

The troops wisely, considering discretion the better part of 

Valour, discretely and quietly departed, first in ones and threes,

Then in larger numbers until quite soon the city was clear

Once more of military interference and could return, happily,

To its old life as a centre of scholarship and research.

He was glad things had ended so neatly, and though he

Regretted saying farewell to the inn and the good folk there,

It was none-the-less a pleasure to have Timothy call up

A long-distance dragon.   As he clambered up to the

Sleeping chamber upon its back, Timothy on his shoulder,

He smiled, more at home already as he noticed

The cheery cockney accent of the Dragon Master who

Welcomed him on board and wished him a good night.

He entered the little chamber, strapped in and to his surprise

Fell asleep so quickly that he knew nothing of the trip

Until Timothy woke him and informed him of their arrival

At London’s busy hub, Bushy Park Dragon And Wyvern port. 

 

He promptly gave the Dragon Master a considerable blessing 

And then went in haste to the rickshaw rank and chose a young,

Strongly built centaur for his ride home.  He was suddenly

In a hurry to be there, and call from the water the sweet Naiad,

Esme, his one and only love, and hold her warm against him.

He allowed himself the luxury of feeling his true yearning

For her and the tenderness no one would expect to find

Within the heart of the Master’s Prime Envoy and Assassin.

---

[1] Miracle Fruit