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The following are
contributions of images and texts that have been influential in the
lives of those contributors:
1.
I am not I.
I am this one
walking beside me whom I do not see,
whom at times I manage to visit,
and whom at other times I forget;
the one who remains silent while I talk,
the one who forgives, sweet, when I hate,
the one who takes a walk when I am indoors,
the one who will remain standing when I die.
Juan Ramon Jimenez (Spanish Poet 1881 - 1958)
Malcolm Tait (Artist) - Skegness
2.
The Kiss by Max Ernst.
Malcolm Tait (Artist) - Skegness
3.
She dwells with
Beauty—Beauty that must die;
And Joy, whose hand is ever
at his lips
Bidding adieu; and aching
Pleasure nigh,
Turning to poison while the
bee-mouth sips:
Ay, in the very temple
of Delight
Veil’d Melancholy has her
sovran shrine,
Though seen of none save him
whose strenuous tongue
Can burst Joy’s grape
against his palate fine;
His soul shall taste the
sadness of her might,
And be among her cloudy
trophies hung.
The final verse from Keats's
Ode to Melancholy.
Caris Jones - London
4.
Once more unto the breach,
dear friends, once more;
Or close the wall up with our English dead.
In peace there's nothing so becomes a man
As modest stillness and humility:
But when the blast of war blows in our ears,
Then imitate the action of the tiger;
Stiffen the sinews, summon up the blood,
Disguise fair nature with hard-favour'd rage;
Then lend the eye a terrible aspect;
Let pry through the portage of the head
Like the brass cannon; let the brow o'erwhelm it
As fearfully as doth a galled rock
O'erhang and jutty his confounded base,
Swill'd with the wild and wasteful ocean.
Now set the teeth and stretch the nostril wide,
Hold hard the breath and bend up every spirit
To his full height. On, on, you noblest English.
Whose blood is fet from fathers of war-proof!
Fathers that, like so many Alexanders,
Have in these parts from morn till even fought
And sheathed their swords for lack of argument:
Dishonour not your mothers; now attest
That those whom you call'd fathers did beget you.
Be copy now to men of grosser blood,
And teach them how to war. And you, good yeoman,
Whose limbs were made in England, show us here
The mettle of your pasture; let us swear
That you are worth your breeding; which I doubt not;
For there is none of you so mean and base,
That hath not noble lustre in your eyes.
I see you stand
like greyhounds in the slips,
Straining upon the start. The game's afoot:
Follow your spirit, and upon this charge
Cry 'God for Harry, England, and Saint George!'
From Shakespeare's Henry V.
Oran Tait - London
5.
If I lay here
If I just lay here
Would you lie with me and just forget the world?
Refrain from Chasing Cars by
Snow Patrol
Anonymity requested.
6.
"There are no exact guidelines. There are probably no
guidelines at all. The only thing I can recommend at this stage is a
sense of humour, an ability to see things in their ridiculous and absurd
dimensions, to laugh at others and at ourselves, a sense of irony
regarding everything that calls out for parody in this world. In other
words, I can only recommend perspective and distance. Awareness of all
the most dangerous kinds of vanity, both in others and in ourselves. A
good mind. A modest certainty about the meaning of things. Gratitude for
the gift of life and the courage to take responsibility for it.
Vigilance of spirit."
Václav Havel upon receiving the Open Society Prize
awarded by the Central European University in 1999, trans. by Paul
Wilson
Anonymity requested.
7.
Friendship, mysterious cement of the soul!
Sweet'ner of Life, and solder of Society!
I owe thee much.
First verse of Epistle to James Smith, Robert Burns 1786
Margaret Odell - Skegness
8.
Cast a
cold eye on life, on death horsemen, pass by!
Epitaph
on the Grave of WB Yeats
Jenny
Tait - Addlethorpe
9.
It's
like the heartbreak hotel, with the heartbreak but nowhere to stay
The doors are shut on us, the neon lights fading to grey
They say I drink too much, to me, well that's just profound
How do you know you can't swim, until you have drowned?
Well there's always a drop in the bottle lady
Always a sip of the wine
The glass doesn't seem quite so empty
When window shopping for blinds.
From
Window Shopping for Blinds by Beautiful South
Rob
Mastin - Skegness
10.
We travel to
be operated on; by the sun, by the sights, by there, the place we want
to get to, and most of all, by the miles of distance between
there and
here, by the separation itself.
From The Global Soul: Jet
Lag, Shopping Malls and the Search for Home by
Pico Iyer
The Wired Jester
11.
Nobody heard him, the dead man,
But still he lay moaning:
I was much further out than you thought
And not waving but drowning.
Poor chap, he always loved larking
And now he's dead
It must have been too cold for him his heart gave way,
They said.
Oh, no no no, it was too cold always
(Still the dead one lay moaning)
I was much too far out all my life
And not waving but drowning.
Stevie Smith
- Not Waving But Drowning
Anonymous Contributor
12.
Science
is the language of the temporal world; love is that of the spiritual
world. Man, indeed, describes more than he explains; while the
angelic
spirit sees and understands.
Science saddens man; love enraptures the angel; science is still
seeking, love has found. Man
judges
of
nature in relation to itself; the angelic
spirit
judges of it in relation to heaven.
In short to the
spirits everything
speaks.
(Honoré De Balzac (1799-1850), French novelist. It later entered the
Comédie humaine (1845, trans. by George Saintsbury, 1971).
Seraphita, chapter III.
Anonymous Contributor
13.
A Collection.
Open a book and open your
mind!
Willie Caxton’s got a lot to
answer for!
Plant a word grow an idea.
Always read between the
lines too.
Robert
Tait
14.
There
are many that I know and I know it. They are many that I know and they
know it. They are all of them themselves and
they
repeat it and I hear it. Always I listen to it. Slowly I come to
understand it. Many years I listened and did not know it. I
heard
it, I understood it some, I did not know I heard it. They repeat
themselves now and I listen to it. Every way that they do
it now I
hear it. Now each time very slowly I come to understand it. Always it
comes very slowly the completed understanding
of it,
the repeating each one does to tell it the whole history of the being in
each one, always now I hear it. Always now slowly
I
understand it.
(Gertrude Stein (1874-1946), U.S. author.
Anonymous Contributor
15.
Laws
alone can not secure freedom of expression; in order that every man
present his views without penalty, there must be spirit
of
tolerance in the entire population.
Albert Einstein
Anonymous Contributor.
16.
Hope by George Frederic Watts
It is Barack
Obama's favourite painting: this famous canvas by the visionary
Victorian artist George Frederic Watts arguably set
the
President-Elect on his long path to the White House In 1990, Obama was
captivated by a sermon delivered by the Rev Jeremiah
Wright, his
controversial former pastor. The focus of the sermon was Hope, Watts's
melancholy painting of a hunched and blindfolded
girl who
sits atop a globe and tentatively plucks at a single string on her crude
wooden lyre.
Recorded on the web, not
a direct contribution by Mr Obama!
17.
There is
nothing like returning to a place that remains unchanged to find the
ways in which you yourself have altered.
Nelson
Mandela
Anonymous Contributor.
18.
There is some kiss we want with our whole
lives,
the touch of Spirit on the body.
Seawater begs the pearl to break its
shell.
And the lily, how passionately it needs
some wild darling!
At night, I open the window and ask the
moon to come
and press its face against mine.
Breathe into me.
Close the language-door,
and open the love-window.
The moon won’t use the door,
only the window.
Poems by RUMI (translations by Coleman
Barks)
Secret language
Every part of you has a secret language
your hands and your feet
say what you’ve done
and every need brings in what’s needed
pain bears its cure like a child.
Two Kinds of Intelligence (Rumi)
There are two kinds of intelligence: One acquired,
as a child in school memorizes facts and concepts
from books and from what the teacher says,
collecting information from the traditional sciences
as well as from the new sciences.
With such intelligence you rise in the world.
You get ranked ahead or behind others
in regard to your competence in retaining
information. You stroll with this intelligence
in and out of fields of knowledge, getting always more
marks on your preserving tablets.
There is another kind of tablet, one
already completed and preserved inside you.
A spring overflowing its springbox. A freshness
in the center of the chest. This other intelligence
does not turn yellow or stagnate. It's fluid,
and it doesn't move from outside to inside
through the conduits of plumbing-learning.
This second knowing is a fountainhead
from within you, moving out.
Mathnawi
IV:1960-1968
Anna Canning - Edinburgh
19.
Every
man goes down to his death bearing in his hands only that which he has
given away.
Persian Proverb
Anonymous contributor.
20.
Remember those walls I built
Well, baby they're tumbling down
And they didn't even put up a fight
They didn't even make up a sound
I found a way to let you in
But I never really had a doubt
Standing in the light of your halo
I got my angel now
It's like I've been awakened
Every rule I had you breakin'
It's the risk that I'm takin'
I ain't never gonna shut you out
Everywhere I'm looking now
I'm surrounded by your embrace
Baby I can see your halo
You know you're my saving grace
You're everything I need and more
It's written all over your face
Baby I can feel your halo
Pray it won't fade away
I can feel your halo halo halo
I can see your halo halo halo
I can feel your halo halo halo
I can see your halo halo halo
Hit me like a ray of sun
Burning through my darkest night
You're the only one that I want
Think I'm addicted to your light
I swore I'd never fall again
But this don't even feel like falling
Gravity can't forget
To pull me back to the ground again
Feels like I've been awakened
Every rule I had you breakin'
The risk that I'm takin'
I'm never gonna shut you out
Everywhere I'm looking now
I'm surrounded by your embrace
Baby I can see your halo
You know you're my saving grace
You're everything I need and more
It's written all over your face
Baby I can feel your halo
Pray it won't fade away
I can feel your halo halo halo
I can see your halo halo halo
I can feel your halo halo halo
I can see your halo halo halo (repeat)
Everywhere I'm looking now
I'm surrounded by your embrace
Baby I can see your halo
You know you're my saving grace
You're everything I need and more
It's written all over your face
Baby I can feel your halo
Pray it won't fade away
I can feel your halo halo halo
I can see your halo halo halo
I can feel your halo halo halo
I can see your halo halo halo (repeat)
Halo by Byonce.
Collette Tait
21.
My bounty is as boundless as
the sea, my love as deep,
The more I give the more I
have for both are infinite.
From Shakespeare's Romeo and
Juliet.
Anonymous Contributor.
22.
This photo was taken by
Voyager 1 in 1990 as it was returning from a space mission. The
photo itself would not have
been remarkable without the inspiring quote from Carl Sagan
(an astronomer), that
reminds us of how small we are, even though some times we think
that we are the center of
the universe, or even, the universe.
“We succeeded in taking that
picture [from deep space], and, if you look at it, you see a
dot. That’s here. That’s
home. That’s us. On it, everyone you ever heard of, every human
being who ever lived, lived
out their lives. The aggregate of all our joys and sufferings,
thousands of confident
religions, ideologies and economic doctrines, every hunter and forager,
every hero and coward, every
creator and destroyer of civilizations, every king and peasant,
every young couple in love,
every hopeful child, every mother and father, every inventor and
explorer, every teacher of
morals, every corrupt politician, every superstar, every supreme
leader, every saint and
sinner in the history of our species, lived there on a mote of dust,
suspended in a sunbeam.
The earth is a very small
stage in a vast cosmic arena. Think of the rivers of blood spilled
by all those generals and
emperors so that in glory and in triumph they could become the
momentary masters of a
fraction of a dot. Think of the endless cruelties visited by the
inhabitants of one corner of
the dot on scarcely distinguishable inhabitants of some other
corner of the dot. How
frequent their misunderstandings, how eager they are to kill one
another, how fervent their
hatreds. Our posturings, our imagined self-importance, the
delusion that we have some
privileged position in the universe, are challenged by this
point of pale light. Our
planet is a lonely speck in the great enveloping cosmic dark. In
our obscurity — in all this
vastness — there is no hint that help will come from elsewhere
to save us from ourselves.
It is up to us. It’s been said that astronomy is a humbling, and
I might add, a
character-building experience. To my mind, there is perhaps no better
demonstration of the folly
of human conceits than this distant image of our tiny world. To
me, it underscores our
responsibility to deal more kindly and compassionately with one
another and to preserve and
cherish that pale blue dot, the only home we’ve ever known.”
Anonymous contributor
23.
.
Animals by Constant 1949
Tin Tiger Gallery.
http://www.tintigergallery.co.uk/
24.
Tin Tiger Gallery.
http://www.tintigergallery.co.uk/
25.
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IF you can keep your head when all
about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you,
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,
But make allowance for their doubting too;
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or being lied about, don't deal in lies,
Or being hated, don't give way to hating,
And yet don't look too good, nor talk too wise:
If you
can dream - and not make dreams your master;
If you can think - and not make thoughts your aim;
If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster
And treat those two impostors just the same;
If you can bear to hear the truth you've spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,
And stoop and build 'em up with worn-out tools:
If you
can make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings
And never breathe a word about your loss;
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them: 'Hold on!'
If you
can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
' Or walk with Kings - nor lose the common touch,
if neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you,
If all men count with you, but none too much;
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds' worth of distance run,
Yours is the Earth and everything that's in it,
And - which is more - you'll be a Man, my son! |
Avril - Addlethorpe
26.
The Cubists pursued one
aspect of the discoveries made from African art. It led to the break up
of form. It also led to the belief
in dimensions. The
Surrealists delved into the subconscious, and swam on the surface of the
oceanic possibilities of what was
really the Shaman's terrain.
For Shamans and African image makers know that we contain the universe
inside us, that the sea is
in the fish much as the fish
is in the sea; that birds breathe the own flight; that forces in the
human frame can interpenetrate matter,
extend the bounds of time
and space, enter the dreams of loins, and travel through the private
histories of rivers and mountains.
From A way of being
free. - Ben Okri.
Richard Shaw.
27.
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It's no go the merrygoround, it's no go the rickshaw,
All we want is a limousine and a ticket for the peepshow.
Their knickers are made of crepe-de-chine, their
shoes
are made of python,
Their halls are lined with tiger rugs and their walls with head of
bison.
John MacDonald found a corpse, put it under the sofa,
Waited till it came to life and hit it with a poker,
Sold its eyes for souvenirs, sold its blood for whiskey,
Kept its bones for dumbbells to use when he was fifty.
It's no go the Yogi-man, it's no go Blavatsky,
All we want is a bank balance and a bit of skirt in a taxi.
Annie MacDougall went to milk, caught her foot in the heather,
Woke to hear a dance record playing of Old Vienna.
It's no go your maidenheads, it's no go your culture,
All we want is a Dunlop tire and the devil mend the puncture.
The Laird o' Phelps spent Hogmanay declaring he was sober,
Counted his feet to prove the fact and found he had one foot over.
Mrs. Carmichael had her fifth, looked at the job with repulsion,
Said to the midwife "Take it away; I'm through with overproduction."
It's no go the gossip column, it's no go the Ceilidh,
All we want is a mother's help and a sugar-stick for the baby.
Willie Murray cut his thumb, couldn't count the damage,
Took the hide of an Ayrshire cow and used it for a bandage.
His brother caught three hundred cran when the seas were lavish,
Threw the bleeders back in the sea and went upon the parish.
It's no go the Herring Board, it's no go the Bible,
All we want is a packet of fags when our hands are idle.
It's no go the picture palace, it's no go the stadium,
It's no go the country cot with a pot of pink geraniums,
It's no go the
Government
grants,
it's no go the elections,
Sit on your arse for fifty years and hang your hat on a
pension.
It's no go my honey love, it's no go my poppet;
Work your hands from day to day, the winds will blow the profit.
The glass is falling hour by hour, the glass will fall forever,
But if you break the bloody glass you won't hold up the weather.
The poem Bagpipe Music by Louis Macneice
Robin Tait.
28.
The time
will come
when, with elation
you will greet yourself arriving
at your own door, in your own mirror
and each will smile at the other's welcome,
and say, sit here. Eat.
You will love again the stranger who was your self.
Give wine. Give bread. Give back your heart
to itself, to the stranger who has loved you
all your life, whom you ignored
for another, who knows you by heart.
Take down the love letters from the
bookshelf,
the photographs, the desperate notes,
peel your own image from the mirror.
Sit. Feast on your life.
Love after
Love by Derek Walcott
John
- Addlethorpe
29.
One day you finally knew
what you had to do, and began,
though the voices around you
kept shouting
their bad advice --
though the whole house
began to tremble
and you felt the old tug
at your ankles.
"Mend my life!"
each voice cried.
But you didn't stop.
You knew what you had to do,
though the wind pried
with its stiff fingers
at the very foundations,
though their melancholy
was terrible.
It was already late
enough, and a wild night,
and the road full of fallen
branches and stones.
But little by little,
as you left their voices behind,
the stars began to burn
through the sheets of clouds,
and there was a new voice
which you slowly
recognized as your own,
that kept you company
as you strode deeper and deeper
into the world,
determined to do
the only thing you could do --
determined to save
the only life you could save.
The Journey by
Mary Oliver
John - Addlethorpe
30.
The poem The Hare by Ted
Hughes.
We are unfortunately as
yet unable to print this here as we are unsure of copyright we will
try to rectify this as soon as possible.
Colleen Shaw.
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