The 25th

Christmas is Really Fantastic

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aNOtHEr fIlLEt fROm ThE mAGpIE cOLlEctiVe.

Have a Beatley Crimble!

and a Proposterous New Year to all my blogging chums!

The Twelve Days of Christmas Lament

On the twelve days of Christmas my true-love gave to me

some very nice presents but now it’s February

and the twelve drummers drumming are driving me insane

and the neighbours keep complaining and I've got an aching brain

but at least the leaping lords have gone, they leapt over the wall

and my true-love’s presents would be fine if my house was not so small

We've only got two bedrooms and the drummers sleep in one

In the other are the dancing girls which sounds like lots of fun

but I have to share under the stairs with the milkmaids and the hoover

and what with the urns and the cow and all, there’s not much room to manoeuvre

At least they’re up at the crack of dawn and a few winks I can steal

Until the geese start cackling. Goose eggs for every meal?

And we can’t coax the partridge down from the pear tree – Lord, we’ve tried

and the constant drumming upset the doves who commited suicide

and the swans swam off, well who can blame them? Lord what a palava!

The calling birds and hens were freed by a man in a balaclava

The best present was the five gold rings which I sold for quite a lot.

Next year I'd like something useful, please.

Like a holiday somewhere hot.

by Roger Stevens

A Feast of Posters

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aNOtHEr dIp INtO ThE mAGpIE mEMOrY pOOoL.

A Feast of Posters

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aNOtHEr drIp INtO ThE mIldEw pIDdLe.

A Feast of Posters

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aNOtHEr dIp INtO ThE mAGpIE mEMOrY pOOoL.

I have Never Seen a Straight Banana

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aNOtHEr dIp INtO ThE mURkEy MudDLe.

One Hour Photo - Remake with Stuffed Toys

New animation by my clever son Archie for a film studies A level project.

Poetry By Inches, Words By a Mile - T.S.Elliot

The Hollow Men
A penny for the old guy




I

We are the hollow men
We are the stuffed men
Leaning together
Headpeice filled with straw. Alas!
Our dried voices, when
We whisper together
Are quiet and meaningless
As wind in dry grass
Or rats' feet over broken glass
In our dry cellar
Shape without form, shade without colour,
Paralysed force, gesture without motion;
Those who have crossed
With direct eyes, to death's other Kingdom
Remember us - if at all - not as lost
Violent souls, but only
As the hollow men
The stuffed men.

II

Eyes I dare not meet in dreams
In death's dream kingdom
These do not appear:
There, the eyes are
Sunlight on a broken column
There, is a tree swinging
And voices are
In the wind's singing
More distant and more solemn
Than a fading star.
Let me be no nearer
In death's dream kingdom
Let me also wear
Such deliberate disguises
Rat's coat, crowskin, crossed staves
In a field
Behaving as the wind behaves
No nearer --
Not that final meeting
In the twilight kingdom

III

This is the dead land
This is cactus land
Here the stone images
Are raised, here they receive
The supplication
of a dead man's hand
Under the twinkle of a fading star.
Is it like this
In death's other kingdom
Walking alone
At the hour when we are
Trembling with tenderness
Lips that would kiss
Form prayers to broken stone.

IV

The eyes are not here
There are no eyes here
In this valley of dying stars
In this hollow valley
This broken jaw of our lost kingdoms
In this last of meeting places
We grope together
And avoid speech
Gathered on this beach of the tumid river
Sightless, unless
The eyes reappear
As the perpetual star
Multifoliate rose
Of death's twilight kingdom
The hope only
Of empty men.

V

Here we go round the prickly pear
Prickly pear prickly pear
Here we go round the prickly pear
At five o'clock in the morning.
Between the idea
And the reality
Between the motion
And the act
Falls the Shadow

For Thine is the Kingdom
Between the conception
And the creation
Between the emotion
And the response
Falls the Shadow
Life is very long
Between the desire
And the spasm
Between the potency
And the existence
Between the essence
And the descent
Falls the Shadow

For Thine is the Kingdom
For Thine is
Life is
For Thine is the
This is the way the world ends
This is the way the world ends
This is the way the world ends
Not with a bang but a whimper.

by

TS Elliot

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aNOtHEr dIp INtO ThE mAGpIE mEMOrY pOOoL.