LOOKING FOR A LEFT
I TURN TOO SOON AND STOP DEAD
CREMATORIUM
Every time I go to Rhydyfelin I always end up at the Crem. It doesn’t matter what part, Shakespeare or Shelley, I still end up in that bleak car park staring at mortality. I wonder if hearses have the same but converse problem and keep ending up at the Ilan Centre staring at the swings and wondering whether there’s time for one last go. If they turned up tonight they could join in my Christmas haiku workshop and I’m already working out the feasibility of creating Japanese epitaphs when the kids start turning up for what they think will be their drama session with the Artworks team. They’re stuck with me and I appear to be stuck with the cast of Oliver! As three of the older group with their long floppy hair and baggy half mast trousers have turned up as Fagin’s gang. Assuming this must be their Christmas show, I’m half way through the chorus of ‘You’ve Got To Pick A Pocket Or Two’ before I realise they’re the drama workers and that’s how they normally look.
I try to pass this off as ritual ice breaker I sometimes deploy and brace myself for the new breed of artful dodgers and teenage hoodies who I’m sure will dominate the two groups I have this evening. Prejudiced old git as I am, I’m fully expecting to run the teenage gauntlet of asbos, hooded heads and Neanderthal grunts. I’m hugely disappointed as there is not a hood in sight and they all seem to be talking in joined up sentences. In fact the only teenage traits I spot are a couple of love bites, and these are worn rather ostentatiously by the drama workers. I find this deeply shocking as I’m sure they’re barely old enough to be on solids.
The kids continue to disappoint during the poetry; no sullen silences or snide backhanders but a volley of ideas that bounce off the walls so relentlessly that both sessions overrun. Of course they have no inclination to stay within the classic lines of Japanese poetry and the finished product bears as much relation to a haiku as sushi does to a piece of battered cod. But they’re words on a page and surprising ones at that. Alongside the normal Christmas fare, there’s charity, family and poverty. Who said teenagers don’t care? Teenagers rock, and so does Rhydyfelin. As I’m going out an old bloke with a beard and a long coat is going in and I swear I can heart the distant refrain of ‘Consider yourself’. They’re a strange bunch, these drama workers.
THREE KINGS AT THE DOOR
ALL CINAMMON AND WHISKY
RED, GOLD AND VERY GREEN
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CHRISTMAS IS COMING
SNOW, CHARITY, ARGUMENTS
WHY DOES TIME GO SO FAST?
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AT LAST IT’S HERE; AND GONE
QUALITY TIME; QUALITY STREET
IN THE PAST. POVERTY!