The Olympics looms - it has always felt central to the Eyewear story, because the blog began just as the Olympics was announced for here, way back in July 2005, 7 years ago (yes, this is our 7th year!). And there is every chance it will be a great Games, and Team GB will do very well, perhaps coming in fourth in the medal tables. However, the news today is more grim than that gold lining implies - the UK is in serious recession. The economy has shrunk 4% in the last few years, and, according to the BBC analysis, this is now the worst financial crisis the UK has faced, outside of the war years, in the last hundred years - that is, worse than the Great Depression, or the 70s. So, as Eyewear faces forward, it does so chastened, and concerned. Yes, poetry matters, and yes, it needs to be published. But the perilous state of the nation is of grave concern also, and overhangs other considerations. Let us try to enjoy the remarkable hot sun, and move into whatever sunny uplands we can find.
A poem for my mother, July 15 When she was dying And I was in a different country I dreamt I was there with her Flying over the ocean very quickly, And arriving in the room like a dream And I was a dream, but the meaning was more Than a dream has – it was a moving over time And land, over water, to get love across Fast enough, to be there, before she died, To lean over the small, huddled figure, In the dark, and without bothering her Even with apologies, and be a kiss in the air, A dream of a kiss, or even less, the thought of one, And when I woke, none of this had happened, She was still far distant, and we had not spoken.
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