Kill or Cure: Cancer & Coronavirus
Well, be careful what you wish for. When in my last post I asked for 2020 to be a year of healing, little did I dream that the universe would respond in epic fashion. Now it’s two weeks into the UK lockdown, and like most people, I’m still adjusting to the dystopian world we find ourselves in. An invisible…
2020: Let the Healing Begin (Please!)
What a year it’s been. Much as I believe in active hope, I found the General Election result incredibly demoralising. Not only was the Conservative majority achieved with a minority of the popular vote, and the bullying help of a billionaire media, I just can’t see how Brexit can be ‘done’ without destroying the United Kingdom. But Tory voters don’t…
Building Jerusalem . . . in Jerusalem
September sings, but the chords of summer echo on, not least of my visit to the Occupied Palestinian Territories in late July for readings from A Blade of Grass: New Palestinian Poetry, the bilingual anthology I edited last year for Smokestack Books. Travelling with Rachel Searle, the Director of BlakeFest (Bognor Regis) – for whom I am consulting on…
Farewell to 2016 – and Cancer
What a year. When it comes to traumas we’re spoiled for choice, but as Amnesty International and Greenpeace remind us, 2016 also brought many victories for humanity and the planet. Here at home, I’ve been celebrating the official All Clear, which clear as a bell, arrived with impeccable timing on Dec 23rd. I’ve still got follow-treatments to come, but to…
‘A Pacifist’s Guide to the War on Cancer’ . . . and Fascism
I’m home from a weekend in London where, with the help of wonderful friends and a small wheelie suitcase I celebrated the end of chemo by taking a few baby steps back into the world beyond Brighton hospital clinics – and a big breath of freedom before my operation on Dec 6th. Thanks to the success of my chemotherapy cycles,…
Defying Dark Skies: the Eco-Warriors of the West Bank
As promised, here are my photo diaries from my recent week in the West Bank. I made it in to Israel-Palestine safely from Cyprus, though what possessed me to put a copy of Kahlil Gibran’s The Prophet in my hand luggage, I do not know! Although it is not illegal to visit the West Bank, you have to do so…
2015: The year of living philosophically?
Farewell 2014, but may your turning tides sweep us between the icebergs and whirlpools of political despair and environmental collapse, toward the hard-won shores of a fairer world. For though global disasters and injustices only seemed to intensify this year – climate change, Syria bleeding into Iraq, Israel’s genocidal attack on Gaza, Ebola, Boko Haram, racist executions on the streets…
Astra & Eco-Literature: Havant Lit Fest Event [Sunday Oct 12th]
From Palestine to eco-literature – my autumn events are rippling out into planetary concerns. Many thanks to the Havant Literary Festival (Oct 3-12) for inviting me to read from Astra at the eco-literature event on their programme this year. I was leaf-tickled to hear that my friend the wonderful eco-poet Helen Moore has been added to the bill! A half-day…