After a year and a half in mothballs, The Dial Up is finally back! We've found a beautiful and unique new venue in the Amanartis Studios, a converted chapel in the centre of Vicarage Road cemetery. The moment I first visited I knew it would make a perfect home for our much loved celebration of community and creativity. So dust off your instruments, warm up your vocal chords and carve out a space in your diary for The Dial Up Open Mic!
Secular Verses, my new collection of poetry now available to buy on Amazon, explores my experiences as a secularist, atheist and humanist. With poems ranging from the thoughtful and lyrical to the comic and polemic, there's something to inspire every reader's interest and imagination. If you want a sneak peek, two of the poems are copied below, and you can also subscribe to the superb e-magazine Humanistically Speaking were I have a regular spot in Poet's Corner.
What’s a Humanist?
They trust in methodologies objective and specific
They describe observed phenomena in a manner scientific
They reject all explanations couched in ghosts or ghouls or spirits
They circumscribe their arguments with naturalistic limits
They ask to see the evidence before they reach conclusions
They prefer to confess ignorance than make up false solutions
They try to meet all human beings with kindness and compassion
And to treat all other animals in corresponding fashion
They’ve no evidence of afterlife, so reasonably deduce
That this is the one life that we have of any earthly use
They put aside the magical claims of many an ancient text
And instead use moral judgement to decide what to do next.
So, in answer to your question, having thought the whole thing through
I’d say it sounds a lot like me. Would you say it’s like you?
Hummingbird
What on Earth more wondrous
Than a hummingbird exists?
Nature’s glory
Floating sharp, a sliver
Silver in a liquid air
Purple-dash flash-blue of slicing
Vibration, mocking gravity
Drinking deep the lees
Of floral nectar hidden
From less specialised imbibers.
Bobbing wonder
Flit of beauty
Pinnacle of process
Evolutionary
Cousin of
All life.
