The Satsuma is starting to go green,
untouched it has gone sour, the sweetness
sucked dry and stale,
I really wanted to taste this Orange fruit
but unlike the plums it held no thought
of ripeness in my mind;
the Christmas stocking,
oversized woollen sock
held many a delight, the Corgi toy car,
a cracker bound in small explosive,
yet every year the Satsuma would poke
its way out of the top of the stocking
and go mouldy before my eyes, even on the coldest
Christmas Day.
Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *
If travel broadens the mind then anyone who takes their instrument of choice beyond the horizon that they see in their first tentative steps of learning is to be congratulated, such is the temptation to just play and not allow the words to flow naturally into the performance, that so many people only ever see the result in the illusion and dreams but never do they take their musical passport to look officialdom in the eye and use the experience to be seen as Crossing Borders.
Like a bomb,
encased in skin,
I just want to self-destruct,
pushing myself
to the limit of simmering pressure,
I want to explode
and be a second sun
on the horizon
at Dawn…
you disarm me
only with your smile.
Ian D. Hall 2016
If it should end, let it end now,
stop dragging it out,
stop feeding the worm in the mind,
for today I discovered futility
and it is a word that I cannot abide.
Wasted years, never in search of riches
and to those I may have hurt, unknowingly
or their perception of what I said,
I apologised more than once if you deserved it,
but blow me down
if you think I am going to kneel
and take your crap forever, infinity was long enough.
Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * * *
Simon Thacker it seems can not only make an enigma shine brighter than it could be imagined in the furthest reaches of an audience’s hopes and dreams but he can do it with such style that no matter what genre of music you find yourself most drawn too, he will have you believing in the art of classical Folk with the added bonus of Roma, Polish and the mysticism blend of the table as if it one of the finest undiscovered joys possible.
The smile of Howard Kendall had entranced him
and the dogged determination of Alan Ball
had always stuck in the mind of this
good son of Goodison as he took his seat
or stood withstanding the noise of the Kop
on alternate Saturdays,
from the days of childhood,
through pouring rain of success
and the desert years of despair, he was faithful,
always sucking on the toffee,
cheering on days of Imre Varadi and the hours
between cup and league, his home painted blue
Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 8.5/10
We are all animals in our own farmyard; we might not like thinking about the fate of the horse, why the pigs are lording it over us or at what point the farmer was allowed to take retirement, yet still we go on, still we place our faith in the feed and the illusion. It takes art to give life meaning, everything else can just be the sound of sharpening knives and it takes real vitality and animation to alert all considered that these could be the Last Days At The Farm.
I never had flu till I had turned 45,
not true flu, I had woken early one morning
whilst I was back packing through rural Normandy
with my head resting in a
dirty storm formed puddle
and I know I probably looked awful for about a week
and the thoughts of unfulfilled dreams
of making peace in my time across the Channel
brought to a premature and early end.
Now every week I seem to be fighting back infection,
the assault on the body, the throat, the eyes,
Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *
The heart rejoices when it hears of a collection of souls achieving a singular aim, a goal far greater than they might have ever believed possible, such is life now that all the glory, all the praise seems heaped upon the younger members of society when the ones who have seen the action, who have lived through the raging wind and the autumn clouds deserve the same applause, that when anyone puts something together with passion, all should be seen as equal under the heavens.
A Blue balloon,
attached to fraying string, the sky
the limit
in its desire to see
the world for what it truly is,
held only by childish fingers,
white with tightness,
grim determination upon the glowing face;
like that balloon
I yearn to look down
upon
the shit storm
we have created
and I will pull away from the fingers that bind me
and sail into the sky
before
I inevitably
Pop.
Ian D. Hall 2016