AmyNomad

2012-01-26T03:04:00.000-08:00

the thought of che

2012-01-26T03:00:00.000-08:00

bought the above book at the airport precisely for the comic value of its badly translated title. The blurb on the back right states "the ethical thinking of Ernesto Che Guevara and his idea on the role fo the masses in the revolution, spoken in informal language".

ready to ak da maga....

2012-01-26T01:20:00.001-08:00

http://www.meetup.com/Act-The-Maggot

http://actthemaggot.com/

2011-12-07T03:25:00.001-08:00

Pepe Panchon's car..which his wife Maria tells me he will do up for me if I return to Vinales! All I'd have to do is drive her and her blind Jose Felix to the beach at Cayo Jutias every now and then. Sweet proposition eh?!

Pepe at work in his tobacco field

Maria offers fresh locally grown coffee from her outhouse... where she does all her cooking for Pepe and the tobacco labourers during harvest time.

Drop of bainne from Pepe's cow

Pepe Panchon

2011-12-07T03:24:00.001-08:00

Bruja mariposa!

2011-12-07T03:23:00.001-08:00

Maria Panchon and son Jose Felix

2011-12-07T03:21:00.001-08:00

she's come undone

2011-12-07T03:17:00.000-08:00

The house is up on the hill about a kilometre from town and the surrounding views are breathtaking. Cuba is captivating and this place, Vinales – a UNESCO world heritage site – is like being inside an old Western except this is Technicolor in real life. I have heard so much about the place and its people from my sister and her husband that I feel I know it. I breathe in the sights and smells. I am blessed.

Ever since I arrived I could not take my eyes off it. I was drawn to it as if some form of bizarre witchcraft were leading me there. I could see it from the bedroom window. Standing tall and majestic. For a couple of days I watched. What strength and power? What grace and elegance? There this tree stood, solid, imperious, like a High King, lording over mile upon square mile of lush newly-tilled tobacco fields and those arresting hump-backed Mojote mountains. I was its tongue-tied servant.

I began to go to the window like an addict for my daily feed of colour and to be sedated by my new master. Burnt orange, red, purple, green, brown, yellow, straw. Yet I could not figure out my master’s own hue from this distance. It seemed so far away. Black maybe? Black or dark grey against the blue sky and its surrounding verdant kingdom.

Having come from the smallness and greyness of Dublin, by comparison, I was almost afraid of this landscape. Its enormity. Afraid it might devour me whole. But this tree. It was more than a mere tree. It was treedom. I had never been so bewitched. I was building myself up to venture forth and make its acquaintance. For this I would have to enter the guajiro’s territory and negotiate the animals, sense my way through the orange and yellow caminos. The yellow brick road! It is hard to understand such a visceral reaction to a tree. I have experienced it for a plump, baked loaf fresh from the oven or fat, pink sizzling prawns oozing garlicy oil, the aroma of steaming coffee or the dark penetrating eyes of a handsome man – but a tree?

This was new. I guess you could say I am from the country - a townie really. But the town of my childhood, unlike now, did have hinterland farms close by. Quiet, unpeopled fields in which to roam and trees to climb or simply sit under while skinning a stick or blowing loud through blades of grass. Perhaps that was the pull. The blissful silence of my own Irish childhood echoing all around me in this vast Cuban landscape. The solitary innocent freedom of rambling through foreign territory – the town girl getting lost in the countryside for whole Saturdays at a time. Watching from a distance those thick-armed farmer-faced men lift things, lock things, push things and nod friendly like but going about their business. In all those hours meandering through the tall grass, I had never set eyes upon a tree such as this.

The third day, unplanned, out of sheer compulsion, I went in its direction. Early morning before the tropical heat, skipping the sweet and simple breakfast of coffee and toast with dulce de guayava. I walked out the back door. Down the dust tracks past cranky Noel’s Godforsaken shack (that was nearly destroyed in the Cyclone) and then the next plain house that belongs to La Pucha, his mother. A wizened old stick of a woman with a sunken face and a bad word for everyone. She owns all the land around and picks fights regularly. At night she eerily walks through my sister’s property – holding a medieval beacon of fire to light her way across land that was once hers. She is definitely a Cuban not to be meddled with. I walk quickly for fear she might come out on to her porch and I would have to look in to that awful face up close.

Next I pass Maria and Pepe Panchon’s immaculate blue and white painted, neat little bungalow. Neither of them about. Good. I’m in a hurry and do not wish to be distracted. Pepe is gone at dawn on his horse dressed in his army fatigues and has probably half a tobacco field tilled by now. Not bad going for a man of 70. Maria is probably peeling her garlic in the outside shed which all the Cubans seem to use for cooking. Her 40-year-old son Jose Felix is the only body present. He is sitting up in a squatting position on his rocking chair at the front of the house. He is blind so he cannot see me. He is deaf so he cannot hear me so I do not know what to do. I walk past him feeling strange that I have not greeted him but he does not know me yet and I do not want to alarm him on his own porch. He senses someone passing and I scurry along vowing to call in on my way back to introduce myself. At this moment though, I have no desire to meet humans. I want to get to my tree and see it in the flesh!

I cross the end of their garden and follow the boundary fence down to the lower field, balancing on the mucky tree stump I cross the river. Now I must pass two very thin horses. They look sad, tired and unthreatening but I am wary walking past in case they kick out in jealousy at my well-fed appearance. I head around by the opening towards the caves and know that if I take a right by the tall corn plants and go up the way that the tree should be on the other side. As I am walking steadily, steeply uphill it gradually comes into view.

Finally, I am face to face with this marvellous beast. Its trunk spreads wide like a wall - the girth of it is hundreds and hundreds of years of growth. I am breathless. I inhale and draw closer, surrender under the shade of its mighty branches. It dwarfs me like nothing has dwarfed me before. I am an ant. It is possibly 20 or 25 times my height. I have never felt anything quite like this here when I am standing beneath it. This tree is life itself. I am undone.

Amy Redmond (c) 2011

2011-12-07T02:54:00.000-08:00

Act The Maggot

2011-12-07T02:37:00.000-08:00

http://actthemaggot.com/

2011-12-01T08:03:00.000-08:00

Today is a wonderful day for AmyQ

Many thanks to the big tall fella
with the white beard who
believed I could
do it too!

he's the
bees knees

2011-12-01T07:55:00.000-08:00

This Is Just To Say

2011-07-22T08:29:00.000-07:00

I have eaten
the plums
that were in
the icebox

and which
you were probably
saving
for breakfast

Forgive me
they were delicious
so sweet and
so cool

by William Carlos Williams

Desert Storm

2011-07-07T16:02:00.000-07:00

A would be panther?
a tiger?

you?

Hah!
you
are
not
even
a reptile
(though your tongue will catch flies)

you are a slovenly bullfrog,
a mewling cat
a greasy wide-bellied scampering rat

No,

I see you

Yes,

I can see you

you are yourself
nothing less
and certainly
nothing more

You belong in the sand

and should be trod upon heavily
by tons of camels
until it gets
very
very
dark

2011-05-10T03:33:00.000-07:00

contributing to the Cuban male's majestic Sunday

Irish Proverb

2011-05-08T04:43:00.000-07:00

The dog that's always on the go is better than one that's always curled up

Tut

2011-05-08T04:23:00.000-07:00

He wants to take me, bring me to the time of the Great Pyramids
I'll be dressed in gold
and we'll both go down, down, down
life's everchanging corridor
We are invincible
We are amazing
We are a fantastic couple
destined for greatness
We are the stuff of ancient civilisation
the stuff of dreams
We tunnel back through time
Clay falls from the walls
the earth doesn't settle
Can't see in front of us
bits flying
and where'll he take me in these wrteched helicopter flights of my imagination
To be honest,
I'm all about the bits
He's more abot the bite
I want the propellers to Stop chopping in my head
Let me go forward
Let me have my dream

Hush, hold my hand

Amy Redmond (c) 2008

Ah Vinales....

2011-01-28T17:33:00.000-08:00

Zoe and Martin's little piece of heaven

Banker Puppets Nowhere to Hide

2010-11-28T04:22:00.000-08:00

One of the many images and placards seen on the streets of Dublin at yesterday's protest march where 100,000+ attended despite the snow.

I'm Mad As Hell

2010-11-21T13:07:00.000-08:00

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WINDtlPXmmE

Bath time dearest

2010-09-30T20:31:00.000-07:00

For fun
I wash him
Rub him
Giggle drizzle water down his back

Then I pour half a bottle of white spirits over his head

Screams of horror
Panic, fear of blindness, general ding aling alarm

I didn't mean it
I swear
I'm sorry
Oh God
Oh God
Oh God

I sit back, wet handed
confused
It was a mistake
It was
Or?

Later, quite a bit later
Calm arrives
We dry his eyes
and he trusts again

My turpentine valentine
I'm dizzy, greedy for his flesh

I feel treacherous
Because I really do want him dead

Beastly love

2010-07-29T14:02:00.000-07:00

Segismundo
is too good a name,
gives depth and nobility where it's lacking,
I need to conjure a real beast who commits beast-like acts,
such as love

such was love
such was the not love love
the beastly love
the black bottom of a barrel love

pressurise
inhabit
subsume
imprison

shatter the glass

hard luck, cowboy....
there is unfathomable safety inside this wall of words

Otter on a bicycle

2010-05-04T04:26:00.000-07:00

Smiling, sweating, singing
I glide southwards
yearning
Sniffing Sea

There,
about me bodies undress
walk, wade, paddle
I pant

Park, peel, plunge
into
Ocean
dive deep, bob up
Feast on sky

Twirling
Otter like
Flipping with the waves

Home: home with the fishes

Bloody love still

2010-03-28T01:51:00.000-07:00

On Friday it came to me like a slap on the face
I saw you there
on the chair
among the commotion
tight chested but resolved
your feet perched ready
and I cried
thinking how
brave you were
and how much
you must have loved

I cried for all that love
and at the same time
hot blood rushed through my body

and Saturday
they flew in again
thick and fast
messages
words
from
you
to
me

how much you still love
that much I know
that much I feel
may these characters keep us apart

Fanore beach, Co. Clare

2010-02-24T08:25:00.000-08:00

When the boys came out to play, Georgie Porgie ran away.

2010-02-08T14:33:00.000-08:00

Short term George - The Political Demise of Mr Lee

After just 8 months as an elected TD in Dail Eireann,
former RTE economics editor George Lee resigned today.
27,000 people in this country gave him their No. 1 vote
27,000 people hoped he'd make a difference
he walked away
he couldn't hack it
Did you ever hear of the words probation? stamina? staying power? determination? reality check?

FG leader Enda Kenny apparently offered him a front bench seat to coax him into staying on.
Instead he resigned. I think most other TDs would have jumped at the chance of a front bench seat after 8 months
Somebody pointed out that he could have resigned from the Fine Gael party and still retained his seat in the Dail as an Independent TD - now why not? If he really meant business why not?He could have eschewed his stunning economical advice constantly in the Dail where he should have stayed if he really cared.
But I guess he couldn't hack it.
So for all the bullcrap being aired tonite about him beign so honest etc., methinks he is not being honest. He can't do committees. He can't listen or debate. He's not patient. He's a bad politician.

He, unlike most other politicians (except Arnold Schwarzenegger) was able to use his celebrity status to get votes. Mind you, Arnie was a body builder and an actor and George Lee was RTE's economics editor - neither of them "the guy who spreads the slurry" as Pat Kenny so arrogantly used as an example to compare super George to the non expert politician.

Who is still in politics?
Arnie or Georgie?
Dear Georgie a Schwarzeneger you are not

The following are just some words which describe the way I feel after hearing this news: Disappointed, disgusted, saddened, depressed, excited, interested, intrigued.

The following are just some words which come when I think about George Lee: fool, useless, self obssessed, myopic, egomaniac, eejit, arrogant. unrealistic, nerd, impatient, impetuous,

and tonight on Pat Kenny's Frontline show, George said he wasn't prepared to play the party games, 'I don't see how schmoozing in the bars will change the economic situation '.
Sorry, Georgie boy, you joined a party....which means mixing, working together, arguing, debating, not getting yoru own way - not barking orders in the RTE newsroom or having a team of people working for you as editor - media, especially RTE is just as 'institutionalised' as the political system. Your host Plank Kenny must have said the word institutionalised almost as many times as he says the word issue. Anyway after watching the news and Frontline, my original fury towards Mr Lee has somewhat evaporated and I tend to agree with Ivan Yates - that he's just an eejit.

Never mind all that claptrap about Lee being symbolic of the dysfunctional state of the Irish political system. C'mon he lasted 8 months! What did he think was going to happen in an opposition seat in that amount of time? Pat Kenny and himself kept yakking on about how institutionalised TDs become. Yada yada yada, what about RTE? Now there's an organisation that's clunking along just as slowly. For Chrissake we have had to listen to so much Charlie Bird (another institutionalised scaredy cat who's planning on packing in a big job) now we'll have to listen to fecking George Lee - if he gets that job back I might have to leave the country or put a hit out on him (and Charlie and Pat and Gaybo)

Restraint

2009-12-06T15:52:00.000-08:00

my dear mr statue
don't make me go after you with a hammer

easy
let me take
you apart
gently
softly
deeply
piece by piece
and put you back together

(me & poetry) what about You?

2009-12-06T11:48:00.000-08:00

Deaf to terrible beauty
terrible stupid things dem

dose poems

hear nothing
nada, niente
flat heartless words

Choose
language
dialect

redirect

idioma
fou
who?

what the expert says
...pff

watch and eat and drink

consume your heart away
time to
participate
synchopate
elaborate
generate

but no

drive and shout
career around full
of hot gas
consuming,
eating,
everything (including spuds from anywhere but here and stawberries in December)

and complain
and lodge and squabble
and eat and drink and eat
and wibble wobble wobble

the precipice

the precipice

the truffling days are done
time for words

Where are our poets?
Is it a dead art?

Hidden, perhaps
under the surface
riding the currents of discontent

but not much use if
no-one's cocked
or even pricked

I have an apetite so large I could consume a bloody continent

Day

2009-12-06T11:31:00.000-08:00

I slip into my sweet suede ankle boots
and
venture
into town

Night

2009-12-04T05:08:00.001-08:00

I pull on my long brown riding boots
and
proceed
in to town

French Polish

2009-12-03T14:58:00.000-08:00

A giggly blond Hungarian
paints my nails
while it rains, rains, rains
days have passed
and these white-tipped appendages
have grown and grown
long and tough
like an eagle
a swan
I must
cut cut cut

keep the home fires burning...

2009-11-30T02:33:00.000-08:00

Sweet Clarity

2009-11-30T02:31:00.000-08:00

"Your vision will become clear only when you can look into your own heart. Who looks outside, dreams, who looks inside, awakens " - Carl Jung

winter

2009-11-29T10:19:00.000-08:00

Dark greys and dark greens
and frosty air
birr-whistles at our necks
making us lift our collars to the cold, cold
hand
of winter

that drenches

sending shivers
down our spines

Oh Lord
for
the
birth
of...........................

Gems

2009-11-27T09:30:00.000-08:00

In my head, I’m alive. I feel like I'm really living. It’s just the wider world around me seems dead, passionless, greedy, now hopeless, lacking in spirit and weak willed.

But I have gathered some gems about me and these precious ones keep me afloat.

I Do Not Love You Except Because I Love You

2009-11-17T06:16:00.000-08:00

by Pablo Neruda

I do not love you except because I love you;
I go from loving to not loving you,
From waiting to not waiting for you
My heart moves from cold to fire.

I love you only because it's you the one I love;
I hate you deeply, and hating you
Bend to you, and the measure of my changing love for you
Is that I do not see you but love you blindly.

Maybe January light will consume
My heart with its cruel
Ray, stealing my key to true calm.
In this part of the story I am the one who
Dies, the only one, and I will die of love because I love you,
Because I love you, Love, in fire and blood.

irregularity

2009-11-15T10:48:00.000-08:00

Seen as an irregularity on the production line
this mini scaffolding housing separate organs
is forced into atrophy
irregular atrophy

strandhill, co. sligo

2009-11-06T02:58:00.000-08:00

Samhain beckons...

2009-10-28T16:01:00.000-07:00

beachcomb-overs

2009-10-26T04:41:00.000-07:00

La Vida Es Sueno - my chapter 2 started here

2009-10-22T12:04:00.000-07:00

Ben Bulben, Strandhill, Co. Sligo - go there!

It's Done

2009-10-19T05:46:00.000-07:00

Done
Done
Done
and dusted

couldn't be trusted

Adios Enemigo

2009-10-12T13:34:00.000-07:00

Slosh, splash, crash.
F*** You

That's how it ended

How had it begun?

A sun-splashed meeting of eyes
street noise, cigarettes
on the chance
out to dance
on the edge

edge of the bed

and down down down
over time time time

things have drowned

drowned

and glugging throat choked hope
has all but expired
from this once hearty happy chest
of precious things

Now

he

loss lost lose me from thee
lost

fumbling,
stumbling,
never willing to learn
anything

not open to amelioration, of any kind

erring

again and again

brassy, brutal,
bad bad bad

an impoverished lost fool in the world
whose own coat is tattered and torn

No more, thanks.
Enough is enough,
I mistakenly thought it was as good as a feast

More of life. please.

Have we forgotten how to hope?

2009-10-12T11:23:00.001-07:00

The American's have Obama
What have we got?
NAMA

I despair of the relentless NAMA-led discussion with no alternative posited.
I'm tired of seeing fat, red-faced men and women in suits pretend they know what's best
myopic, short-term thinking, pandering to the already too-well off, and oh so arrogant and overfed
risky, inflated, careless, business practises should not be condoned, let alone re-financed all over again
I despair
I tear my hair
It's not fair

I Rock!

2009-09-22T10:04:00.001-07:00

I was between a rock and a hard place

Now I'm sitting on the rock

looking back

at the hard place

and thanking my lucky stars

Glencolmcille, Co. Donegal

2009-09-21T17:20:00.000-07:00

Not a bit

2009-09-10T15:35:00.000-07:00

I don't miss you at all,
not one bit
except this bit
now,
I suppose
but
that's really only to tell you
now that I don't miss you one bit
no, not a bit
not one bit
i'm happy to report

Dear Dorthe, keep painting...

2009-09-10T15:24:00.000-07:00

Danish artist Dorthe Wolf Sorensen lives in Canada. http://www.dorthewolff.dk/

my shitty knick hell!

2009-09-07T11:18:00.000-07:00

Gone afishing

2009-09-03T03:32:00.000-07:00

She's casting her golden net wide, wide and further afield.........

Bye bye stolen years

2009-09-03T03:26:00.000-07:00

Faye is looking over at me and Adam is squeezing the cat while my sun splashed short-wearing family in the '70s radiates from the fridge door. The sounds, tastes and smells of summer and sand and fizzy orange and a mouth full of sea and the twigs and seaweed in your hair – siren youth, where is it gone? Or is it just around the corner? Always here. I feel its sweet breath on my neck. That neck that would have been snapped so easily. Those stolen years are back. Life's mighty clock's big arm has swung heaving the bulldozed earth aside to let me pass on my way.......

braveheart

2009-08-31T04:16:00.000-07:00

braveheart, no heart, all heart
I used to worry when my heart was knocking around in my chest
now I consider myself lucky
big heart
one heart
braveheart
free

my 49 day shitty knick hell

2009-08-31T04:13:00.000-07:00

Prem Rawat-Maharaji: The true self does not drift

2009-05-29T14:58:00.000-07:00

http://video.shabab3net.com/video/Q6jlQ32AZfc/prem-rawatmaharaji-the-true-self-does-not-drift.html

my dream of you

2009-05-02T11:25:00.000-07:00

I do - and you?
'will you let me in please,' she asked
'why won't you let me in?'
'it's cold out here,' he said
'you wouldn't like it.'
'we can't keep having this with you going out and me coming in
and you coming in and me going out,' she complained (softly!)
he looked at this woman
really looked at her
he looked into her eyes and smiled
he took her by the hand
and held her close
and said absolutely nothing
they breathed together soft and easy

soon they learned to breath the one breath together
My God, it took time
but it was worth it

Fragments from a life

2009-04-22T13:15:00.000-07:00

Trudging through New York in light snow, freezing, jobhunting
I learned I couldn't control certain things

Health

I learned she weighed hardly anything before she left us
I remember her swimming in the sea in November and December for feck's sake

She danced

rehearsing for the big role
the long corridor
the field for disappearing

She'd swing her head back with huge belly laughs hearing or telling stories
of making ends meet, paying bills

Bountiful
Working life
Big kitchen
The hotpress - trying to give the psychology of a person

To run

To Know My Own Heart
To produce feeling

Amy Redmond (c) 2009

Not so Short Story (for a blog): The Execution

2009-03-31T13:18:00.000-07:00

I am cowering in the hallway. Me and my sisters were in the bathroom earlier, squinting through the leaf-patterned windows, listening to the men’s voices out in the field. The house is dark. Everything is quiet.

All the adults are outside in the back garden and my father is up the field with Peadar Ryan. They have Drum. They have it in for Drum. Drum is going to get it tonight. Me and my four sisters are all in our nighties, wandering up and down the corridor, going in and out of each other’s rooms, not knowing what to do. Where is Sean? Could he be outside begging the men not to do what they are planning? Maybe he ran off. Jumped onto his 10-speed racer and pedalled away in a huff.

There is a lot of talking and cajoling. Perhaps Sean is out there with them? So much talking. Such a build up. It’s making me nervous. Were the Nazis like this at executions?

I’m not sure if I like this house anymore. There is always something to be afraid of. Some drama. Somebody getting hurt. Somebody crying. A week ago, I saw Mammy crying in her room. She didn’t see me. I had gone into the little sitting room next to hers to look through old photographs. I heard her talking on the phone so I carried on poring over the pictures, holding my breath and keeping as quiet as I could.

I was holding a dog-eared shot of Grandad with his greyhounds. He looked so proud. I was always told Grandad was a lovely man. That he was good and fair. I never met him. My parents told me he died young, but my sisters told me he drank a lot and used to get into fights and eventually he ran off to England with some horsy woman. If that’s true, it means he wasn’t such a good man. Or maybe he was a good man but he kept making mistakes. I don’t know. I wish someone would tell me the truth sometime.

I wish I could go up to my parents and ask them straight out about Grandad but my sisters once tied me to the front gates and cycled around me making Indian noises, squawking and squalling. “Big babby tell-tale. Don‘t you dare, or you‘ll get it,” they threatened. They left me there on my own for about three hours. Daddy was at work and Mammy was gone off visiting for the day with her friend Angela. My hands burned. My back hurt. It was cold and I only had a t-shirt on. When my sisters came back, I had lost my defiance and I promised to keep my mouth shut. I would keep their secret.

I am getting used to secrets. Like Mammy crying. I know better than to say it to anyone. Still, I wonder what is upsetting her. Who is she talking to? I sneak out of the room and head for the phone in the hall. Ever so quietly, I pick up the receiver.

“It’s a horrible, undignified way to go, Mrs. Roche,” a voice says angrily to my mother.
“I know, I know, I‘m so sorry,” I hear Mammy say. “Something will have to be done and I‘ll see to it,” the angry man says. Mammy, still in tears, agrees and says not to worry and that it’s been arranged for the following week.

I hang up the phone. It suddenly dawns on me. I know what she means because it is the thing the whole family knows and won’t talk about since the night the Doyles from down the road came up to the house and threatened Daddy. And that was probably Mr. Doyle on the phone.

I remember clearly. We had just finished having our tea. Scrambled eggs on toast. I had moved up to Mammy’s seat while she and the others were clearing away the plates. I was sugaring and milking everyone’s tea and the doorbell rang. Daddy went out. All we could hear was someone shouting at him and it sounded like someone else was crying. Daddy came back to get his jacket and said he had to go. He and Mammy were muttering in the hall. But we couldn’t hear anything. By the time Mammy came back, she was in a foul mood and wouldn’t drink her tea. Nobody said a word and as everyone sat quietly, trying not to fidget and looking at the table, I watched in fascination, as a thin skin appeared on the top of mammy’s tea.

My sisters told me the Doyles threatened Daddy over Drum. They said it was Drum’s fault the Doyles were angry. I am glad I didn’t see them at the door because they are a scary enough looking family without being angry. Mrs. Doyle has a pinched mean-looking face and wheels an old black bicycle everywhere. I have never seen her cycling it. She just likes to carry a bag of shopping on each handlebar and wheel it round all the time. Mr. Doyle works up in the leather factory and nearly all his sons work up there too. They’re real grim looking, with roundy white faces and pigeon chests. They’re big into shooting and I see them going up the road in the evenings with their rifles. They never say hello, just tilt their caps and nod, even the younger one my age. Tough men. I suppose they think they’re real dangerous looking with them rifles. Ever since the night they came to our house, they haven’t walked past. Maybe they are going another way. Or maybe Daddy threatened them back and told them not to walk past our house.

My brother Sean told me, the Doyles are ignoramuses. I had to go and look it up in the dictionary to see what he meant. He could’ve just said they were stupid.

Sean had a fight with one of the Doyles yesterday. I know because when he got home, he came straight into the bathroom where I was trying on Mammy’s old lipsticks and he had to tell me because he had a bloody lip and his jumper was torn. He showed me his back and his belly which were covered in scratch marks. He was so chuffed with himself. He said it was the black-haired one who used to be in his class but left school early to join his older “ignoramus” brothers in the leather factory. He was laughing telling me he “kicked the shit out of him”. He said he had spotted him in the park on the way home and decided they needed to have a little “one-on-one”. I said he shouldn’t be going picking fights and if Mammy and Daddy found out he’d be dead. Sean got really mad and said Mammy and Daddy are just as bad as the Doyles and they have no right to order him to do anything and, anyway he said, that Cyril Doyle needed a good leatherin’. With that, he threw the bloody tissue down the toilet and stormed off in a huff. I looked at the red and white swirling round the bowl as I flushed it away and thought, I hate fighting but I suppose my brother is growing up and becoming a man.

Tonight is a test for my brother. If he gets through tonight, he’ll get through anything. I’m scared though. I don’t like Drum much. I’m afraid of him and he is always half-eating other dogs. There’s trouble whenever Drum is around. But I don’t want Drum dead. Who would ever ask for that only the “ignoramus” Doyles? It doesn’t seem fair. Sean loves Drum so much, and Drum really does love Sean. He’s going to be mad.

Me and my sisters have now moved into the big bedroom at the window. We’re all standing up on the bed trying to see through the trees and out into the field. All the voices have sort of faded and there seems to be a general hush outside. We’re all muttering and whispering and flapping our hands, shishing each other when we think we hear something different. We hear Peadar Ryan, the vet, say something to our father and then suddenly, Bang. Silence.

A howl like I have never heard before comes from the field and the sound of someone running hard and fast. The back door bangs shut, the metal chairs clang in the kitchen and the bathroom door is walloped shut. Inside it gets louder and with the mirrors and windows and bath, there is an echo too. It’s deafening. He is hysterical. At the crack of the gunshot we all scarpered to our rooms and now each of us is lying stiff as a board in bed, joining in with our brother’s wail.

The night is long. Sean stays locked inside for hours, bawling, weeping, then shouting out abuse at my parents who try to reason with him, console him. He won’t come out. Drum is gone.
Hot tears drip down into my mouth and I find comfort in their salty taste.

Fight Words? Fighting Volunteers more like

2009-03-30T11:51:00.001-07:00

I've tried to sign up to volunteer a few times now and it seems things are going so swimmingly at Fighting Words that my services aren't necessary until April 29th! Good for them. They're definitely doing something right...

Deportation challenge and news values

2009-03-30T06:42:00.000-07:00

This extract is from Ian Dunt in Talking Politics (Death Of The Newspaper): "People consistently rate journalists as one of their least favourite people, battling it out at the top spot with lawyers and estate agents. This is not innate. It is a product of a growing awareness that the media is fundamentally failing in its duty, and reporting on facts which may or may not be true. When so much news comes from PR agencies, whose aims are often at odds with those of truth-telling, you know something somewhere is going wrong."

Often it isn't as clear cut as reporting something that may or may not be true. The irresponsibility in reporting is far more subtle than that. It often comes down to the in-built news values of the writer. What is the real news angle of this story? If you look closely at this story on the front page of today's Irish Times the actual "news" is buried way beyond the opening par.

In this story, look to paragraph five:
"The Sligo-based Nigerian woman acknowledged yesterday that documents used in her legal challenge were bogus. She said her husband had admitted to her on Friday that he had obtained fake documents after the doctor who had treated Elizabeth demanded a substantial payment in exchange for the genuine papers."

that, to me, should have been the opening paragraph
and later,

"In a statement, the Irish Refugee Council, which had supported Ms Izevbekhai’s campaign, said the facts in the case that Elizabeth died as a result of severe bleeding due to FGM were never disputed by the State during the legal process to date."

From reading the headline and first few paragraphs (which incidentally is usually ALL people can manage in this paper), I thought, oh dear, forgeries yeah, it was all a hoax and I even had conversations yesterday with people who read the Sunday papers saying that now it seems the child did not exist at all. All from irresponsible journalism. To me, whether lawyers continue working on the case will depend on a matter of law. The story is what she and her husband say and whether they will be proven right or wrong, no?

citizen of the world

2009-03-29T11:45:00.000-07:00

Yes.

I am a citizen of the world.

You may think it odd
but if you were lucky enough to be a fly on my soul
You’d want to be me. You silly vainglorious fool.

I know I’ve been around for eons
and I’m not the least bit worried about
where I go or when I come

You may be over-ripe and seething
but you’ll have to bear with me as I
Flesh out my own republic,
my field
my house
Myself

You see

I did not kill a baby or maim a child.
I will not kill a baby or maim a child.

So. No more will I do what I am told.
I distrust what I am told.
Do not speak to me of
Hasty land grabs
Tribunal funerals
Citizenry or Politics

When all your sound bites and smart quotes
are poor meat for my famished heart

Hear me
Do you dare
to tell me
to think
what I can think?

Assume nothing. Fool.

(c) Amy Redmond 2004

the invisibles are born

2009-03-28T11:49:00.001-07:00

after a domestic delay from Italy, further exacerbated by a Croat-Hungarian bicycle-induced drama, a quick walk in the park (and the spotting of a dead duck on a statue) tea and talks were finally had and The Invisibles parted feeling excited about the Incubation and Town Centre plans! I am particularly attracted to the 'I beg your...more than pardon' leopard skin lady idea. A good day, all round.

Excuse me, Mr Cowen...

2009-03-28T08:13:00.000-07:00

We have to look at pictures like this?

And then you have the audacity to say no

to this?

for Goodness sake, you've more to be worrying about than us seeing your diddies.
Background info to: Cowengate.

Pokerface Mary

2009-03-28T07:33:00.000-07:00

from The Irish Times, March 29, 1859: under the heading Police Intelligence, Capel Street Office: "Mary Byrne was sent for trial to city sessions on a charge of stealing a poker and fire shovel, the property of the Ecclesiastical Commissioners from Grangegorman Church last Sunday evening. "

G'wan ya good thing ya. You showed em who was boss, Mary

The Late Late Show: Pat Kenny does us a favour

2009-03-28T02:05:00.000-07:00

Woo hoo. Yee hah. Well ba low me down!! What a wonderful way to wake up on a Saturday morning - to be greeted with the knowledge that no longer do we have to suffer the stiff physicality, the flat interviewing, the awkward pauses and corny dialogue of Cat Penny on the Late Late Show. Bliss. (does this mean that in the future when I tune in I might see a fair reflection of 21st century Ireland and hear some meaningful debate? Hold your horses Amy, it is RTE we're talking about, they did punish you with the Pat angle for more than 10 years after all! ) So what happened? He tired of trawling the RTE canteen in a desperate bid for last minute in house guests because, oddly enough, the numbers of celebs willing to suffer his rigid 'stick to the cards'-style was dwindling, dwindling, dwindling? And he says, for him it's a case of "quit while you're ahead" !! Yeah sure Pat, everything in the garden is rosy. Oops, don't mention the garden, Geraldine might sniff a real news story and whack another spate of full-page spreads in our paper of record, The Irish Times. Sticking to the important things on the news agenda, as always. Ah well, perhaps, this Monday current affairs gig will make a difference. On with you Pat, get back in your box. You shouldn't have been let out of hard news in the first place. Sure you've made your moola now, you should have a few shekels spare to pick up a few nice bulbs and saplings in Lidl for your garden! Hope you have the cojones to ask a few HARD questions.....

Virgin on the Rock

2009-03-27T15:16:00.000-07:00

A virgin am I to scaling Howth Head
green sea beneath
gulls on rocks squealing
like children when the bell rings

Sink stepping on mattress hay grass
I imagine Jim and Nora and the sex they had.
Transfixed by swishes and squawk, I come to.
'One loose footing and you’re a goner,' my companion warns.

A school group passes, German I think.
I wonder how nervous I’d be bringing youths so high
They fade, we walk, each at our own pace
Breeze brings us along

Ahead in the distance lumbering towards us a large ungainly man
pale-faced perspiring clutching a water bottle
This chap is no veteran
positively sore-thumbish and oozing sleaze

Passing me he leans in close, muttering something about danger
Would I be safe to do this walk alone, I muse
My companion catches up and reckons the fellow reeks of murder
We both agree, we should have pushed him over

(c) Amy Redmond 2005

Middling love on the eastern coast

2009-03-27T15:04:00.000-07:00

Did you really want to marry me?
That time in Alexandria
Sitting on the wall, sun-splashed, with the waves crash slapping up against the citadel
Or that time in the Rodeo Bar on 3rd Avenue,
me compulsively shelling nuts,
you drinking 5ft beers
Or in my narrow apartment on 90th street,
me roaring, you screeching and the trucks hurtling past
Or that time in Coney Island both of us pregnant pausing over the untouched borscht
Or by the East River when you scooped your hand up under my dress
and your spectacles fell off
Or on the armchair in the unlit apartment in Queens
with you tasting of doughnuts and ice-cream
Or that time in the seedy mirrored motel where we outdid ourselves and paid by the hour

If I’d have given you the chance, would you?

(c) Amy Redmond 2009

my nightly Treatment In. Thanks 3e.

2009-03-26T15:16:00.000-07:00

Fighting Words

2009-03-26T14:16:00.000-07:00

Turned up keen for the volunteer training and what do ya know? Ol Rodzer himself was in attendance and "talking it up"along with Orla. Fighting Words is a truly great resource.
Everyone is a winner - kids, teens, volunteers, organisers, staff and creators. A great concept.

Following a typical workshop model, we came up with a story about Benny the busdriver but didn't finish it. (Ingredients: Young people, facilitator. illustrator, typist, big screen, extra volunteers) But I want to go back to Benny. I feel a connection with Benny. I care about Benny. I named him and enough people voted for his name so with a show of hands, my Benny was born! He yearns to be a dancer but would be mortified if anyone found out, especially the lads down at the depot. I imagine what goes on in Benny's head. What he dreams of. Wht he does and where he goes. For example, I already know that everyday at 12.30, like clockwork, he lays his sambos out neatly on his lap and expertly polishes them off mid-route so he can slip off to his daily lunch-time dance class with his best friend belly dancer Babushka. He's usually wiping the crumbs from his handlebar moustache around about the time he passes the church on Gardiner Street. It's belly butterfly time now. Nearly at the studio. He pulls in nearby, flicks the bus number to 'As Seirbhis' and off he trots. But oh. What's this today? Babushka is......

And so it goes......

Fighting Words is based on writer Dave Eggers' 826 Valencia originally in SanFrancisco, now spawned to Brooklyn, Boston, Seattle.

Trees: mother's day, always

2009-03-25T15:47:00.000-07:00

A mother's spirit spurts in paint and water from her daughter. A beautiful possession indeed. A mother living on inside her child.

communion

2009-03-25T15:05:00.000-07:00

ah, a, the communion,
I made my first.

42 pounds and bought a bike
communing with the handlebars
communicating with the wheels
on common ground
in the park, where else?

I'll never forget the taste and it sticking to the roof of my mouth
shaking hands with the thumbless
peace be with you
the body of christ
on a bike
flying along
the business!

the first and the last
and a few in between

a la carte, is what it's called
the first shall be last?

cattle licks

cattle licks first, cattle licks last
cattle licks living in the past

(c) Amy Redmond 2009

there are many keys to presenting the invisible

2009-03-25T14:53:00.000-07:00

We're getting closer. We now have Hungary on side for the invisible project.

Humour is definitely a big avenue for exploration. If we are funny we may not get into as much trouble! We need to bring 3 or 4 things to the table and whittle away, find the common ground and develop something sharp and powerful from there. Precision and clarity will be key.

agreeing on 'goals' will lead to creating suitable 'roles' to PLAY pLaY Play

kind of like the idea of going with the news agenda of the week.....or perhaps what is not on the news and should be. Hungary no doubt will have lots of light to throw on human rights.

it's all good

we've been invisible for long enough

2009-03-24T21:15:00.000-07:00

It's time for the invisible art to begin. It's time to start saying what needs to be said. It's time to have a good old belly laugh at some things and be knocked sideways in shock at others. It's time to get mad. To get it off our chests. It's time to ask if things can change? So far I have an Italian and a Croatian on board. A great beginning. We need to research the ethics and best practise for what we are planning to do - create theatre in unexpected places. (Surely, the most unexpected place of all is in the theatre itself! Imagine witnessing something really really unexpected, or funny or unsettling or tragic or unacceptable .....at the theatre??? Food for thought, but I digress) I suppose my real interest is in entertaining people, appealing to the nosy gossip in all of us, in sparking people's imaginations and getting them to ask questions or wonder or look at these situations and characters and also to look at their own responses and ask, now why did I react that way?

the field is within

2009-03-24T14:28:00.000-07:00

"Out beyond ideas of wrong doing and right doing, there is a field; I'll meet you there" (Rumi)

How many have had as much as a glimpse of this field, real or imagined?

I have imagined myself in this field and it felt exactly right. Free. Light. I have been there.
I consider myself lucky... but there is a dark current that rolls across my consciousness from time to time which drowns me. I sink in gurgling wet mud and cannot get over the fence and in at the long green grass. I strive to be in green. Water, water, for my dry throat. It's only the world rattling at my cage. I want to pick a blade and make that glorious grass bugle sound. To be. To see. To understand. Oh Let me speak of things that have been buried in the muddy chest.

El Camino - The Way

2008-01-20T04:13:00.000-08:00

Caminante, no hay camnino, se hace el camino al andar

Roughly translated it means: traveller, there is no road, the road is made by walking