The Bird and the Forgotten

I thought today I would post a short tale that I wrote for another blog, another time, illustrated with a lovely painting by Miki

The Bird and The Forgotten


The great train grumbled into Braunschweig station, almost reluctant to break its journey through the heartland of Eastern Germany. Grey green, grey green, it went, the sprawling farmlands contrasting sharply with the gunmetal urban decay of its forgotten towns.

I sat in my compartment, contemplating the day. A long day, filled with the miasma of endless travel that would take me from post-communist poverty to the sun-kissed shores of Spain. Eventually.

After a cursory glance along the platform, I returned my gaze to the novel I had wisely brought along to forestall the boredom, when suddenly a soft thud and a flurry of feathers in my peripheral vision caused me to look outside.

A tiny, imperceptible mark on the carriage window was the only clue…..I looked down and saw a still, feathered form on the platform.

Then, slowly, very slowly, it began to regain its wits, and sat, stunned, alone and abandoned on the platform, a sparrow of sorts, I think, though ornithology is not one of my strong points.

It looked like a confused traveller that had alighted at the wrong stop. More than a little frightened, it glanced around worriedly. The train made ready for departure, and I found myself urging it to wait, that I could longer observe and witness the outcome for this poor unfortunate.

It became apparent that it was severely injured, for it moved not an inch, and the feet of a thousand impatient travellers, unaware, were perilously close.

The train conductor paced backwards, carriage by carriage, purposefully along the platform. I held my breath…he signalled the impending departure, as he walked, backwards, ever backwards, his boots coming down mere millimetres from the bird.

I realised then….like an epiphany, I was witnessing a metaphor for modern life and the victims that fall beneath the cracks. Powerless to alter their destiny….ignored by the masses…and life, hanging by the slenderest of threads.

© Kev Moore 2006, painting by Miki

Another Brick in The Wall…

by Le Piou de Pomme

Hello everybody!

I invite you to come and take a drink at the Minibar.

Our youngest artist Le Piou de Pomme is exhibiting here a new drawing, to which I – his proud godmother – have given the title of that wonderful song by Pink Floyd. I will never forget how I was listening to it on loop while I was travelling by night through the North of Norway, on my way to the Northern Lights….

Anyway, the more I look at this picture the more fascinated I am. Really, take time and look at everything there. Each detail is so enjoyable,  sometimes even a big mystery, and the featured characters have such a strong expression by simple means.

I adore the two people on the bottom  putting their fingers in their ears… not to hear the plane in the sky?

I also adore the little cool and relaxed figure on the bottom right, like an impartial observer.. the artist himself perhaps?

And the one on the ground?

And the bricks on the wall!!! Absolutely wonderful!

And the door, no more belonging to the house it seems…

I am generally not an adept of taking art, poetry, music, etc, into pieces, but in this case I cannot help to observe everything.

I would be happy to hear your comments about this adorable picture, and anyway:

we should all support and welcome  our young artists from the MiniBar!

Piou, I love your drawings and I love you!

************************************************************************************

31.01.2008 Supplemental

Yesterday I asked  Pomme, Piou’s mother, if she could ask Piou what he had in his mind as he made this great drawing. Pomme translated to Piou this post and the first comments Kevin and me left, and here are their own comments and explanations :

• les deux enfants ne se bouchent pas les oreilles, ils font une grimace.

(Il a représenté là des jumeaux qui ont été longtemps ses amis et l’ont mis de côté maintenant …)

The two children don’t put their fingers on their ears, they are making a face.

(He has featured twins who had been his friends for a long time and ignored him now…}

• L’avion ne fait aucun bruit !

The plane isn’t making any sound!

• C’est bien lui qui est représenté en avant du dessin (toujours habillé)

It is really Piou himself in the foreground (always wearing clothes)

• le personnage par terre il s’est fait taper par les jumeaux et le personnage à part sur la droite va venir le chercher.

The character on the ground has been beaten by the twins and the character on the right side is coming to gather him.

• Quant à la porte, c’est la porte du jardin!

As for the door, it is the door to the garden!

************************************************************************************

By Miki

Separated at Birth…..

Following a discussion that came up on a previous thread with Viv..I present my evidence….

by Kev Moore…oh okay then your Honour, some photomagic by Miki too!

Bullfighting is a Mug’s Game!

I am very proud to present you today one of the products which The Bay Attic in Scotland have created especially for my

Bull and Bullfighting Art site.

I have received these two mugs, yesterday, together with some other wonderful products which I will present in my site there. These cups are simply wonderful, beautiful quality and design.

Right now Kevin is making coffee and we will use these cups for the first time, here, in Cafe Crem, right now!

Cheers and Ole!

PS: Please don’t start here discussing bullfight as such… if you want to do that, I have a special blog

Amour Toro

where your comments (positive and negative) are most welcome!

By Miki

The Lazy Poet

He went through life oblivious

To all good things

That were his fortune to behold

The beauty of a summers morning

The joy at seeing children

Welcomed back into the fold

The sight of two old people

Walking hand in hand

Or swallows heading southwards

In the sky

Never seemed enough

To stir his hand to writing

He’d just observe, in passing, with a sigh

And all this depth of wonder

Washed in silent splendour

O’er his heart

He never grasped the need

To write it down, and play his part

For there are wonders in this world

that someday maybe lost

We fail to tell about them at our peril…

…And the cost to each man’s soul

Each infinitesimal  amount

Diminishes by sad degrees

Just what we are about

So the old, old lazy poet

In the autumn of his years

Pledged to write of childhood dreams

And all his hopes and fears

But all too little, much too late

As preparing now to meet his fate

He watched the cloud formations in the sky

And he put aside his pen and let a tear roll down his cheek

Onto the empty page, the lazy poet died.

© Kev Moore, 10am, in bed, 11/07/06

Accident of Birth

I was born a blonde
But beneath layers of fairness
There lurks a redhead,
Fiery, impulsive and hot.
I was born a Pisces,
On the cusp of Aries, Scorpio rising.
But I’m no bland cod-fish though:
I’m Jambalaya, in Cajun sauce.
I was born in the South;
Accident of fate, Northern stock.
Lose a leg? Hop, girl, hop!
They breed ‘em tough up there.
I was born a woman.
But my inner man sits firm,
Fists balled primevally
Nursing a proper pint.
I was born complicated:
Don’t try to understand me,
It’ll just make your brain spin.
Best just let me be.

by Viv

Bubble Boy – 9 -

Bubble Boy - 9 - , by Miki

(Original German Version)

(Bubble Boy – 1 -)     (Bubble Boy – 8 -)

…

And while the moon up there was falling deeper and deeper into depression and crying upon the world, he couldn´t help following with one tearful eye our little witch on her way through the galaxy. Barbra was slowly reaching her aim and had just started to make a landing manoeuver. Down there, in the sunless darkness of Barbracadabraland, stood her castle.

Yes, Barbra lived in a proper witch castle which she had conjured up herself. The thing is, a long time ago she had got a new broomstick for her birthday and on the first test flight she crashed exactly in this place. The air was clear and quiet. She was  gliding wonderfully through the sky and suddenly she had fallen asleep. A short while later, the impact with the ground had woken her up. She had not been smashed to pieces in the crash, but she she had got a lot of bruises and above all a big swollen nose. Unfortunately her nose had never swollen back again, and had even got a big wart in the middle. She was always asked if she had received the misshapen nose in the boxing ring and sensitive as she was, she hated it!  She had sworn to herself that this would never happen to her again, and she stopped sleeping on her broomstick, But over time broomstick technology made progress and one day she finally had equipped her broomstick with an autopilot. Since that day she’d been a fan of technology and kept herself informed about any new broomstick developments via the magazine,

“Witch Broomstick”.

Anyway, after that first fateful crash she had stood there, and there was absolutely nothing to be seen for miles around. She had walked all four points of the compass, but she had met with nobody…Well, almost nobody. In the woods she had found a strange creature with wings, let us call it an owl, which suddenly appeared and had flown behind her all the time. She thought, well, if nobody was there, then this land didn´t belong to anybody, and so she thought she might as well declare it hers. As nobody was there to vote against it, she called that land:

„Barbracadabraland

She had decided to build a real Witches castle there and flew back to her place, a little rented flat in Peckham . She spent day after day looking through hundreds of books featuring Witches castles. She seriously studied everything concerning their inner and outer architecture, and noted all the elements which she most liked. She was especially enthusiastic about a castle of which one of the towers had a long sleeping hat, and decided that she wanted a castle with such a tower. When she finally knew how her castle should look down to the tiniest detail, she started to study all her witch books to find out how to magic it into existence. She was extremely careful not to make the kind of fatal mistakes she always did, because a castle is really an important thing and she didn´t want to make a mess.  She finished her studies and eventually spoke the incantation, and there it was, her beautiful castle in the middle of Barbracadabraland.

Well, not all towers and corners were exactly straight , and not all lines obeyed the laws of perspective, but altogether it was the right castle for our little witch, and above all one of the towers wore a wonderful sleeping hat!

After that Barbra thought that it was time to change her look. She studied a lot of Witch fashion magazines, in search of the best outfit for such a castle …. She chose a long purple  hat –yes, Barbra loved all kind of long hats, perhaps because she was born with  a hat on her head!- and a long purple cloak…. . all wonderfully co-ordinated. Then she skipped the last month’s rent on her flat, climbed on her broomstick and flew back to her new castle in Barbracadabraland. In the moment she entered it, she felt a deep emotion, the kind of emotion you feel when you come home back home after a long journey.

Something though, was upsetting her.

She was not alone there.

The owl was back!

As Barbra was in the woods she had tried to get rid of her, but the bloody bird had followed her everywhere shouting

„Tuwit Tuwoo, Tuwit Tuwoo!“

all the time. And here it was again, following her into the castle.. Barbra, who was quite a superstitious person and had seen in her fashion magazines that modern witches have an owl as a pet,  thought that it was surely a hint of fate and decided to adopt her and call her “Tiwoo“. Original words were not Barbra´s  strength… And anyway most of the time she simply called her „Bloody Bird“.

Let us come back to Bub´s story now.  You remember, Barbra was heading home on her broomstick, with Bub caught in a net tied to the autopilot button. She had been away for days, her first long absence from her castle since she had got it, and she had missed it. She had even missed the bloody bird, although she would never admit it, and she felt a deep deep emotion as she saw them both again.  Because you know Barbra, although she was a real witch, was not so bad as the other witches we know from the stories. Sometimes she was really  happy about things, like the earth creatures were. She was quite ashamed of that though, and had tried, again and again to transform herself into a bad witch with some sophisticated spells, but it had never worked, She has even tried a very new method of psychology, called auto-suggestion, 1000 times loudly repeating to herself sentences like

„I am a bad witch I am a bad witch!“

or

„I want to be a really really bad, ugly witch“

or

„Me, Barbra Cadabra, the worst witch of all time!“

but it didn´t work. For example, she couldn´t help to feel some kind of warm thing in her heart for the bloody bird, sometimes it was even  like butterflies dancing in her tummy,  and  she  gave up eventually. She even thought, secretly of course, that these butterflies were quite a pleasant feeling! And anyway, nobody else but her could see her butterflies, and she certainly wouldn´t tell anybody about them, and certainly not the bloody bird! There was also no reason to worry about that…

(next instalment on Monday 2nd February 2009)

By Miki

Meaningful relationships

I had to go for a long stomp on the beach and thankfully, due to sunshine, I had company: the dog decided a six mile hike was just what she fancied today. There’s something decidedly naked and unnatural about going for a walk without a dog, if you are used to having one with you!

The reason for the stomp was down to simple irritation with someone. Not even someone very important to me, but it did get me thinking.

I’ve come to the conclusion that I can’t bear small talk any more. You know the kind I mean. Not the sort that is the socially accepted preamble to a more meaningful conversation, nor yet the gentle pleasantries exchanged between people at bus stops and doctor’s surgeries. I mean the banal exchanges of nothingness that takes the place of real conversation between friends. Now, again, I don’t mean the banter and playfulness that close friends engage in, but this deadly, dull, shallow and pointless chatter that masquerades as conversation when you’ve said all you’ll ever need to say to each other and you can’t yet face the fact that you have nothing worth saying any more. It’s a horrible feeling when you realise you have been talking to someone and actually, you really would have been better just walking away. It can be the awakening to renew a relationship, to find something deeper but in the main, it’s a death knell. It’s a clanging bell that says, this friendship is going nowhere, never was going anywhere. It may not ever have been a real friendship anyway.

Before anyone worries, I don’t mean me and mine. After 21 years of marriage, we can still find enough to talk about to keep us up half the night sometimes. It was just someone I was friendly with . It just made me realise that I don’t have time to waste on that kind of relationship, where meaningless nothings are exchanged rather than deeper somethings. I’d rather be lonely than fill my life with that sort of empty rubbish.

by Viv

Icicles on Rhododendrens

©2009 Psychscribe

Just words

Just words

No one listens to me.

But then I have nothing to say

I have not said a thousand times before.

I'm dying for someone to hear

My silent screams

And offer help.

I'm searching for the words:

The right words

The magic words.

They're just words;

They hold no power

To save or damn me.

Just words: no more.

by Viv