16 October 2025

The smirk had barely disappeared from Netanyahu’s face before Israel began doing what it does: ignoring any treaty or ceasefire that inhibits its plan to obliterate Palestine. Banish any optimism.

Picture of the Week

This painting Yamba XXX (inspired by a visit to Australia) is part of retrospective exhibition (Unquiet Layers) of Bridget Flannery’s work at the Draiocht Gallery in Blanchardstown. It was one of her last completed paintings before she died in 2024 after a short illness. She left an impressive legacy of abstract art that encompasses her love of landscape, particularly the famine-haunted regions of North Mayo. There are also, in her work, intimations of the ethereal music of Benjamin Dwyer especially , Linda Buckley and David Fennessy. Like the best of abstract art (think Rothko), her work is to be experienced rather than just viewed.

The Moronic Inferno

The madness of King Donald becomes more florid and his ramblings more grandiose. Soon he will surely be replacing his arch-rival God in the USA’s school curricula. The media generally continue to quote his wild and unreliable assertions and ordinances as if they are meaningful and normal. Maybe the walkout yesterday of the Pentagon press corps, including Fox News is a harbinger of change.

“PRESS CORPS STATEMENT : Today, the Defense Department confiscated the badges of the Pentagon reporters from virtually every major media organization in America. It did this because reporters would not sign onto a new media policy over its implicit threat of criminalizing national security reporting and exposing those who sign it to potential prosecution. The Pentagon Press Association’s members are still committed to reporting on the U.S. military. But make no mistake, today, Oct. 15, 2025 is a dark day for press freedom that raises concerns about a weakening U.S. commitment to transparency in governance, to public accountability at the Pentagon and to free speech for all.”

Musical Interlude

Sweet Gene Vincent by Ian Dury

My introduction to the music of Ian Dury came in an apartment in Stockholm in the late Seventies via a local enthusiast who played me the New Boots and Panties album. This track resonated with me particularly being an old rocker by inclination. Gene Vincent was one of the originals. Also, I imagine Dury had a particular affection for Vincent as they shared a similiar infirmity - both had severely damaged legs, Dury from polio and Vincent from a car crash.

Bedtime Reading

I finally got around to reading Nobel Prize winner Olga Tokarczuk. Her novel Drive You Plow Over thee Bones of the Dead sounds unpromising (unexplained deaths in rural Poland) but turns out to be a multi-faceted delight. The protagonist is an independent 60-year old woman with an affection for William Blake and a serious belief in the power of horoscopes. Her real passion is for animals however and this is the fulcrum of the book. The attendant cast of local characters add colour and texture to the whole entertaining and subtly radical story.

A Morsel of Memoir

There was a small ramshackle cinema in the Curragh when I lived there in the 1950s and I went there regularly. I remember my older sister telling me that if there was a fire in the film then the cinema was also likely to be engulfed in flames. I sat in terror during one movie set in Africa where a herd of elephants was stampeded by a forest fire. As the flames grew on the screen I begged my sister to get me out. She tried to recant on her story but I was not for mollifying and she had to take me outside - so we both missed the remainder of the film. An early moral lesson for her.

The film I remember most vividly was Shane. I suppose I was roughly the same age as the boy in the movie and I identified strongly with his hero worship of the short but noble Alan Ladd character. For years afterwards I would brood about how he could go off to fight a gun battle after giving his hands such punishment in the fist fight with the farmer - provoked by the farmer’s jealously of his wife’s apparent attraction to the bould Shane. But the most memorable part of the film was the role of Wilson the black-clad gun fighter played by the smirking Jack Palance. I was also moved by the poignant final scene where Shane literally rides off into the sunset – away from the cosy domestic milieu and into the unknown. It thrilled me.

Footfalls echo in the memory. My father was friendly with the legendary Cavan footballer John Joe O’Reilly who was an army officer stationed in the Curragh. He captained Cavan in their legendary All-Ireland final win over Kerry in 1947 - in New York. He was struck down in his prime by a kidney injury - from a stray kick in a club match. My father and I visited him in hospital a few days before he died. He was a friendly, personable man and didn’t seem terribly ill to me. As I was leaving he gave me a half crown - a huge amount at the time. A couple of days later I watched his funeral pass through the Curragh – his coffin on a gun carriage.

Poetry Corner

I am fond of my tragic poets, my poète maudit. Ernest Dawson was a prime example. Dead at 32 from TB and alcoholism - his days were certainly not long.

Days of Wine and Roses

by Ernest Dowson

They are not long, the weeping and the laughter,
Love and desire and hate:
I think they have no portion in us after
We pass the gate.

They are not long, the days of wine and roses:
Out of a misty dream
Our path emerges for a while, then closes
Within a dream.