It's only business

"Don't be afraid, it's only business
The alien prophet sighed..." (Roger Waters - What God Wants part 3)

I've been testing the water of organized religion for a few years now, unfortunately I haven't been able to commit. The institution and the people made it too difficult for me to join. 

I've been working with them for quite some time now but I think I've reached my limit. While I contemplate what to do next I thought I'd try to write what I'm feeling at this moment in time. 

A brief goodbye letter to the Church.



Dear The Church,
I'm afraid our relationship may be coming to an end. It seems you couldn't listen. You sensed you were losing your grasp of the world and reacted the way institutions always do.
Why is it do you think you are failing? Will you save the body of Christ by clutching at power and money? Didn't you hear the parable about the camel and the eye of a needle?

You thought you could hold your place in the world by securing lucrative business deals with unscrupulous corporations. Well you were part right... You have secured a position but are now exclusively 'Of The World', but your place in it is lost.

You were unable to see that by the virtue of your own action you defy the very principals you espouse. You are dying because you have nothing of value to offer the people. (If what they value is what you preach)
When they look to you for truth they see denial, lies and deceit, when they seek faith you greet them with illogical rationalizations, when they turn to you for courage they find institutional protectionism, when they look for love they are confronted by your fear. Take a step back, it's not hard to see.

You were called to carry the light, you but you did not shine. You traded shelter for property and mistook bread for profit. Pilgrims continue their journey but they no longer knock at your door. Will you dare to ask them why?

You manufactured Contempt and now it's all that remains.

I am not a 'good man' I thought you could teach me, I was mistaken. I have sat with you in prayer and listened for your testimony, but sincerity cannot be contrived or pretended. I have lived in the dark and I know the false act. When I sought to be good I came your way but was warned the Devil is at home in the church. And sure enough I saw him, hidden in plain view. Do you still not know this?

Soon I'll leave your company and you'll be free of this agitation. I am not here to harangue or annoy you. Go back to your stories of goodness and peace and forget me. Secure and protect your financial investments. Talk yourself to blissful doped joyous sleep, while the offering basket sits idly in a corner of your empty shrine, songs fading out as the loyal few are called home and the pews and hearts remain empty.

If you wonder what went wrong remember what Dr King said.

"...the end is pre-existent in the means"

Home sweet River

Do you feel it? Can you feel it?
The incredible weight and the pull of the land where you were born, the place which raised you... It is calling always for you to return. Can you hear it? It is strong, it's in the blood and the metal of you. It hurts to go back but if you deny it you will be dragged... It will always be within you whether you respond to it's claim or deny...

I am back. For just a short time, in the cool of spring and the cold rain and the wind and the paddocks are wet and my feet are cold and my heart is pounding and the river is flowing and the birds sing and the roos bound and the trees remember.

Ancient trees remain where they were before my birth and I pray will continue when I'm gone

At times like this I remember a few lines from Roger Waters song 'Sunset Strip'. 

"And I sit in the canyon with my back to the sea
There's a blood red dragon on a field of green
Calling me back, back to the Black Hills again"

Billy, a young man from Wales many miles from home, trapped somewhere in the mad rush of Southern California and Sunset Strip... but his roots demand his attention and he cannot deny it!

From my parents house I have made a couple of early morning treks back into my old stomping ground. To those secret places which formed me in some way in the valleys among the trees, on the steep and craggy dry slopes, the cliff side ledges and river flats of the Plenty Gorge. I knew that place before. Does anyone know it now?

The old trails remain

Wombats have appeared, I never knew them here

Where there had been impenetrable blackberry now fields of grassy tussocks.

 This place is burned deeply inside me. I am overjoyed to see it spared from the urban sprawl and possibly even  forgotten or ignored by the mass of humans entrenched on the other side of it's boundary fences. I wish I could stay to care for it, but maybe it's best left forgotten, long live cable TV and the sedentary life of consumers!    

Billy searching for his native land.

Years ago, late one sweltering summer Sunday morning, as we lay on the floor of my mates grandmother's house crunching ice and nursing horrendous hangovers, at the height of a friendship now a fading memory, I was introduced to Roger Waters solo album. Radio KAOS.

We were broke and couldn't afford any more beer, all we had left was a bag of ice, to cradle as the mercury rose beyond what even we desperadoes could handle. Hungover and with only our legs for transport we found ourselves in the intolerable situation of being Housebound!

Then my mate John, after establishing that we were stuck said: 

"I've got a record I want you to listen to."(Yes we still listened to LP records back then) "I think you'll like it, but you've gotta listen to the whole thing. Don't talk, don't do anything just listen to this record"

I was having trouble getting myself up off the floor, on account of the severity of my self-inflicted dipsomania...

"OK" I said wondering if I was going to be left in the prone position on the floor while he played more Heavy Metal at full volume or if I was going to have to endure another round of George Thorogood...

I heard the crackle of the speakers as John placed the needle down on the album... the telltale rhythm as it's diamond tip orbited a slightly uneven vinyl disc... I had no idea what to expect.

There was a distant sound of Morse code growing louder... the voice of a talk back radio presenter announcing that we are listening to K.A.O.S. radio in Las Angeles... then the robotic, mechanized  voice of Billy introducing himself and announcing that he hears radio waves in his head... (I already felt disjointed and divorced from reality, and my body, as I remained virtually paralyzed on the wooden floorboards of an elderly lady's house, the drunken guest of her rebel grandson...) In my feeble state the album penetrated me to the core! Each song followed the central theme, it was a story line and the lead character had entered my brain as though there was no record playing. To me it was like Waters had channeled the Billy's voice directly into my head. (I was in shocking condition, still unable to gather my own thoughts after a hard night of unending alcohol consumption)

We'd played that album about three times in a row when the rest of our crew finally become so completely bored they opted to walk in the 40 degrees Celsius heat, on melting bitumen rather than endure another round... I kept listening... I read the lyrics... I played songs over and back until the ice had melted.

When I left that house my brain had been re-organized. So many of my private feelings validated at last, and all held together in a green Morse album cover. I cherished the heat and my hangover, the ice and the wonky, splintered wooden floor I'd been laying on all day.  I had heard the baffled ramblings of my own mind and spirit beamed back at me via the turntable as if I had been communicating directly with the source via radio waves myself.

Possibly a once in a lifetime experience.       

Watching TV

Just spent the morning learning how to advocate in a rational way for people whose lives are at the mercy of a system run by despotic psychopaths.

I have to be realistic and admit... I can't fucking do it!

Over the past 3 days facebook and just about every media source on the planet has featured images of a little boy lying  dead, face down on a beach. Aylan Kurdi. It seems this image has shook the world. so it should. Compassion is beginning to flow due to wide exposure to the tragic image of this little boy (Thank God). Remember him, his mother and brother when you hear about asylum seekers and refugees, think of his father who only wanted to save his family and remember! There are 1,000s more who our country has turned it's back on. Can we now talk about a humanitarian response to the tragedy of war and displacement?

As I was writing this post an email popped into my inbox. This article by Natasha Blucher says it all.

If you've posted an image of this boy out of sympathy or, donated money or signed a petition, please don't let it stop at that! Hit the streets when you are called to stand up for human rights. Go and meet your local MP or at least write them a letter. Australia is engaged in some pretty evil shit right now and it's being done to children just like Aylan. We meet them every day but their faces can't be shown in the media. If you could only see how they suffer you might think twice about supporting the Australian Government's Border Force (farce) policies.

I left the training session feeling powerless. Came home and listened to Roger Waters and remember we've been through all this before. Apparently after the Tienanmen Square massacre Australia accepted about 40,000 asylum seekers. 

Attitudes in this country have changed a lot since then. What will we do this time?

(Warning: The following film-clip contains images of war and deceased people)

The Guys who built the dark satanic mills that manufacture hell on earth.