I am of Cornish blood,
it hangs in my veins like the apple
orchard that hugged the cliff
looking down on The Tamar,
rough water leading to two miles of joined land,
looking across to Plymouth
and the Hoe in which I kicked a football
and the early swimming lessons in the sea stormed
and tossed lido, perfect on summer’s days
with ice cream in hand
and the barnacles wading in with the march
of the sea.
I am of Cornish blood, it races through my veins,
Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * * *
Time is nothing more than illusion, something purposely created by humanity to make sure we find ways of being productive and marking the hours between dawn and dusk so that the darkness of night has something a little more concrete to hang onto, to remind us to get something down on paper that is tangible and worth leaving for the next generation.
Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *
To see the wreck on the shoreline, fire blazing through its hull, the explosion waiting to happen as the flames get nearer to the gunpowder and the bottles of premium whisky, the mast holding up resolutely and with pride; sometimes you just have to Swallow the inevitable and move back a few feet to take in the bigger picture, the dynamite of Rock that is about to shatter and pulverise the masses into submission; this is exactly what life is for, making the Rock move, to see the Burnt Out Wreck blaze in fury and fire, nothing comes close to excitement as this.
In wasting away by wasting the day,
a certain call from the crow on the church
roof reminds me that the rest
of the time available to me
as I spin in the void
is now in the red, I owe
Time, meaningless,
malingering Time,
a bomb waiting to explode
and Big Ben crumbles
but Time is to be honoured,
I am in debt to Time,
the second, the minute, the hour strikes
as the sun dips behind the crumbling edifice
of Johnson’s Cleaners;
Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 8.5/10
Tomorrow never comes, for many the possibility of it being worse than the day they have just lived through is enough to make sure the alarm clock never rings, that the year to come could be as cloudy as the one that just faded with nightmare stealth into the past. Tomorrow though should be viewed with a sense of optimism, with a sense of candour and hope and one that no matter what is the stepping stone to being able to breathe easily.
Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * * *
Cast: Shaun Evans, Roger Allam, Sean Rigby, Dakota Blue Richards, James Bradshaw, Anton Lesser, Caroline O’Neil, Daniel Attwell, Nicon Caraman, Geff Francis, Chris Fulton, Natalie Grady, Dawn Hope, Ty Hurley, Eleanor Inglis, Adam James, Katherine Kingsley, James Laurenson, Robert Lucklay, Abram Rooney, Gillian Saker, Tristan Sturrock, Abigail Thaw, Ruby Thomas, Sara Vickers, Tony Paul West.
Was it possible to feel jealousy
after so long of denying it existed
in my psyche, as I watched the young
poet, the woman of words
pour her life into my beaker
on a Monday night and make it overflow.
I don’t find jealousy attractive,
it is an emotional state
that leads to a rotten core
and Hamlet is no relation of mine
and his uncle an excuse to behave
like a bastard.
I muse all night and thankfully,
jealousy is not the cause, to find
Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10
Cast: Benedict Cumberbatch, Martin Freeman, Una Stubbs, Rupert Graves, Mark Gatiss, Amanda Abbington, Louise Brealey, Toby Jones, Lindsay Duncan, Sian Brooke, Asheq Akhtar, Usman Akram, Sharon Cherry Ballard, Miranda Hennessy, Lee Kemp, David Kirkbride, Tom Williams, Chris Wilson.
The rich and powerful can always be counted upon to act how they like, that in cases of responsibility, of holding back and restraint of acts of cruelty, they believe they are untouchable, above the law, both physically and morally; it is how corruption breeds, how money will always look after money and in the end how everybody lies just to keep in line, to toe the official version.
Like Samson, my hair
is not for sale,
mine though is not a sign
of heroic strength,
masculinity of its alleged highest form,
more in the way
that when it is short
I look like a thug
in the mirror, polished
but with dusty edges of time
throwing back images of the one hair cut
I forced myself to have
and how
in the end
I just stood anonymous
in the crew.
Ian D. Hall 2017
Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10
There is almost nothing that can touch the feeling of the unhappy or dejected cry in the dark that is wrapped in the tune of the unforgiving and delighted jig; the dichotomy of two states of mind that we find ourselves in when something upsets us but we know it is for the greater good that it happens.