Poems and Pictures from St Paul de Vence

A miscellany of pictures and poems from a beautiful day in St Paul de Vence.  Enjoy them.

EMBRACE THE MOMENT

Embrace the moment,
Life so fleeting then gone,
Reach out, be all you can,
Strive for those moments,
Life captured in an instant,
The red flag on the Reichstag,
That first step on the moon,
The first kiss of new love.
Look for them, find them,
Moments when life is made,
Lived and that last forever.

 

 

RUN FREE

Running free, the wind in my face,
I transport myself to another place,
Where mind floats over body, and
Body floats over me.

The ground melts away,
And my mind unwinds itself,
I hear my breath, and feel my heart,
Pumping me clean of daily cares.

I begin to think in the open,
Without hindrance, without weight,
I am rising up on heeled wings,
I can see horizons now, where I must go.

I gather pace, and lengthen my stride,
Liberated, I can do anything now,
Body and mind melding as one,
Perfect union, the runner’s Holy Grail.

Mile after mile, I feel no pain,
The running, a drug that numbs all,
Euphoria takes me over, surrounds me,
I am invincible, I am running free.

I return to Earth, spent but satisfied,
I slip back into reality, a temporary lapse,
Soon I shall return to that other place,
Where I reign, and all is possible.

  

 

Sydney Down Under

On my travels I was fortunate(?) enough to spend some months last year in Sydney, Australia.  Sydney is a spectacular City built around its natural harbour and, of course, it has some iconic landmarks such as the Opera House and Harbour Bridge.  But Sydney also suffers from spectacularly chronic urban transportation considering its status as one of the world's premier capital cities.  I was  involved in Sydney's first concerted effort to build an urban Metro - to eventually emulate London's Tube and New York's Subway.  And thereby hangs a tale.

I soon learned about Sydney's (Australia's) tremendous parochialism, especially in the business environment.  I learned that the original architect of the Opera House (a 'foreigner' no less) never actually visited the finished building....It seems that when you are at the edge of the world, it breeds an attitude that, 'we do things differently here'.  Well they certainty do that.

To cut short a long tale, suffice it to say that Sydney may be waiting a bit longer for its first Metro, and Sydney's long suffering commuters will be waiting in traffic jams for some time until the New South Wales (NSW) Government gets its transportation act together.  NSW politics was also different - a cross between Korean parliamentary fisticuffs and Westminster expenses and wine, liberally lubricated with Australian lager.  As you can imagine, the end result is not pretty or effective.

My two poems are about the fiasco of the NSW Government's attempts so far to establish the new Metro using a public-private-sector partnership (PPP)  similar to that used for the Tube in London - don't mention Metronet - I did but I think I got away with it.  The first poem was written shortly after the initial 'pre-qualification' exercise reduced seven bidders to just two.  The second poem I wrote today, after learning that the Sydney Metro may be postponed for many years.  I hope you enjoy them.

Sydney Metro - Chapter One - The Measuring Stick

Sydney, city of opera house and bridge,
So far away, located at the world’s edge,
Smelly buses so loud they wake the dead,
Traffic jams that commuters dread.

A new Metro the Government wants to spawn,
Through which the people’s trust to earn,
The private sector they turned to deliver this miracle,
But first a competition to find the subway oracle.

Seven teams took to the field of battle,
To see who could make the loudest rattle,
Local and foreigner teamed up for the mission,
Not always working to a common vision.

Joined by banks and an army of experts,
The teams get ready to parade their exploits,
But first each team leader must be selected,
This totem by measuring stick not merit is selected.

Cries of mine is bigger are heard all around,
Skirmishes, tantrums and peacocks abound,
The customer, his desires he is articulating,
The teams are busy fighting, no one’s listening.

But wait, a lull in the internal circus,
The teams are focused on their purpose,
Rulers back in their desks, pencils in place,
The calendar forces a change of pace.

Eventually the submissions are made,
The grandstanding is over, cards are played,
Who has a winning hand, we must wait and see,
And the Metro miracle, ah that is the big maybe.

Merit, track record, what are the criteria,
Customer must decide who is superior,
But I thought it was the one with the biggest stick,
Seems that the client is not that thick.

Suddenly the miracle builders are announced,
Shock and awe, the favourites are trounced,
But wait, surely mine is longer and fatter,
No it is the client who will decide the winner.

The story is not over, seven became two,
But only one can wear the shoe,
It starts again, my stick against yours,
The Metro, must wait a few more years.

Sydney Metro - Chapter Two - Metro Impaled 

Two bidders left, five have hit the skids,
Those left have to prepare their bids,
Government says the project will proceed,
The Opposition seems to take no heed.

Sydney’s papers all hate the project,
Hosts of other experts line up to object,
The NSW PM has been stabbed in the back,
Quickly replaced by another smiling hack.

Other transport blueprints are unveiled,
All schemes designed so Metro is derailed,
The Metro it seems is a smelly Black Sheep,
The underground tube never gets a peep.

At last the project is put out of its misery,
It will be deferred for much later delivery,
Sydney’s patient commuters will be spared,
The Metro and its supporters finally impaled.

But how will Sydney Siders get to the office,
What’s in store from the planning orifice?
Billions are promised for heavy rail lines,
And billions more for other fine schemes.

But first New South Wales has an election,
A new Government, then some rail erection,
We wish Sydney’s passengers best of luck,
From their commuting hell to be soon unstuck.

 

 

Polemy in Germany

Polemy steps out in Germany,
A land of checkered history,
Not to be judged too harshly,
We’re all part of that party.

Berlin, long divided by wall,
For so long it cast that pall,
Kennedy, Reagan tilted at it,
But people finally ended it.

A Colossus at Europe’s heart,
But two wars it helped to start,
Millions died in camps and battle,
Those souls our consciences rattle.

As Dylan said, we all learn to abide,
Germany too has God on its side,
Goethe and Schiller, now lie together,
Near Buchenwald, guarding it forever.

Some of our greatest minds are German,
Marx, Einstein, Plank and Beethoven,
Only a nation of deep soul and substance,
Can produce men of such importance.

Its engineering and productivity,
For long driven Europe’s industry,
Quick to protect the environment,
Now we all follow this sentiment.

Polemy has now reached Munich,
City of formal beauty and funny tunic,
German culture in its every pore,
And home to Bier Keller and more.

Yes a nation of stark contradiction,
But one of real historic distinction,
Polemy sees past terrible blemishes,
To reach the greatness in other spaces.

Where next for our alien explorer,
He will ponder a little while longer,
So many more insights are waiting,
All those places curious and inviting.

To Bliar Or Not To Bliar

After slipping in (and out) through the back door, Tony Bliar gave six hours evidence last Friday to the Chilcot Enquiry. To say that he was given an easy ride would be the understated equivalent of the claim that Saddam could launch WMDs in 45 minutes. Federer had a harder time against Tsonga in the Australian Open semi-final.

Nervous at the start, until it was clear that the Chilcot panel was the anti-thesis of the Spanish Inquisition, Bliar predictably re-hashed all his usual defences of “his decision to invade Iraq” – as if Bush Junior’s vengeful decision to invade, and Cheney’s greed-based commercial decision to do so, were incidental to the plot.

At the time of the invasion in 2003, the possession of WMDs by Saddam, and related violation of UN resolutions, was the pretext used by Bush and Bliar to justify the war. Leaving aside the highly questionable legal basis for the invasion (dealt with in an earlier blog), and ignoring the dodgy dossier and assorted other “evidence” of WMDs, there are some facts worth remembering.

In 2003, the UN inspectors had asked for more time to inspect having failed to find WMDs by March; second, the UN inspectors had not cited Saddam’s Government for UN violations. As we now know of course, Saddam had destroyed all Iraq’s WMDs years earlier and there were none left and none found; ipso facto, Iraq was not in violation of any UN resolution on WMDs in 2003. However, Saddam was found guilty until proven innocent by the US and UK Governments, the war (aka capital punishment) followed the kangaroo verdict….there is unlikely to be a re-trial.

Often cited by Bliar’s apologists and the man himself is the sincerity of his belief at the time that Saddam did have WMDs, and that because he thought he was right, the decision to go to war was justified. Ignoring the fact that many credible politicians and organisations at the time challenged the evidence on WMDs, just because Bliar claims he believed he was right is no excuse for his decision and sets a dangerous precedent. Doubtless, Pol Pot, Idi Amin, Pinochet, (the list is endless) all held their deadly views sincerely, shall we excuse them too?

Bliar is well aware that the invasion was sold (I should say spun) to the public on an entirely false basis. Therefore, in the years since, he has sought to retrospectively justify the war using two other basic approaches – which he hardly used at all in 2003. One is linked to so-called, “regime change”; Bliar told Chilcot, “The decision I took-and frankly would take again-was, if there was any possibility that he [Saddam] could develop weapons of mass destruction, we would stop him”. In relation to this argument, the Wall Street Journal today editorialised that, “Listening to him, we are reminded why he ranks with Margaret Thatcher as a pre-eminent statesman of post-war British politics,…” I doubt Thatcher or many in the UK would agree with those sentiments.

By 2003, Iraq was heading rapidly towards being a financially bankrupt failed State. Its only potential source of revenue, which could have underpinned its development into a real threat to the West and its neighbours, laid deep underground – and Iraq, even now with Western investment, is a long way from being able to exploit its oil resources to the extent that would have been necessary to justify Bliar’s speculation.

Bliar’s “Saddam was a bad man” argument is no justification for the war. In 2003, Iraq did not present a clear and present danger to the US or UK; and there was absolutely no evidence that it would do so in the future. Bliar cannot retrospectively justify the decision to invade Iraq on the speculative grounds that Saddam might have become a problem later; using these criteria, we would have been at war with all sorts of regimes for the past 50 years. In any event, the 1980s, when the UK and US Governments sided with Saddam and helped build up the Baath Party in an effort to help Iraq beat the then “common enemy”, Iran, would have been the time to worry about whether Saddam might become a future problem.

The other argument Bliar used relates to 9/11. He said to Chilcot, “The point about this terrorist act was that over 3,000 people had been killed on the streets of New York, and this is what changed my perception of risk: If these people inspired by this religious fanaticism could have killed 30,000 they would have.” [Of course, we know that Bliar (and Bush) are no strangers to religious fanaticism.] The self-serving attempts (led by Cheney) to link Saddam with bin Laden were debunked a long time ago; the Chilcot panel’s already tarnished credibility was finally trashed altogether by their failure to nail Bliar on this line of argument.

Blair spun himself and New Labour to power, and nothing much has changed. You can take the man out of the aspiring rock star, but you can't take the disappointed rock star out of the aspiring man. The seeds of Blair's policy on Iraq were rooted in his vanity and his intoxication with his own position and with US power, and not in any deep moral conversion. By aligning himself so closely to Bush's "War on Terrorism" and by sharing with him the world stage, and basking in the adoration of the US Congress, Blair left himself with nowhere to go when the Bush fundamentalists switched tack to Iraq and WMDs.

The US-UK attack on Iraq played into the hands of fundamentalist extremism everywhere. It weakened reformist movements in Iran and throughout the Middle East, and spawned a whole new generation of martyrs and terrorists. It won't bring democracy or stability to Iraq in this decade, any more than the lines drawn by the UK and French on the maps which created Iraq more than five decades ago, achieved stability then. The Iraq war has strengthened terrorism not weakened it; in fact, the war diverted critical US and UK military and intelligence resources away from a real fight on terror and has left us with today’s critical terror situations in Pakistan, Yemen and Afghanistan.

In conclusion, perhaps the most reprehensible aspect of Bliar’s attendance last Friday was his failure to publicly recognise the sacrifices made by our servicemen and servicewomen in Iraq and Afghanistan. Even when invited by Chilcot to add some final statement at the close, he remained defiant and arrogant, and silent. The families of lost soldiers were in the audience and, whatever the rights and wrongs of the war, these soldiers did their duty and paid the ultimate price. Bliar should have thanked them and honoured them; the fact that he did not will ensure that his coveted legacy will be irrevocably destroyed, and rightly so.