As the well-to-do homeowners of plummy and posh south Kensington wring their hands as the death toll mounts on their backyard, it was their demand for a more pleasing vista – and not the Grenfell residents’ plea for better, safer accommodation – that led to the multi-million pound RBKC council “regeneration” of Grenfell tower.
Shhh!
Follow @UrFhasaidh Everyone but undergrads knows it is bad form to talk in the library. During my early days as a student in Trinity College I took to sitting up on the fifth floor of the Berkley Library, where the theology books and those on the history of religion were to be found. We called … Continue reading Shhh!
I won’t believe that Death has Passed Over
Fifty isn’t old. She always insisted that she wasn’t our mother, but sometimes she sort of was. She has always been great to have on side, and has been one of those folk you had to work at to keep sweet. She never put up with half-hearted attempts at friendship. It seemed at times that she was hard work, but in a good way. She never talked down the people around her. Condescension wasn’t her thing. She wanted everyone to be at her level, which was grand until she got her doctorate.
A Letter Written Too Late
Word came to me that you died peacefully, that you slipped away in your sleep. Chrissie, I hope that’s true. In those moments I hope you were content, and that you had around you all the people and voices you needed to see and hear, and I hope you felt the love of those who were far away.
God Help the Children of Syria
Let’s make this real with a question: Have you ever held a dead child? Not just seen one in a photograph, but really held the corpse of an infant? Some reading this may well have done. That child may have been their own, and to them I can say only that I am sorry, and – by God – my heart goes out to you.
Returning not to Penelope and Telemachus but Horror
Last Wednesday my thoughts were with young lads a hundred years ago lying face down in the mud in Flanders. Now last Wednesday’s news is a little baby boy lying face down in the surf in Turkey.
Early on the First Day of the Week
There is a room furnished with familiar things; a carpet with a ruddy woven pattern, a three piece suite, and a polished mahogany display cabinet. It adjoins a small kitchenette, cluttered with the cups and plates of a widowered man. This room and kitchen exit now only in my memory, but sometimes in my dreams … Continue reading Early on the First Day of the Week
What Will You Do?
A little before three in the morning, on the corridor of Anne Young ward, Austin and I had gone for a stroll. He and I both got a little more life about us late in the evening, and had to escape the ward to let the other patients sleep in peace. Sometimes you’d get the … Continue reading What Will You Do?
