E Y E W E A R, THE BLOG - FREEDOM MEANS BEING UNAFRAID TO WRITE WHAT YOU THINK

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.

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

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

  eyewear because you see through it     i can indent with the best        of them but the curving lens is housed ultimately              by an acetate formal design as shapely as a Hart Crane bridge                   slung between failure and visionary        which is where love & desire want to be    ,     in defence         of all short-sighted crests waving coke bottles at light