The Last Supper, 1495, by Leonardo da Vinci (1452-1519) I love the music of Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina (1525-1594) and I’m also a fan of paintings from the Italian Renaissance so Easter-time is a great opportunity to indulge myself. I’d much rather this than…
My cactus 26 March 2013 March is always cactus month for me. This is my cactus, given to me in 2002 as a very small plant but now much bigger more and more eccentric in its shape. I stop…
I blame Pyotr Ilych Tchaikovsky (1840-1893), the Russian composer for a minor accident that happened here at my home in Lewes, UK. Ironing is a dangerous game if you take your mind of it and that is exactly what I…
I don’t usually like parties and I never want to go to them. I dread that mix of formality and forced sociability that hangs over me the moment I walk into the room. I always want to say something rude to break…
This is the neat and tidy bit of my study. I’ve been on a writing rush all week and, amazingly, stuck to my word count schedule. It would’ve been great if I had achieved this without turning the rest of…
Looking out of my study window here in Lewes, UK, yesterday afternoon, I saw four magpies on Brach Mound, the ancient defensive mound that dominates my view. Oh no, I thought, rapidly trying to remember that old nursery rhyme. This…
There have nearly been as many killed in Syria during the country’s civil war as died during the Iraq War ten years ago even though the figures for civilian deaths in Iraq were conveniently left out of the allied forces’…
London 2003 I was proud to have been one of over one million people who demonstrated in London against the British government’s plan to attack Iraq. Was I right? History will judge. Tony Blair Tony Blair: ‘I took this country to…
I’ve never been to Cyprus but I’m told that it’s a pleasant enough place. Actually a few years ago I used to have a Cypriot personal trainer called Tasos whose voice still echoes in my ears if I’m tempted to give up…
I’ve been recording three of my new, recently published poems, Diplomacy, my latest Fibonacci poem, and two ‘New Jersey’ poems written after a trip to the USA in 2011. Diplomacy: Hummingbird Feeder/The Blueberry Cage: