Survival, war, poetry. What is it like to fight for your motherland with words and on the streets? Here is a message to transcend time and place.
One snort for hello?
“It doesn’t have to be like this, as David Attenborough has reminded us at the end of every episode of his most urgently powerful and poignant series: Green Planet, and with force in the final fifth, Human Worlds. Solutions are tantalisingly within reach. At no risk to ourselves we can make our own surrounds much greener – and a lot more pleasant.”
Blow winds…rage, sing, make music
there’s something comforting about listening to the music made by a different natural force over which we have no control.
A kind of healing: poetry for endings and beginnings
How and when do you mark the passing of a pandemic which is not yet done? Politicians stumble, their messages swaying between promises of better days ahead and threats of worse to come. Can poets help us?
NHS alert: code red for climate change
Bold declarations of climate emergency and world beating targets came before the pandemic showed just how quickly human behaviour can change. We can do it when we have to. Yet last year’s euphoric thoughts of ‘building back better’ seem to have got lost.
Covid inspires a can-do response to old problem
Brace yourselves for good news. A ‘can-do’ story of enterprise, ingenuity, and kindness. Though, there is a familiar theme – how Covid has exposed the faultlines of our society. Who knew so many university students would be going hungry?
Emergency: close the gap between real life and government ‘FACTS’
“Too many lives have been lost or destroyed. Integrating equitable support services for those most at risk for covid-19 is a national emergency and governments should act accordingly”
How to end food poverty?
Fair shares? Big supermarkets and other private corporations have seen profits boom during the pandemic. If they each invested just a small percentage of their profits it could end food poverty in Britain.
Doses of compassion from the doctor-poet
“If it is our mission…to alleviate suffering as well as to preserve life …”
The crystal-clear words of doctor-poet Gael Turnbull feel like a timely gift in our time of need.
On the threshold: songs and poems for a Covid-safe Christmas
Covid has closed the doors at least for now. But, there’s death-defying joy in Michael Marra’s song, a lockdown escape to be played loud and long. Here’s Frida Kahlo cutting an intoxicatingly exotic dash dancing to Perdido among the locals in the singer’s favourite bar.