Poetry – Freedom – Not a selfish greed but an expression of love and togetherness.

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Freedom

I am always reminded of Donovan when I hear the word freedom. Back when I was a boy I remember sitting in my room playing that Donovan track – Catch the Wind – and taking in that line – Freedom is a word I rarely use without thinking of the times when I’ve been loved.

Freedom is relative and can never be complete. There are too many strictures. If we choose to live within a social setting then we need to be aware of the feelings and needs of those around us. That is a limitation on our freedom, a compromise of our actions.

We are all different and yet we find a way of rubbing along together. That is life. We accommodate each other; we assist, help and look after each other. In return we get warmth, friendship and reciprocal help when we need it. We create society.

What stands out are the ones who refuse to be part of that society, who are greedily exploiting and grabbing everything they can for themselves. For them their freedom to do what they want becomes abuse of others.

I strive for a fair world where the compromise between personal freedom and social equality is based on empathy and compassion.

 

 

Freedom

 

Freedom is a concept that is compromise

An idea of amorality

That is even a landmine for the wise.

One man’s freedom impinges on us all

When without restraint,

Limits or bounds

It could result in making

Others crawl.

 

For the main we learn to rub along quite well

To find our ways through the twists

Without plunging others into hell.

 

When I speak of freedom

I mean equality,

Fairness, justice and space

For all humanity.

 

Others speak not of freedom

But selfishness;

Wanting it all for themselves

Without a thought for the rest.

 

My freedom is of the loving kind.

 

Opher 1.5.2016

Poetry – How can we agree? Democrat/Republican- Tory/Socialist

How can we agree?

There are a multitude of things that create divisions, and divisions create distrust and hatred. People become entrenched in the views they adhere to. Yet people are people. On their own they are mainly caring and compassionate, friendly and helpful. It is only when they collect into groups that reinforce those differences that the feelings become magnified, the crowd become rabid and we find we have made enemies out of different perspectives.

Emotions are the fuel that generates the heat. Talk is the only way to cool the flames. Talk is good. Exchange of ideas is good. Listening and understanding is good.

We may not agree but we are human, family, we can understand a different point of view, share our fears and dreams and tolerate the views that are different.

We do not need painful divisions. We need understanding. We need love and dialogue.

We need more poems!

 

How can we agree?

 

How can we possibly agree?

Me with you and you with me?

We live in universes far apart

That shapes our minds

Our thoughts and heart.

Yet reach and talk

Is the only way

To bring universes closer

Every day.

 

We will never agree

You and me

But we can still laugh

And set our minds free.

 

Opher 1.5.2016

Opher Goodwin Author – Featured Book – The Blues Muse

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I was in conversation with a good friend who, like me, is a Rock Music fanatic. We have both been everywhere, seen everyone and have had our lives hugely affected by music. However it is not who you have seen but what you failed to catch that you dwell on. I said to him that it would be brilliant if we had a time machine and were able to go back and see all the major events in Rock history; Robert Johnson play in the tavern in Greenwood, Elmore James in Chicago, Elvis Presley in the small theatres, The Beatles in Hamburg, Stones in Richmond, Doors in the Whiskey, Roy Harper at St Pancras Town Hall…………….. and a thousand more. Then I realised that I could. I knew it all, had seen much of it first hand, and had the imagination to fill in the gaps. All I needed was a character who worked his way through it, was witness to it, part of it and lived it; someone to tell the story and paint the picture. I invented my ‘man with no name’ and made a novel out of the History of Rock Music. This is that novel. It starts in Tutwiler Mississippi in 1903 and finishes in Kingston upon Hull in 1980. On this journey you will breathe the air, taste the sweat and join all the major performers as they create the music that rocked the world and changed history.

In the UK – https://www.amazon.co.uk/Blues-Muse-Opher-Goodwin/dp/1518621147/ref=sr_1_4?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1469093602&sr=1-4&keywords=opher+goodwin

In the USA – https://www.amazon.com/Blues-Muse-Opher-Goodwin/dp/1518621147/ref=sr_1_11?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1469092766&sr=1-11&keywords=opher+goodwin

Opher Goodwin Author – Featured Book – Ebola in the Garden of Eden – a Sci-fi novel.

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This is another of my best Sci-fi novels. A look into the future as a government comes up with the solution to the population crisis with unexpected results.

This is the blurb:

The Synod

The Synod is a group of the world’s top politicians who received their orders from ‘upstairs’ – a shady group of billionaires who pull the strings. There is concern that the huge population is out of control. It is no longer economically viable. The problems now exceed the profits. It is time to take drastic action.

The Scientist

Science is pure. Working with the genome is expanding knowledge. The ethics can be left to the politicians to worry about.

Mickel’s Syndrome

Mikel’s Syndrome is a rare genetic disorder of partial trisomy creating a slight difference in biochemistry but a large difference in a person.

A crisis precipitated

There is a law that whatever can go wrong will go wrong. Evolution is the survival of the fittest.

The future

The future is where it all starts.

In the UK you can purchase it here: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Ebola-Garden-Eden-Opher-Goodwin/dp/1514878216/ref=sr_1_14?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1469100246&sr=1-14&keywords=opher+goodwin

In the USA you can purchase it here: https://www.amazon.com/Ebola-Garden-Eden-Opher-Goodwin-ebook/dp/B0116VXVIY/ref=sr_1_25?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1469100591&sr=1-25&keywords=opher+goodwin#navbar

Pete Smith – Genius Cartoons – Nuclear questions

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I grew up with the threat of nuclear war hanging over my head. I know that even now I have a number of nuclear missiles aimed right at me. For me nuclear war almost looked inevitable.

I think we were used as an aircraft carrier for the USA. They cynically believed they could fight a limited war with the USSR which would involve Europe but not the USA. A third Word War and nuclear holocaust was a real possibility.

Fortunately it hasn’t happened yet. But the possibility still exists.

I am in favour of unilateral disarmament but, of course, would much prefer multilateral disarmament. I do not believe that nuclear weapons make us safer.

The interesting thing about this cartoon is that the nuclear explosion is made up of question marks. We all have these huge seismic questions in our heads about life, purpose, meaning, mysticism, morality, afterlife and what is sacred. They are the nuclear bombs inside our heads.

Opher Goodwin Author – Featured Book – In Search of Captain Beefheart

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Yes that is me on the left in the photo from back in 1971.

This is a memoir of my life with Rock Music – the music, the bands, the gigs, the meetings, the search for excitement and the greatest gig, the best band.

Music is a huge part of my life. This tells that story – the sixties and on to the present.

Here’s the blurb –

The sixties raged. I was young, crazy, full of hormones and wanting to snatch life by the balls. There was a life out there for the grabbing and it had to be wrestled into submission. There was a society full of boring amoral crap and a life to be had in the face of the boring, comforting vision of slow death on offer. Rock music vented all that passion. This book is a memoir of a life spent immersed in Rock Music. I was born in 1949 and so lived through the whole gamut of Rock. Rock music formed the background to momentous world events – the Civil Rights Movement, Vietnam War, Iraq war, Watergate, the miners’ strike and Thatcher years, CND, the Green Movement, Mao and the Cultural Revolution, Women’s Liberation and the Cold War. I see this as the Rock Era. I was immersed in Rock music. It was fused into my personality. It informed me, transformed me and inspired me. My heroes were musicians. I am who I am because of them. Without Rock Music I would not have the same sensibilities, optimism or ideals. They woke me up! This tells that story.

Why not check it out here:-

In the UK – https://www.amazon.co.uk/Search-Captain-Beefheart-Opher-Goodwin/dp/1502820455/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1469093602&sr=1-1&keywords=opher+goodwin

In the USA – https://www.amazon.com/Search-Captain-Beefheart-Opher-Goodwin-ebook/dp/B00OHXSIQ4/ref=sr_1_7?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1469097796&sr=1-7&keywords=opher+goodwin#navbar

Pete Smith’s cartoons of genius – Religious Lies strangling us.

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So much to see in this image. The person runs through the tangle of life with the question WHY over his head and MEANING and TIME before him, using the LI of religion as crutches while his head was caught in the noose of GOD. God with the knot of infinity – the unsolvable conundrum.

MUST DO THIS – WHY – WRONG

Pete Smiths cartoons of genius – trapped, restrained

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I think we all have those unanswerable questions in our head. We crave to be free to explore and find the answers to our existence, to penetrate the mystery, but we are held back by all the restrictions. Society, convention and the strictures of family, career and life in general clamp us down in their cloying chains.

How we long to be free!

Opher Goodwin Author – My books.

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I have been writing for nearly fifty years. I write alternative indie books. I write about the subjects that matter and I write with passion.

My major works are in Sci-fi and Rock Music but I venture into the environment, education, literature, Beat poetry, Sixties culture, poetry and art.

My books are different, accessible and thought provoking.

Why not check them out here on Amazon:

In the UK – https://www.amazon.co.uk/s/ref=nb_sb_ss_i_1_5?url=search-alias%3Dstripbooks&field-keywords=opher+goodwin&sprefix=opher%2Caps%2C168

In the USA – https://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss?url=search-alias%3Dstripbooks&field-keywords=opher+goodwin

Pete Smith’s Cartoons of genius – knowledge

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There are no facts. Every moment is new. We experience everything for the first time. No two moments are identical.

I used this cartoon on the front of school documents prepared for Ofsted. As with the previous drawing on the education sausage machine the cartoon was never commented on.

Too often the teaching of science has been the transmission of ‘facts’ and the learning of knowledge. Science should be the investigation of the wonders of the universe to find out how it operates and celebrate it, learn from it and utilise it.

The more we investigate the greater the mysteries we unfurl. We have accumulated a wealth of knowledge but underlying it all is an even greater mystery.

Science progresses by scientists disbelieving the theories they are presented with, challenging them and coming up with superior theories to test.

Science is creative.

Science is thought-provoking.

Science is fun.

Science is illuminating, expansive and exhilarating.

There are no truths.