The Pass – By Paul Holland (Again)

 

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Ginger Rimmed (By Paul Holland – Again)

The Sea’s waves

Fat

Heavy with the Moon’s oily light

Moon glow seaside Bundoran

Ginger rimmed

Caked in winter’s corona of cloudy night

The town glows too

From above seen

The waves take on the pores

Of skin swept sea

All held firm this

Extra

Given

Night

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Moving Stones (By Paul Holland – Again)

Five hares on a morning field

Five ways to wake early

To glorious sunshine.

Spring’s clocks springing forward

Bringing me stumbling out early across the yard

My myopic squintings

Saluting the sun.

To be

Startled at the springing forward of the hares,

At their desperate hurtling away

And them disappearing into the back bog.

From where I was never to see them again.

Binoculars squinting serving only to point out

‘..the difference between a Hare

And a rock in a field?

If you see it move it’s a rock’.

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How Do Drunk People Get Home? – By Paul Holland

Oh, but how do drunk people get home?
I wonder
But…
How do drunk people get home?
My careening well…
Scars and scurf
And a long whole ago
….that pill in the morning in the clinic
that pill…
Hmm…
But how do drunk people get home?
I met the man with the box of frogs and had occasion to ask him
Feeling that the rain would stay off a while
as I sheltered under his hanging umbrella
He was too busy to answer
Much too busy,
The boxing of frogs and the herding of cats
Taking up
Way way too much of his time!
But it’d come to a pretty pass
If the only weavers of dreams left to us
Were to be the joke of the bank
(Their jokes are cruel)
And the many sellers of smoke
They there
Still there
There in the glam of the threadbare glade.

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The Ginger Scrolls – Section 2 – A Gladdening of the Hearts

THE GINGER SCROLLS – PART  2 THE DEPARTURE CONTINUED……

You can read Part 1 here

 

Friend,

I remain nameless but deign not to remain silent. For my people, a gentle friendly Volk with arms outstretched in friendship for all they come across, remain afloat on their small lard hair vessels, tormented by the loss of their lands and kin.

But lo! Just as our tragedy told, seemed to beckon all hope to the shadowy leather bucket of Norsglkiadrtothonotom we received message in form of salvation from great Lord Protector. Galleothon.

Once a mighty warrior who challenged evil to a mime war and boldly saw evil from the door when he did his smiley face, Great Galleothon protector of our beliefs and spirits in times good as well as those tainted by sadness and despair had come to us. The incant of Galleothon was heard across the heavens in the defence and protection of his people;

We fall grim destiny

Locked upon a baleful wind

That draws us toward a future unknown

Oh Land! Oh ice and snow

What befalls us cannot stay

We shall weep but we vow to return one day

A promise made is a lie denied

Krol climbed the mast of his boat and bade us to listen to his warbling message. He took blood from his wrists and scrawled in a proud fist upon the spider’s web sail that sought the winds solace for our benefit. By his luck he wrote in a smallish hand stemming blood loss but those of us with eyesight weak had to squint mightily to read the tiny words.

We are free

Doubt not your heart

We can see

No end but a start

We sail to Deep South

For have no doubt

Galleothon will guide us well

Away from this cruel swell

To calmer water

That is free of slaughter

 

And on we sailed, for once the steel of cold sadness tempered by the thought of new homes and fates with land for us to till in return for our friendship and fealty. Each day we forged further, Mother Sun would appear for longer time, her warmth on our faces and her kindness rekindling our spirits.

The land of the Notalots beckoned……

 

 

To be continued….

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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The Ginger Scrolls – Section 2 – Vos’ Lament

We posted a week or two ago about the great scrolls found in a Canister in Norway by Robert Hamstrangler, Norway’s greatest anthropologist and hot water blower upper that told the story of Ginger Volk.

You can read Part 1 Here; Part 2 Here; Part 3 Here, Part 4 Here, Part 5 Here, Part 6 Here, Part 7 Here and Part 8 Here.

Following the tremendous reaction garnered around the world and beyond we are pleased and nearly honoured to bring you  Part 2 of The Scrolls.

There remains a debate amongst egg heads about Part 2. This is because it is not universally accepted by the shadowy Supreme Ginger Council that the Scrolls are indeed an accurate portrayal of the history of the ginger people and have in fact been completely made up.

This view has already featured on BBC 2’s excellent documentary series, “Smug bastards with nothing to be smug about being smug about things that nobody really cares about but allows them to travel the world, doinking dusky maidens and prattle on about the future of the Planet”.

Sadly our budget only stretches to sausage and chips in the local café served by Hilary a part-time orthodontic technician with a phobia for railings.

As with Part 1, an editorial decision has been taken to focus on the story and leave out the more technical elements contained in the Scrolls. This is particularly pertinent to one item.

The lard hair boats. 

For those interested in discovering more about lard hair boats we recommend;

“Fat and Follicles – Ghingar boat building techniques and methods” by Douglas Sandwell OUP (635 pages and a pop up keel).

“Sculpting in Lard – fat myth or fat fiction? – Douglas Sandwell – OUP 230 pages (Out of print).

THE GINGER SCROLLS – PART  2 THE DEPARTURE CONTINUED……

The Story So Far; The remnants of the Ghingar have been forced to flee their loved homeland in the north as a result of attacks by the warlike tribes, the Hups, Cups, Jups and Lups who blamed the Gingars for the famine and joylessness visited upon their own lands by the refusal of the Sun to return to them after the long winter months.

Making good their escape in the lard hair boats designed by Rep the Carpenter, the remaining Ginghars are dealt a further blow by the suicide of their beloved Princess Treytel after her betrothed Vos, turned into a dolphin.

Only the brave words and sincere heart of the warrior Krol girded their loins. At the end of Part 1, the Great Lord Protector,  Archangel Galleothon arises from the deep of the deep bits of the ocean to provide the heartbroken folk with hope and succor for their long journey into the southern seas and their untold future.

Their great journey now unfolds like a Cos lettuce leaf in a Waldorf salad. Enjoy.

We begin with Vos’ Lament for the death of his love Treytel……..

When told of her death he could not be solaced by friendly hand or pilchard snack as befitted a part man part Dolphin. Deep, deep into the eyes of Krol did Vos look as he bobbed in the swelling sea. Aghast at the news of the death of his love he forgot to float and sank into the deep. He hoved into view and cried out these words;

Stitch my wounds they have come undone

Rebind the ties that tether me to sanity

My heart bleeds useless sentiment

As I visit your memory

This breaking, raw, flailing pain

Swirls with unctuous ease

Around my mind

As to what if and perhaps

 

Youthful, stubborn pride

Earnest wishes of a mendicant fool

Return to me stolen years

Of the loss of you

 

Cold cold my mind’s eye now lies

No longer towards the sun and future untold

But to hoar frost breath of far behind

The Sun’s rays fall cold upon my soul

Embers of their fires warm no part of me

I am frozen in essence and form

Bereft of all that I know to be true

If I had known what I know now

I would have died for the memory of you

No love will conquer your loss

No hope will instill peace in me

This septic, taunting pain endures

As brute reminder to my folly

Friend, tell me how to forget her

Because I cannot

I will not, shall not

My last breath shall shape your name

My last thought shall capture your smile

My last heartbeat will be broken

And when the worms that will dine on me rest

They shall spell your name

 

Rip and tear my flesh

I have no need of it now

Salt these opened sores

A foolish life I have made

But a life I know must be lived

And true

To all those things

I hold dear 

 

You above all

I wish you well

As I depart dead hopes

Now decaying and pustulant

But like a child’s first unsteady steps

There will be a world of untrampled dreams

To set foot upon once more with undisguised glee

I love you

But I must source peace

To tie me to sanity’s calm purpose

Tears soaked our cheeks as these words, whispered with a sadness as was never heard before or since, fell upon our souls like the dust from a traveller’s sandals.

Vos fell beneath the water as the life of the careworn mariner in the northern seas bade him to come forward. Like Treytel, he too was now lost to us.

To be continued….

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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How Do You Write The Sound Of A Bell? – By Paul Holland (Again)

There are deep words that sound
Sound throughout the doings of a day
Working, Running, Cooking
Hillwalking
Can cover them for a spell.
But as a bell  clanging
The tension of the sound carries.
So there are words  there
From behind trees
Around buildings
Along byways
And main  roads.
In places where people gather
And are alone
There
On waking

And at the pause before sleep
For me now the deep sound
And the words
Merge into
The sound of your name
And the answering echo

Calling in my heart’s space
Your name before me.

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The Ginger Scrolls – Part 8 (Of Many)

We posted a week or two ago about the great scrolls found in a Canister in Norway by Robert Hamstrangler, Norway’s greatest anthropologist and hot water blower upper that told the story of Ginger Volk.

You can read Part 1 Here; Part 2 Here; Part 3 Here, Part 4 Here, Part 5 Here, Part 6 Here and Part 7 Here

Now ’tis time for Part 8……..a very short one….

THE GINGER SCROLLS – THE DEPARTURE continued……

Then from the sea a beam of light poured out, shooting to the heavens and in the beam a great figure, shadowy at first but gaining depth and texture with each moment, emerged. The figure stepped out of the Ray of Light.

Krol fell to his knees, tears fell down his cheeks and he beat his chest with his mittened hands. “Lord Galleothon! Thou hast come! Thou hast answered our prayers and heard our laments” We are blessed Lord by your presence.”

 

Galleothon rose to his full height of 4 adult sheep. He spoke;

“I am with you people of Ghingar. Your time in the North is now at an end. You are chosen. Your history was written eons ago by myself and my cousin Borofron, keeper of the saints shoes. It is now time for the next part of your history to unfold.”

 

He stood amongst us all, his great size and power over all things giving the broken spirits of the Ghingars new heart and hope. No more tears flowed that day. No more sadness entered hearts. Our Lord Galleothon was with us.

 

We fall grim destiny

Locked upon a baleful wind

That draws us toward a future unknown

Oh Land! Oh ice and snow

What befalls us cannot stay

We shall weep but we vow to return one day

A promise made is a lie denied

 

 

That concludes Part 1 of The Ginger Scrolls……..What will happen in Part 2?…….

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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The Ginger Scrolls – Part 7 (Of Many)

We posted a week or two ago about the great scrolls found in a Canister in Norway by Robert Hamstrangler, Norway’s greatest anthropologist and hot water blower upper that told the story of Ginger Volk.

You can read Part 1 Here; Part 2 Here; Part 3 Here, Part 4 Here, Part 5 Here and Part 6 Here

Now ’tis time for Part 7……..

THE GINGER SCROLLS – THE DEPARTURE continued……

 

Some swore they saw mother Sun beyond the Horizon, at last revealing herself to us after wait so long and tragic. Hope built once more like the snow mason constructing a new home cube by cube.

But it was not to be.

Princess Treytel loved Vos as deep as the ocean and as high as the sky. For each day of passage the lovers would look across to each other and utter betrothals of love. Each day Vos’ became more and more fevered with loss for his bride and eager for his love’s embrace. Finally, foolishly, and like all young love – stupidly – Vos leapt from his vessel and sought to swim the narrow channel between to reach his love.

 

Treytel saw him fall under the foaming water and never saw him return to the surface as a mortal. A dolphin took his place and wore his little leather cap until it too was lost to the deep. Treytel maintained an eye upon the smiling face of her dolphin lover as he swam nearby, singing to her with a series of clicks and fish impressions which only he understood. But they still made her laugh, the laughter of lovers. Her tears fell at night worried about married life with a dolphin and how she would survive in the water for any prolonged period but love would accommodate her fears and allow her to avoid salt damaged skin. She hoped at least.

Melancholy sat over the vessels like a mighty cheese, dripping salty distemper amongst the flame haired. So much death. So much sadness.

When would the fates allow them to come ashore? What would they find when they reached land? Heroes and hand maidens or goblins and left handed people?

The darkness blackened their souls. Hatred returned when for generations they had existed without it.

Treytel’s tears would not abate, as Vos  skitted one final time, bade his love a clicky farewell and swam with his new family away as their protectors and toward the open sea and a rendezvous with Sea World (note – possible translation error). As she watched him swim away, Treytel cried after her love,

Run to my memory

Along the shore

Swim to my memory

Across the ocean

Climb to my memory

To the highest peak

And when you arrive

Forget not your labour and do not forget me

 

Will I lay with you upon a bed of foaming sea?

The quilted tide warming our bones

Will I hold your heart?

As we float toward Epthereon

Will you my love, love me?

I am distant from your shore

Will you wait for me?

 

 

Such sadness consumed her that she fled her vessel and met the sea water with a diffident splash never to be seen again. The sorrow of the Ghingars at losing their beloved princess was now complete. No words or songs could rest their weary hearts. No tales of the brave or the beautiful would suffice them. Their misery now total.

 

Krol spoke to his people, in quiet hushed tones, mournful in full and suffering from a rooted wind;

 

“When I see your face

I know that I am not past

To the Northern skies I shall turn

And watch the winds dance atop our lands

I will bade them sad departure

As my homeland is now far

 

Oh! Joy of Galleothon bid that I

Even as an old man who asks not for life long

But to sit by your shoulder

And at peace finally I set
My home

My land

Of snow

Of Ice

But the warmth of my kin

Shall stay anymore sadness
Krol finished his sentence and at the moment the wind dropped and the sea was calm, flat like the milkmaid’s embrace. There was silence amongst the Ghingars, for once dropping their daytime incantations. A great hand, cupped into a fist came from the water. It smashed down upon satin sea and threw up a great plume of spray, covering the lard hair vessels.
The fist smote the water once more, again deluging the fearful crews and their broken hearted cargo. And then it was gone. The water’s returned to their calm status, benign and forgiving.

Then from the sea a beam of light poured out, shooting to the heavens and in the beam a great figure, shadowy at first but gaining depth and texture with each moment, emerged. The figure stepped out of the Ray of Light.

Krol fell to his knees, tears fell down his cheeks and he beat his chest with his mittened hands. “Lord Galleothon! Thou hast come! Thou hast answered our prayers and heard our laments” We are blessed Lord by your presence.”

Galleothon rose to his full height of 4 adult sheep. He spoke;

“I am with you people of Ghingar. Your time in the North is now at an end. You are chosen. Your history was written eons ago by myself and my cousin Borofron, keeper of the saints shoes. It is now time for the next part of your history to unfold.”

To be continued……..

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The Ginger Scrolls – Part 6 (Of Many)

We posted a week or two ago about the great scrolls found in a Canister in Norway by Robert Hamstrangler, Norway’s greatest anthropologist and hot water blower upper that told the story of Ginger Volk.

You can read Part 1 Here; Part 2 Here; Part 3 Here, Part 4 Here and Part 5 Here

Now ’tis time for Part 5……..

THE GINGER SCROLLS – THE DEPARTURE continued……

 

One of our number, Strik, bade us farewell and leapt to his death, honoured to be with his kin in after world favouring their affections to those of us still alive. His choice his Way.

Upon the prow of our ships, Narwhals guided us through the disdainful water, their tusks like beacons of light in the grey murk, guiding our navigators to sail with some knowledge of where our desolate future lay.

To each side of our vessels dolphins swam as outriders, to inform and protect the flame haired of any advancing danger or destitute Huplanders who dared to do battle still.

 

Great birds, sent by their brother Exeretheon the Night Flyer squalled above the vessels, eyeing the clouds, wind and future light and the greatest of them the size of a small motorway service station (this may be an error in translation), would defecate on Kerkhof the Pilot of the lead vessel, with messages of the course to be taken.

Man, woman and child, in lard hair boats were carried by desolate winds of despair and the surly tides of bondage. For 173 days we ventured south towards unknown worlds and peoples we had so studiously sought to avoid these previous eons.

We made our peace with the green eyed sea for safe passage. And still mother Sun refused to appear to help or woes lighten and our misery.

Silver gilded Gryphon’s spied upon our desperate journey and their spectral presence haunted even the youngest amongst us. Only Exeretheon’s brothers prevented attacks. For evil’s granite claw has dug its black heart into our people and is determined to make us suffer with every cruel twist of the fates.

 

From each vessel our volk peeled low murmurs to reason with our Gods for safe passage and sanctuary and to cry for the loss of homes, kith, kin and kilns. Oh Tragedy! Oh despair from whence we came, to where we go, we know not save for the lone Pilots of our own destiny, guiding the last of our volk to a future unwritten and unknown.

Sing for the dead

Sing for the living

Sing for the forgotten

Sing for the weary, the tired and the vanquished

Sing of mirth and good nature

Sing to life

Sing my song my love when I am far away

For I shall sing for you

Our incantations, as tradition dictated would continue for the time between day and night, when the winds turned against us. On we would sing, bitter salted tears stinging our eyes and grazing our sallow, dirtied cheeks, but we would not stop as the words gave us comfort and hope as if our past was with us in the present and so we could see a future.

Our flame coloured hair billowed like sparks of fire in the mocking sea breeze, assailing our features and licking our faces like tongues of spitting flame and the people of the lands we traveled past considered our vessels aflame. Even the tawdry gulls afeared, squawking their desultory announcements.

Where we venture from, our land cruelly taken from us by famine and the curse of the fear and famine forged into evil intent by Overath and his minions, was unknown to many who saw us float past them, nor could they fathom or dared ask as we sailed along the coast of Hupland.

Shoreliners, peasants and warriors alike, eager to see us on our way from their barren coastal lands forged a peace with each other in doing so. As we approached night would fall, the Sun abandoning these places also. Even mother Sun was abandoning us to our fate in near Southern lands. The Shoreliners and their protectors invoked the voices of their Gods for wrath to be visited upon our wretched band of kin to move us from their lands and allow precious light to restore its benevolence upon their lands. For famine too had wreaked great suffering along these lands.

As the Hup Chronicles say “There these carriers of doom, these harbingers of evil, and these soulless beasts moved along the coast murmuring and chanting to our gods for evil mercy to fall upon us for the passage of sin conducted by the drowned Overath and his blooduse minions. Had they been abandoned by our deities for foul deeds done foully or had they failed to pay homage to our Gods for protection?

Across the land the people begged for Valhalla’s curse to be lifted and mighty Odin to protect them from the reek of evil these red haired people came imbued with. Curse upon them and their kin we would cry and we would launch stones, rocks and leather leggings out to the cold, green swell in an attempt to ward the flame hairs from landing on our land. But the flame hairs never looked towards land. Instead they maintained a regal pose aboard their proud ships made of lard and hair and steadily floated toward the place the great sea creatures and sea birds were leading them to. For some of us it became a beautiful sight to behold – a broken people together in life and death.” (The Hup chronicles are available in hard back from any good bookshop).

Our tears do fall into the sea

Our hearts are broken wrenched as we are from home

Our hopes are battered upon the brooding swell

But we shall meet again of that I am sure my friend

In a land of peace and Sun

 

We trusted our senses and we paid fealty to our guides and no amount of leather leggings would dispel us from this aim.

On the vessels sailed, beyond the fear and callous overtures of the mortal Shoreliners – our phalanx of sea creature’s guiding us to our unknown destination. Our people’s thoughts finally turning to warmer kinder thoughts, of dance and merriment of love and laughter. Perhaps the great tragedy that lay in the recesses of the far North could be laid to rest.

Some swore they saw mother Sun beyond the horizon, at last revealing her to us after wait so long and tragic. Hope built once more.

But it was not to be.

To be continued………

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