So wrote Carol Ann Duffy, the Poet Laureate when she threw her weight behind the fledgling NATURAL BEE- KEEPING TRUST, in becoming NBKT’s PATRON.
“I am delighted to offer all the support I can to NBKT & to draw attention to the age-old connection between poetry and bees..We owe bees so much & should give everything in our power for their protection”
http://www.naturalbeekeepingtrust.org/
http://www.natural beekeeping trust.org/mantra
Last few days so beached, I’ve thought of my Aunty Gertie…who spent many an hour, many a day, on the loo: that’s the Legend.
Gertie and Rick lived in those long line, red brick houses in 1930s Liverpool. Privet hedge two feet from front door. Weekly polish; front step…Red Cardinal, letter box…Brasso. Enter the tunnel hall. Stairs straight up left. Parlour on the right. Aspidistra defending the netted window. Proud glass cabinet displayed BEST things… Never opened. Painfully untuned, unplayed piano. Musty still, in my nostrils. A funeral room, on hold….
Next door…. Light… Fire… Hub of the Home…The back kitchen… Black iron range…Clock and two China dogs above…Ancient maiden Aunty Lyle sat sitting in hard-backed chair close to ever- boiling kettle. Mum Lil & Gertie … catching up from their loneliness. Me, sitting there!
Gertie ‘lost’ Rick years earlier. Took usual cuppa up to him one Sunday afternoon…Dead in bed…Hair still elegantly Brill-creamed.
To my amazement one quiet afternoon, I spied two discreet tears moving down, down Aunty Gertie’s cheeks.
The Crone Goddess, together with the Mother and Maiden Goddesses, represents part of the circle of life.
In today’s society which worships youth and beauty, the Crone Goddess is frightening and misunderstood as she represents destruction, decay and death.
Positively, she’s depicted as a Grandmother, wise woman, or midwife. Crone derives from ‘crown’, suggesting wisdom emanating like a halo. Her child bearing days over; she’s the wisdom keeper, seer and healer and midwife, whose knowledge is sought to guide others during life’s hardships and transitions.
The Middle Ages Church feared these wise women and the esteem from their communities. Many were killed during the Inquisition and the wise woman of old was relegated to the Wicked Witch and Hag Archetype of fairy tales – the meanings of witch and hag deriving from ‘wit’ denoting wisdom and ‘hagio’ meaning holy. Today as women live longer and take more prominent roles within society the tide is starting to turn as they start to reclaim their power.
[ Pix – Rosa Davis] www.goddess-guide.com/crone.html
Friday 21 April 2017 was Britain’s first ever working day without coal power since the Industrial Revolution, according to the National Grid.
The control room tweeted the milestone – it is the first continuous 24-hour coal-free period for Britain since use of the fossil fuel began. West Burton 1 power station, the only coal-fired plant that had been up and running, went offline on Thursday.
Britain was the first country to use coal for electricity when Thomas Edison opened the Holborn Viaduct power station (London 1882).
Hannah Martin, head of energy, Greenpeace UK – “The first day without coal in Britain since the Industrial Revolution marks a watershed in the energy transition. A decade ago, a day without coal would have been unimaginable, and in 10 years’ time our energy system will have radically transformed again’’
Gareth Redmond-King, head of climate and energy, WWF – “Whoever forms the next government after the general election, must prioritise a plan for reducing emissions from all sectors.”
www.theguardian.com/environment/2017/apr/21/britain-set-for-first-coal-free-day-since-the-industrial-revolution
[Guardian – Georgia Brown 22/4/17]
‘This business of petty inconvenience, of being kept waiting about, of having to do everything at other people’s convenience, is inherent in working-class life. A thousand influences constantly press a working man down into a PASSIVE role. He does not act, he is acted on. He feels himself the slave of mysterious authority and has a firm conviction that “they” will never allow him to do this, or that or the other.’
George Orwell – The Road to Wigan Pier 1936
Does current folk wisdom say that the experience which most people have of their personal power, has not altered since 1936 ? Or forever ? Vote Brexit ? Vote Trump ?
JUST VOTE !
[Pix – Philip Guston, Mural Work and Play, for the Queensbridge Houses Community Center, NYCHA, 1940]
We have been reviewing The Imagination Acts in order to create more space for various STORY formats; ranging from fleeting thoughts to lengthy scripts or detailed reports about events we judge to be significant. In addition, we have improved cross referencing access to the sections .
That done, we’re now promoting the site by a scatter of contact cards to friends and supporters; placing info in local event directories and initiating a monthly update-email to our Network.
…and exploring social media….Easy familiarity for many but very new to me…
AND a heart warming way to keep in touch with an ever expanding NETWORK.
Help, if you like TIA.. by telling friends about us. Appreciated.
At the Christian celebration of Easter ..in the midst of the miracle of Spring’s awakening.. we honour the celebration of CONNECTEDNESS in all Faiths
Brian – a good friend of ourselves and of THE ENVIRONMENT, saw this tree in Swinley Forest; an Oak hosting a Rowan.
He is one of a number of friends who share thoughts and observations on a regular basis, around connections between nature and spiritual insights.
We go to a lot of Celebrations of Lives. Not all elderly, either. Carefully setting aside the Faith enfolding of the ceremony…Here’s reflections created by family & friends. Stories from family standing up front, tell us more about the Departed than we ever knew. And there’s those photos of them smiling out at us, usually in their prime. Gosh! How lovely. The dear ones’ favourite music lets the listeners, even farther into the mind of the box’s cargo, lying there under flowers. And the Service Sheets frequently self- published. What a deeply touching wreath of grief, appreciation, relief, ‘wish- I’d – known / done- more’ feelings… all going on in our hearts. Tears. We are scant on wailing in this country, out loud that is. Then standing outside, slowly emerging back into so-called ‘life’. Recently we ‘saw away’ a limo to the cemetery with a golden ‘MUM’ of chrysanthemums. Visiting the grave next day, all golden flowers..gone. Just the wire-framed ‘MUM’ remained and some oasis. Rabbits or maybe Deer ?
As an 83 year old woman, I write of my childhood and young womanhood. BOOKS were central to my family life. It was the era when ‘getting educated’…going to University…rising up the social scale…My Father adored Foyles book shop, Charing Cross Road. Here he bought SETS… all 32 volumes of Balzac, Dequincy, Mary Webb. Beyond the book-shelves which my Dad botched up, there were LIBRARIES! Those quiet places filled with great literature. Knowledgeable LIBRARIANS who could answer all your enquiries. And after accident, Arthur survived months of pain and poverty by my Mum’s VISITS TO THE LIBRARY; couldn’t WAIT, to see what she’d got in her basket.
It grieves me beyond measure that these HAVENS of culture, inspiration, eye-openers to the world and SOLACE and QUIET are under serious attack. Buying cheap from Amazon or Waterstones .. watching TV and DVDs is absolutely NO SUBSTITUTE for the libraries, so PROUDLY established in the last 100 years .
To think so, reveals BARBARISM LET LOOSE by our elected local ‘leaders’.