Waking The Gods

The Godheads are sleeping.
It’s their divine Siesta time.
At the appointed hour, they will be
awoken by the resident sadhu monks;
who will bathe and feed them
and dress them in today’s choice
of creamy silks and crimson robes
- ready to greet their adoring public.
That’s when the piped music will begin.
Shlokas will be spoken. Lamps will be lit.
And the doors to their golden shrines will slowly open.
There, beneath the luminescent limestone pinnacles
cross-legged in sockfeet upon the milky marble floor,
I will give thanks to Lord Vishnu for bringing her back to me.
I will give praise to Lord Shiva for giving us this second chance.
I will offer my blessings to Ganesh and Hanuman
for granting me the strength to form those
three-little-words
in my gullet once more.
Om Shanti my friends. Peace be unto all.

Neasden’s Shri Swaminarayan Mandir: Daily Murti Darshan

The Eighth Wonder Of The World

Old Father Thames is 535-metres wide
as it meanders around Woolwich Reach
in search of Gravesend and The Nore sandbank
and the open epicontinental sea beyond.
Standing guard against the threat of storm surges
sit the steel-plated sentinels of The Thames Flood Barrier;
their foundations sunk deep into the London chalk below.
Water levels continue to rise.
The British Isles continue to tilt.
These steel-plated sentinels stand firm. For now.
There are those who have claimed the barrier
to be “The Eighth Wonder Of The World”,
but in truth it faces some pretty stiff opposition
for that much-disputed of titles.
There’s the Acropolis of Athens for one.
And Cambodia’s Angkor Wat temple complex for another.
Then there are the 2,000-year-old Banaue Rice Terraces in The Philippines.
And the monolithic Moai statues of Easter Island.
There’s Istanbul’s Hagia Sophia cathedral.
And the Panama Canal.
And the Leaning Tower of Pisa.
And the Eiffel Tower.
And the Moscow Kremlin.
And the Empire State Building.
And the Sydney Opera House.
And Emperor Qin Shi Huangdi’s vast Terracotta Army.
There’s even the artificial Palm Islands in Dubia
and the Astrodome stadium in Houston Texas to consider.
Not to mention King Kong and WWF wrestler André The Giant.
(Both of whom are now sadly deceased).
However, to my mind, the main problem with
The Thames Barrier’s claim, is that it’s not even
the biggest moveable flood barrier in the world.
No, that particular honour goes to The Maeslantkering
- which is located in the Nieuwe Waterweg waterway in Holland.
Well, that and the fact that The Thames Barrier
would appear to closed to the public on a Bank Holiday.
Even thought the website said it wouldn’t be.

A Silent Light. A Holy Light.

Time lapses. The Earth undercranks.
Night sky gives way to dawn sky
gives way to widescreen daybreak
gives way to Old Colony
of Christian Anabaptists nestling in
Neo-Biblical landscape of Northern México.
Plautdietsch dialect carries on the morning breeze.
Bread is broken. Ears of green corn stand tall.
The enfant-terrible is slowly working his magic.
The enfant-terrible is slowly weaving his spell.
Allowing ifluence of Tartovsky and Dreyer to seep on through.
Shows us Love. Shows us Betrayal. Shows us Forgiveness.
Teases out visual and spiritual tour-de-fucking-force.
Rains fall. Heavens rotate. Light flares in the lense.
Out through open window flies cabbage white butterfly.
Out through open window, and off
over hill and over dale
and across bend of slow-moving stream.
On to the place where the sun sets and the cattle low.
On to the place where the first stars twinkle from
on high.

Carlos Reygadas's 'Stellet Licht'

50,000-Odd Fall Fans Can't Be Wrong. Can They???

I had a clear choice tonight;
the Santa Fe Centre Of Contemporary Arts in
The Royal City of the Holy Faith of Saint Francis of Assisi,
or The Galtymore Irish Social Club on Cricklewood Broadway.
Naturally, I chose the later.
Instead of the yucca flowers and the broken mesas,
I chose to come and watch an
ambling rambling shuffling shambling
creased crumpled cantankerous
non-sensical Illegible mumbling
50-year-old Mancunian strut his stuff.
Santa Fe is revered for its Pueblo Revival Style architecture.
And sure, while it may also possess
the oldest mission in the United States
and be blessed with arguably the
greatest sunsets anywhere in the known world,
it doesn’t have anything quite like Mark Edward Smith.
For he’s a true one-off.
And to hell with the mould.
Broken or otherwise.
Normal Social Club service will be resumed next week;
just in time for the annual Galway Association Dinner Dance.

Mark E. Smith reads the football results