A Cruelty Free 2015?

A look at some acts of animal cruelty

What About Reeva?

Opinion piece on why how the media have forgotten about Reeva Steenkamp.

‘Something there is that doesn’t love a wall’

With the anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall, Lady Ardour takes a look at the city as it stands today.

Why You Should Watch America Horror Story

A persuasive article on why the world should watch American Horror Story, including you.

Party Blues

Hand me an apple and an orange

perhaps a champagne bottle,

full of course. For my party

you can take a few pictures

of the things I will wish to remember

and please make a cake that remains uncrushed.

 

So I can keep it in my bag uncrushed

and when I reach for my pen or pencil, the orange

Happy Birthday icing will stare me in the face and I will remember

You. And when I reach for my perfume bottle

the little rabbit and squirrel pictures

will dance around my fingers, like animals that like to party.

 

And next year when nobody comes to my party

and my heart is crushed

then I will remember the pictures

you took last year in the tungsten orange

light as you gulped off the last of the champagne bottle.

I will smile and remember.

 

The next day you will call to say you just remembered

my birthday. Ask if I had a good party,

that you are busy now with baby bottles

and making your new husband strawberry crush

pie. You will tell me you’ve picked orange

paint for the nursery, and you want to see the pictures.

 

You will hang up before I say I have no pictures,

no memories made to remember

because you were too busy picking orange

paint, too busy to party

to make some uncrushed

cake and finish the champagne bottle.

 

Only interested in baby bottles

and baby pictures

and crushed

baby food to remember

my party,

to hand me an apple or an orange.

 

So ill bottle it up and try not remember

burn the pictures of last year’s party

you crushed my heart choosing paint that’s orange.

 

As part of a Creative Writing class that took place here at five oak avenue one of my fairies took my piece of prose,  "A Lonely Back Garden" and changed it into a poem. It turned into something extremely different, yet the sentiment is still there.

 A Lonely Back Garden

A labyrinth of sunny days and fairytales.

Forgotten fields of climbing trees.

Smashed flower beds of soccer balls.

Cracked windows and an angry mom.

Winter nights of fireball stars,

smells of sleepy logs.

A different kind of waiting room,

Spider webbed Silence.-

Washing lines of socks and ties.

Whistling birds in gutters.

Beneath empty shells and broken dolls

 just swingless Silence-

Laura Roddy

This was the original ( which I had posted on here, but somehow managed to delete)

The worms are coursing through my veins, my blood I need to breathe. The wind glides through the grass upon my crown; it helps me to keep warm. But, its winter now and the frosty mornings make for ice down through my tummy. It’s the time of year when I’m coarse and hard and have no sympathy for pecking birds. Birds that must fly south every year and I blame it on the elements. The ice and cold are not my friends too much of them cause me damage; they stunt the flowers within my growth and cause for municipal rooting. In the spring time when it’s wet and windy and I just wish to be left, its then you come with your spade and start to dissect.

            You tear the grass from my head and start to dig holes, placing flowers in me that reach down to my bowels, extracting my life and nutrients. You have dug me up before, built a wall on me, an extension and a garden path, but don’t you realise... I am the soul of a lonely back garden, the foundation you needed for your family home, your wooden shed, your happy children. They played soccer on me, they made scuff marks on me, they slept on me and like you tried to dig me. You placed a swing on me, stabbed its feet into me. It hopped every time she swung on it, and I felt jabbing pains in my stomach, but I didn’t complain. I liked the sound of your children’s laughter, it helped me flourish. Your dog’s bountiful leaps on me, the sound of his bark, the way he too tried to dig me up with his snout burying bones that are still embedded deep under my skin.

            Your children have grown up now, and you took the swing away. The dog sleeps in his basket all day, occasionally getting up for dinner or to greet you from work. It seems that I am the only part of your family that is still left. I wait for the sunny days, when you come to the outer shrine, lay down your blanket and lie on me, the worms still eating through me -Our pulses beating as one. I am the soul of your back garden, please don’t forget me.

Keep calm and call batman

“Superheroes were born in the minds of people desperate to be rescued.” – Jodi Picoult

Trapped on the top floor of a hotel in Gotham City, forced to walk the ledge alone because the ‘sweet’ guy from the club you were just in decided to... pick you up, bang your head and throw you into the back of his truck. You awoke here, to the sound of heavy drums. Wait,  that’s just the the blood in your body pushing its way through the swollen vessels in your brain.

It’s freezing in here, and there’s a gross smell coming from the corner of rotting cabbage (at least you tell yourself it's cabbage). You fumble about the room in a drowsy frenzy. Your eyes unable to focus and your hands rummage around the floor. You are looking, searching for a way out. But, as your thick clumsy fingers glide across the cheap dusty- carpeted floor of this hotel room they encounter something slimy. Still warm and wet, it sends shivers down your spine. There’s a noise from the corridor, a droning sound of a man’s deep voice and the whimpers of a higher pitched voice. Your heart is in your mouth, racing. But... Then you see it a yellow colour lights up the room showing you the way to the curtains, you pull them back and peer out the window to see the night sky lit up by an illuminated yellow sign.

Your heart drops down to your gut and the voice in your head repeats: ‘Don’t fear my dear- Batman is here’. You make the lunge from the window to the ledge that connects you to all the other windows on this level. Just in time too. As your left foot departs from the shadow of the smokey room the key of the door twists in its lock. The cold night air hits your lungs and sends shock waves through your system. High above you on the opposite building you can see the caped crusader, a black figure standing strong against the largeness of the city; you know you will be safe now. You stand on the ledge of the building – exhilarated – waiting to be saved by your favourite superhero.

Super heroes, begin in the mind of the creator and grow in our imagination. Batman is one of the most realistic superheroes. He in fact does not adorn super powers. Instead he uses human intelligence in the form of technology and physical prowess to safe the citizens of Gotham City.  He leads a double life, and the people of Gotham City are left in awe as they wonder who Batman really is. His true identity lies with us. Bruce Wayne, son of a billionaire. As a child he watched his parents die in a gun-down in Gotham City and since then has fought to save the lives of those who need him most.

But where was Batman last Saturday Night when faithful fans gathered in a cinema theatre in Denver Colarado to see The Dark Knight Rises?  The caped crusader was nowhere to be seen when one villain entered the screening and shot into the darkened terror of the red seats lined with people. 12 people were shot dead at the scene. All of those gathered had one thing in common, their interest, fascination and perhaps love of The Batman, "The Worlds Greatest Detective". Film fanatics who had booked their tickets weeks, months perhaps in advance, sat together in excitement under the big screen, and watched as the fear and violenceof Gotham CIty poured through the film screen and into their reality. This time there was something amiss.

From their childhood perhaps they watched the programme series on Saturday mornings, played with Batman figurines on Christmas day and read DC comics during their teens. However, in their moment of need there was no yellow illuminating light, no batmobile, no caped crusader or ringing in their ears that said: ‘Don’t fear my dear- Batman is here’.  Instead they lunged to the floor of the cinema and remembered Batman’s teaching, his words ‘No miracles. No Mercy. No Redemption. No heaven. No hell. No higher power. Just life .Just...us” ...no batman.