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THE SWIFT REPORT 2023

I am writing this post without much enthusiasm, but with a sense of duty. This blog will be 20 years old soon, and though I rarely post here anymore, I owe it some attention. Of course in 2023, "Swift" now means one thing only, Taylor Swift, the billionaire musician. Gone are the days when I was asked if I was related to Jonathan Swift. The pre-eminent cultural Swift is now alive and TIME PERSON OF THE YEAR. There is no point in belabouring the obvious with delay: 2023 was a low-point in the low annals of human history - war, invasion, murder, in too many nations. Hate, division, the collapse of what truth is, exacerbated by advances in AI that may or may not prove apocalyptic, while global warming still seems to threaten the near-future safety of humanity. It's been deeply depressing. The world lost some wonderful poets, actors, musicians, and writers this year, as it often does. Two people I knew and admired greatly, Ian Ferrier and Kevin Higgins, poets and organise
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Oppenheimer by Nolan

Nolan's film Oppenheimer when at its best, is as good as cinema has ever been. I admit to writing this on the anniversarary of the dropping of the first bomb on Japan, which I consider a war crime and a human tragedy of the largest kind, as was the second bomb. I write this post with great respect for those who died or suffered then, and I know that the film itself seeks to expose, somehow, the sheer magnitude and moral toxicity of this invention - one which, as the film shows, could have burnt the whole world, not just Japan. Art can perhaps speak to the atrocities at Nagasaki and Hiroshima, or avoid them. Nolan's film obliquely references the horror - the inventor and the president both speak of guilt or innocence, neither seems to inhabit the space to fully comprehend their crimes. So why make a film about nuclear bombs, if the material is so powerful, so painful, so irradiated with historic guilt and shame? I suppose because of ambition, a desire to take on the largest th

thinking of kevin

L ike a lot of people, who knew and loved him - and I am not referring here intrusively to his closest relations or loved ones, but instead, to the poets, editors and publishers who worked with him - I am having a hard time with the death of the great Irish poet, and person, Kevin Higgins . Though we often disagreed on politics, and though we had drifted apart, he WAS the person who wrote the introduction to my Salmon Poetry selected poems, Seaway , and he WAS the person I included in almost every anthology or event I organised for over a decade or more, starting with Poets against the War . He felt like a soul brother to me, and for many years we met relatively often, had dinner or drinks, and spoke about poetry. Our partners met with us, sometimes; and we met not only in London, but Paris, New York, Budapest, and of course, Galway. Other than Patrick Chapman , he is the Irish poet I feel closest to, aesthetically, but also, in how we view the established order of poetic things (that

IRISH POETIC GENIUS KEVIN HIGGINS HAS DIED

  Terrible sad news - the major Irish satirical poet of his generation, and a poet of comedic genius, and powerful authentic resonance, Kevin Higgins, has died yesterday in Ireland. Higgins, the author of many poetry books, most published by Galway-based Irish press Salmon, was known and admired world-wide, but nonetheless deserved  even more  recognition from the established great and the good - i.e. the prizes, medals, crowns, gongs and other titles thrown at many many lesser lights - except, he was so brilliantly biting, critical, and scathing of all that he spied as dishonest, unfair or wretched. Sweet-natured and hilarious in person, on paper, he was terrifyingly sharp-witted, and sparing of no prisoners. In a just world, he would be seen as the greatest of recent Irish poets, and even so, is recognised in anthologies and critical studies everywhere as the most acute, savagely clever, and startling of Irish political poets. The measure of his unexpected reach - a 'Heineken poe

THE SWIFT REPORT 2022

2022 WILL LIKELY BE REMEMBERED by historians for the Ukraine War, the ongoing climate emergency, the deaths of The Queen and Gorbachev, the three UK prime ministers, and the lingering pandemic and economic fall-out; maybe the Bitcoin collapse, as a 7th. For me, it was the year of recovery, after nearly dying in hospital last Christmas - taking 4 months off, getting a defibrillator implant device, and taking 11 pills a day for my chronic Heart Failure. I want to express how grateful I am to the doctors, and nurses, and those who helped me stay alive this year. Grateful to God. I want to thank my friends, my family, my partner. And say how glad I was to spend time with my brother, his wife, and my godson Alex, this summer, in Spain. I want to thank those writers, poets, colleagues, and patrons, who helped me keep BSPG functional in a challenging year for small businesses. Please may you have love, peace and light this Christmas time, this season of holidays and the solstice.

CHRISTMAS POEM 2022

The secret is not to have a secret The magic is to be magicless The trick is to go without the tricks The plan is to be avoided The path is to be downtrodden The lie is to be forgotten The carnival is to be inverted The lamb is to be converted The killer is to be caressed The dress is to be undressed The cure is to be lost The time is to be mis-told The crime is to be lawful The beauty is to be awful The secret is to speak widely The magic is to turn the tables The trick is to be born in the stables The plan is to go to shambles The path is via the brambles The lie is to stand in the open The carnival is to roll the king The dress is thorn this season The lamb is the feast for a reason The birth was clearly at night The death was notably during day to day This means something about lighting Between the cracks, between the shrugs Between the thighs, between the thugs, Between the shimmering royal displays, Comes a meagre passion

NEW SIMPLE MINDS ALBUM REVIEW - DIRECTIONS OF THE HEART

This wouldn't be an Eyewear blog without a review of a Simple Minds album. In rear-view, none of the recent, critically lauded comeback LPs have been truly as great as that run from the 1980s - but usually as pompous, majestic, grandiose, religious, and shimmering. My love for this band is in their sure-fire surges of greatness cranked up to 11, and utter refusal of irony - they are the sincerest, and most engaged of bands - emotive, political, passionate - lacking nothing in the way of conviction. In terms of launching into the crowd with dedication to songcraft, pulse of inspiration, and faith in a better future - this is maximum uplift. Now, 40 years after 1982's New Gold Dream 81-82-83-84 - the greatest new romantic/ new wave LP of the 1980s, tied with one by Echo & The Bunnymen maybe; and arguably one of the most romantic and religious works of Scottish poetry and music ever composed, their latest is back - more bombastic than ever. In terms of grandeur, and rock dr