The Ginger Scrolls – Part 5 (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 and Part 4 Here

Now ’tis time for Part 5……..

THE GINGER SCROLLS – THE DEPARTURE continued……

 

“The lard hair boats, be our saviour!” he cried. Many hand mocked his father’s insistence on lashing lard and spare hair together into vessels three sun cycles previously, a mad eyed Karibou they called him, but now his foresight was praised for we, the remnants of the Ghingar Empire could finally set about our future with renewed vim and vigour.

“For when we sail

To far off shores

What shall we see?

What will our children say?

What will be their final word on us?

That we fled our lands, their future home

That we banished them from their destiny?

That we stole their souls?

That we gave them life?

That we gave them destiny?

That we could in our darkest hours afford them hope?

What will they say?

I hope it is kind”

And so friend, we sailed with deep tears in our hearts to witness farewell to our time and our peace. Leaving the lee of the mighty river Sallopian, for so long our source of protection we floated into the gloating Northern seas.

As we set south, the God of Ice, Rijsbergen, sent forth his messengers to guard and guide us through these a dark desolate places populated only by the ghoulish memory of drowned adventurers from time immemorial, their frozen faces etched into the ice that gaoled them.

(Oh Archangel Galleofron where are you to protect your soul keepers? We need you more than ever. Not since the time of the arrival of the Shoelace People have we sought your protective cloak and twig of justice.)(Note; Twig may in fact be sword but the lettering is unclear)

We sail in peace to new found lands

To find our loves who have left before us

We hope that we shall meet again

But even if we do not

Know that you sail with us!

 

Our Ice Guardians, Neeskens and Jongbloed, great slabs of ice, hewn from their Kingdom’s lands at the earliest memory, their faces etched with age and shaped by the sear of the sun and the freeze of the cold, moved south with us and slowly saw our homeland diminished. A deep, still sadness fell upon us as the distance formed between us and our home of memories and kin.

One of our number, Strik, bade us farewell and leapt to his death, honoured to be with his kin in the 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.

Of which there were many.

 

 

To be continued………

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The Ginger Scrolls – Part 4 (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 and Part 2 Here and Part 3 Here

Now ’tis time for Part 4……..

THE GINGER SCROLLS – THE DEPARTURE continued……

They sailed for evil intent.

We still huddled in our homes, yearning for lost sun and warmth and food did not see, hear or sense their approach. Three hundred or so ships melting from the east, slicing through our frozen waters in their stone clad vessels like a snore through dreams.

They visited terrible vengeance, slaying our weary Out Guards, pulling down the great beloved Ice Buttock and entering our lands. They slew our King, Michelsrinus, pillaged his family and boiled his potatoes in a cauldron lined with the skins of his children. “Tasty, very tasty.” Overath murmured. “Kill them all!” was his final order to his squadrons.

“Avenge these flame hairs from our lands – sweep them out to the seas beyond our sight and nets. We besiege the Gods. There is nothing we ask of them. Woe, woe, woe upon us that we must sight such evil.”

Fires were kindled and lit along our shores to guide more avengers toward us. Swords sharpened, arrows tipped, axe heads forged and shields buffed to shiny niceness. Men of war and men of peace cojoined to attack the evil they saw in these Northern lands. They coated themselves in grease and roasted chestnuts to pass the time. Some played tag, others knitted and the greatest warrior amongst them known as Bloodlust, the height of two adult sheep, learned the basics of tap dancing.

Why did you come?

Men from the South

Why utter such hatred

From your pustulant mouth 

We sheltered in the lee of the Hidden halls, deep beneath Holy Mountain Westerneye, sheltered from the slaughter but not from the pitying screams of our Volk as they sought false sanctuary, from the bloodied axe and the striking sword, pitiful cries for clemency ignored. We cried, deep sorrowful cries of primal intent for them and yet amongst us few, guilt sodden relief that life still flowed through our piteous bodies.

Three nights of slaughter. No invader did venture towards the Hidden Halls, our brave blood refusing to betray us. Until the men from the South, sated in their need for ignorant vengeance finally set down their swords, axes and clubs and slept among the bodies of our dead.

Trebor the North wind came to our aid, forcing the invaders to leave our desolate lands and pushing the sighs of our dead and grieving South, away from our ears and memory.

 

(Translator’s note – Here the Scrolls fall silent. The in depth description and desecration of the Ghingar’s capital city of Rasmouldjensoningbirdemdeleanto, has never been recorded. If they were recorded in the Scrolls, for whatever reason the author has removed them and there is no trace of them anywhere else. Having said that it must have been pretty bad and so we can only guess at the sadness that these poor people endured. We know that the destruction of Rasmouldjensoningbirdemdeleanto, led to the first ever sponsored walk on behalf of someone or something. This is the stem of the modern day Ginger people’s love of a sponsored walk.)

 

…………One warrior amongst us stood still. Krol, the son of Rep the carpenter, bound us with fortitude. While we weak, afeared to leave the icy shell of the Hidden Halls for fear their protection would be rent from us, Krol parried our weakness and filled us with strength previously unknown in our hearts.

“The lard hair boats, be our saviour!” he cried. Many had mocked his father, Malcolm The Prepared, keeness to lash lard and spare hair together into vessels three sun cycles previously, “A mad eyed Karibou” they had called him, but now his foresight was praised for we, the remnants of the Ghingar Empire could finally set about our future with renewed vim and vigour.

 

For when we sail

To far off shores

What shall we see?

What will our children say?

 

What will be their final word on us?

That we fled our lands, their future home

That we banished them from their destiny?
That we stole their souls?

That we gave them life?

That we gave them destiny?

That we could in our darkest hours afford them hope?

What will they say?

I hope it is kind

 

To be continued………

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The Ginger Scrolls – Part 3 (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 and Part 2 Here

Now ’tis time for Part 3……..

THE GINGER SCROLLS – THE DEPARTURE continued……

As we say “In the darkest times night follows night”. The wisest knew that such darkness and cold meant that other tribes suffered from similar tribulation. We lived with our way and them with theirs. We hope it would stay that way. It was, alas not to be.

The King of the Hup, a mighty warrior ennobled as Overath, bade blood and fury to reek vengeance upon nature itself and tear the gentle Earth apart to teach her a lesson that never more would she treat the Hup with such disdain. His rage a madness that could only be lessened by death.

He crushed the skulls of thirteen House Carls with his double headed axe and bade for the blood of others. “Tis our tithe to kill, Tis our right to life, Tis our right to blame,” he cried. The people of Hup agreed and foamed with false anger and blazed with sham rage. Strangers. To blame. To find. To punish.

“To the North, to the North. The Ghingars have wrought this upon us with their devilry and odourless magic. It is they who must be stopped. For they are seeking to capture our souls for their own evil intent. They seek to starve us and steal the sun from us – we must destroy them. Summon the other Kings from Lup, Jup, Cup and Wup – I declare Council must be opened!”

It was as if they had become a single terrible beast spoken of in our own fables but never seen, whiffed or heard. A beast of ignorant rage and no more. “To the toll booth then –who has change?” cried mighty warrior Overath. With the Lups, Cups, Jups and Wups now in unison with the Hups, they sailed in mighty force in stone clad ships, captained by the black hearted sailor birds of the Vogts tribe, half man half puffin who sought no more reward than fish for their black hearted deeds.

 

They sailed for evil intent.

We still huddled in our homes, yearning for lost sun and warmth and food did not see, hear or sense their approach. Three hundred or so ships melting from the east, slicing through our frozen waters in their stone clad vessels like a snore through dreams.

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The Ginger Scrolls – Part 2 (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

Now ’tis time for Part 2

THE GINGER SCROLLS – THE DEPARTURE continued……

 

Ours was a simple world, made good by kindness, potatoes and a lack of foot disorders.

Kindness would be shown to strangers who ventured to our Homestead. The stranger would find life so satisfying that he would stay in perpetuity. On these rare times we would learn of the times in other worlds, the rise and fall of empires far to the South, East and West –  of men of different creeds and living their lives with many more laws, too many I would wager for peace to be allowed to roam over their lands and their people.

For the outsiders, where contentment was a threat rather than a treat, the non-return of strangers, or Nonomers as they were titled, from our lands only saw a further sense of mystery wrap itself around our people.

Tales of devilry and witchery amongst we Ginghars came common to these ignorant tongues. Tales were told by their story men and women of how we would eat our own, raw flesh torn limb from limb. How we savage hearts would allow our women to lay with wolves to produce offspring half man half wolf and how these desperate creatures were used by us to mortify the souls of neighbouring peoples.
Such tales are nonsensical in construct and meaning. Our great thinkers communed closely with the Wolf King, Haan for we bordered each other’s land and it was in each other’s interest to understand each other’s lives. But as we learned, efforts to understand anothers nature were oft seen by other men as an opportunity to curse our namewith their peoples in the name of greed and ignorance.

We lived on vegetables with animal flesh barely passing our lips – only then when the wolves left us offerings at the beginning and end of the dark season to mark their return to the forests that neighboured our lands. Again this was taken as signs of sorcery and witchcraft from our eventual foes.

For we ever understood their ways. We had no good or evil only what we termed Way (author’s note – the Ghingar term used here is actually Veluxmindacimentorroulatersnttfghping – literally translated as “direction of life within our snowy lands – we consider Way to be an appropriate translation).

 

Way of life, Way of death, Way of things, Way of meaning, Way of loving – we had many Ways.

(Note; there is now a lengthy passage in the Scrolls on agricultural techniques employed by the Ghingar. The main topic is how they managed to grow so many root vegetable in such Northern climes and only having snow and ice to grow them in. Whilst this may be considered an agricultural miracle, it is not considered relevant for gingerfightback’s purposes to include these pages. For an in depth assessment of Ghingar growing techniques the reader may like to obtain a copy of “In Ice and Snow We Made Things Grow – Ghingar farming practices and rituals – by Douglas Sandwell – OUP – 956 Pages and includes pop up lettuce).

 

The Dark Stayed…….

……………………………………………..Why the Sun decreed to stay in that year nobody will ever reason. Why the famine took hold, why the fish left the sea waters and why the reindeer moved deeper into the forest, man will look askance at man and never find an answer.

When Mother Sun departed, we bade her farewell and sought her return with due speed. But she did not return at the known time, leaving us and other men to speak with hoar frost breath.

No plant or animal would grow that season. Haan led his tribe further into the Taiga for sustenance, their howling farewells bidding us safe return to summer warmth. Our left flank was exposed. We huddled in our homes for warmth and boiled snow and ice for miserly sustenance, only our stories and madrigals keeping us from mind loss and starvation.

 

The dark is upon us

But your beauty lights my soul

A bright arc fills mine eyes

You are near to me

That I know

Dance with me

Sing with me

Laugh with me

Lie with me

My love

Be among my dreams

And dart among the stars
As we say “In the darkest times night follows night”, so the wisest of us knew that darkness and the cold in our lands could only mean that other man tribes suffered from similar tribulation.

We lived with our way and they with theirs and this it should stay.

It was, alas not to be.

Part 3 to follow……….

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Stan the Man – By Paul Holland

You hear me

Then heed me!

And other nights of his dinner

Hitting the wall.

To be picked up and eaten with fingers

Namm namm….

 

Two brothers would be wise enough to be offside

My sister and I instead too damn like him to cower

A younger one, God love her

Never concerned him enough to talk to

Nor to pick on

Just the odd stray snarl

Of the beast caged in dark bars

Our Mum always a target

 

Try not to antagonise him as he’d maybe pick on someone else

Seeing your family suffer being much worse than

Being under the Dull Stupid Bloody lash

Of his forked tongue

 

You damn fool

We were your kin

While you were digging out

All we wanted was that you dug in

When they dug the hole for your ashes

Who of us there could pray

‘Our Father who art in heaven…..’

That first line had us all stumped

 

But I know it’s either

‘Love or destruction’

In this life we do get to struggle and to choose

 

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Morning – By Paul Holland (Again)

Bluebell frillary

Shoots of Barley on the hillcrest field

Wet dripping barbed wire

Silver slivers of cold Spring light

Through a disorder of branches

A palette  of greens

Smatterings of shade

Brown muddy boots

And from everywhere

Birdsong

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Brontes Country – By Paul Holland

I’m Squinting

With my glasses lost again

But I know enough to be struggling to see

God,but will I ever stop the drink

Once and for all?

 

Today I saw a Belfast man

Marching the road

Collarete on in the sun

The traditional

Tribal triumph

Seen in his swagger and away of shoulders.

 

But this is Spain

And the collarete was Instead ONCE

(Organización National de Ciegos España)

Tickets

Orange and yellow tickets to be sold

Their luck tacked to his waistcoat.

His swagger and away

Sadly as a result of the twisted racking cracking

Of his body’s being.

It spent moving

His spine choked frame in the ways of his days

Him I squinting saw

Not him then

Thran

With the self blinded

Hurray of the Cyclops.

 

Last time at home

A fella:

Brother to one in the company

Complained to the slow barman

-I’ll get you done!

But the bar was packed

And the barman

(Who I too, thought slow)

Was having none of his old craic.

 

-Get me done?

He hollered

-Get me done?

-You can fuck off,

Yer barred!

 

Old Belfast bashing

Hard man against the new.

The silence of naked fear

That such a statement

might once have entailed

Bloody death or at least a beating

Was gone

The bouncer gleefully bounced the

Soul scarred, jail tattooed poor twerp

Drinkless

Out into the night.

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Under A Duvet Of Stars – By Paul Holland (Again!)

I went to sleep in the stranger’s bed
And woke needing to pee.
Not knowing where the light was
Nor wanting to wake her.
Well,
Wanting to wake her…but.

Through the curtains
Could see the stars
Sow stars
Sow that light across this universe
This brief moment of time
Across the darkness
Light my way
Be my light
Don’t let me stumble.

But she wakes
And as she watches my return
Know now
This means more to me
Than the light
Of our one lonely star.

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A Snowline Of Yellow Furze (By Paul Holland Again!)

I’ve given up the shore for Hills

These Hills

At twilight the Lough glows yet red

Clutching the last of the Sun

I’ve given up The Shore for these hills

Hills yellow with furze

Coconut smelling

And birdsong trilling out

Below ribbons of streetlights

Show colour, a friendlier yellow

It’s the mounds that have it tho’

Dusky mounds of fecund blossom

Falling away making this

Spring’s snowline of bushes

Broad brushstrokes

 

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Diving For Pearls – By Paul Holland

Shifting over in the bed.
Waking at
My usual time to wake
Minutes before the alarm sounds.
I laugh at the lonely
Silliness,
Of my being pleased
That I can turn on the other lamp with a toe
My left big toe.
It has taken these years
To shift from having
Had
A
‘My side of the bed’
But I navigate around
These various double beds
Painters long since slipped
Still a deep sleeper
But wandering now
From clinging to the
Ribbing at the side
Of a queen-sized mattress
In the company of
Her
Her of splendid isolation
To now
To all the kingdoms
And beyond
As there’s no one there to wake to.
If there were to be
It’d be a pretty pass
To wake a sleeping lover with a big toe in her gob
(Still?
….horses for courses…)
As I swing to turn on their lamp
I can imagine lights being put out for less.

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