Experience The Divine - Best Gift
Maria von Trapp complained
she couldn’t stop singing and
saying everything that comes
into her mind, in tribute to his
favourite flibbertigibbet
Pratchett invented the Chattering
Order of Saint Beryl Articulatus with
Sister Loquacious and Sister Voluble
who were free to be quiet for one hour
on Thursdays only
Pratchett’s causal narrative makes
redress for all past injustice, fills me
with inspiration to visualise the office
as a Chattering Convent and to project
the holiday resort
Which we are going to visit as a corner
of unsullied paradise and YOU as the
best gift the universe could ever provide,
thank you for every moment of time
you spend
It is the highest compliment and when you
polish uneven lines, you do the work of
angels and change my consciousness
into an experience of the Divine…
Good Omens – Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman
Corgi edition published 1991, pp 33,36,38, & 41
poem by Margaret Alice Second
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Miracle Disclosure (Revised)
Reading ‘Good Omens’ – Antichrist Adam Young and
his gang have fun with Tibetans and Flying Saucers –
in conjunction with The Science of Discworld which
‘David Attenboroughishly’ explains evolution as if it
were an already proven and therefore universally
accepted Gospel Truth – while it
is still only another childish theory, a speculative
hypothesis no better or worse than Creationism, but
creating the same reputation for itself by launching
attacks on other theories and posing as the Modern
Age equivalent of Miracle Disclosure; while ALL
these theories are illusion
made-up narratives explaining mysteries of existence
with no entitlement to claim any final revelation of the
true state – sanctimonious and condescending tones of
New Western Materialism sounds even worse than the
Middle Ages Inquisition – and in our universe ALL
being as speculative and unprovable as each other!
“Good Omens” – Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman,
Corgi Edition 1991
“The Science of the Discworld 1” Revised Edition
Jack, Pratchett, Terry, Stewart and Ian Cohen
Kindle – bought from Amazon
poem by Margaret Alice Second
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Righteous Dustbins
Coffee break at ten, whirled through the
antichirst’s birth as retold by Neil Gaiman
and Terry Pratchett - the Spawn of Satan
without hoofikens, looking unlike his daddy-
waddykins as Sister Loquacious remarked
Brought to a Chattering Order where nuns
speak incessantly, however inconsequential,
in marvelous contrast with the usual nun’s
tale of silence broken by delightful renditions
of holy songs all jazzed-up; I laughed aloud
This day is blessed by this great piece of
irreverence, creating a context in which I
can read little documents, my mind held
in thrall by the righteous dustbins of this
saintly tale – thank you so much!
poem by Margaret Alice Second
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Damien-kid
Hunting for recipe books in the bookshop, I bought
Good Omens, what FUN, the Damien-kid playing
Spanish Inquisition, dunking the witch, a little girl
tied to a chair, in the pond until the Inquisitors so
hot, they dunked themselves
Never thought of playing this when I was small, just
danced around in my mother’s wide dress and sang
songs, my brothers’ gang sat on the rafters, tried
sleeping in a hole in the ground though it got too
cold and they crept back inside
A theme running like gold thread through the book
all tapes turn into Queen’s music if left in the car for
too long, Freddy Mercury replacing the classics to
the demon’s chagrin, brings on fits of laughter;
Sister Loquacious switching the babies
So Damien’s hell-hound changed into a sweet little
doggie; both demon and angel lamenting imminent
Armageddon as heaven is too boring - its highlight
the Sound of Music* and hell’s excitements too
painful - both trying to save the world
Since human beings are the source of real grace and
real heart-stopping evil*, both demons and angels are
needed – the secret is, they only exist inside the
human mind, once humanity is destroyed, they
also lose their existence
Good Omens, Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman,
Corgi Books,2006
* Quoted from p.93
Damien –The Omen – An ominous film
The Sound of Music – A film about the life of Maria
von Trapp, changed her story too much, read the book,
though the film is good fun, don’t watch it over and over
too much syrup makes people go funny in the end
poem by Margaret Alice Second
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In Heaven Also (Revised)
The worst thing about heaven is it only boasts
two world-class composers: Liszt and Elgar,
the best of the rest – Bach, Beethoven, Brahms
and Mozart apparently all went to hell:
I shall gladly join them there
Hope to meet Bizet and Strauss as well and that
some enchanting demon finally teaches me to
dance properly, preferably a waltz and a
wonderful tango – like the one Death danced
dramatically with Renate Flitworth
I hope Vivaldi with his regular beat and
Stravinsky with his musical themes in
single row explosions are in heaven
also where I shall not be – and never
need listen to again
“Good Omens” – Terry Pratchett
Corgi edition published 1991
p 55
poem by Margaret Alice Second
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Unseen Academicals- 22/11/09
Pratchett’s Unseen Academicals was a
joy from beginning to end, the author is
a prince among men
Ridiculed fashion items like six-inch
stiletto heels and all kinds of bling,
empty-headed models
Remunerated exorbitantly for glittering
while toiling labourers doing necessary
things are paid next-to-nothing
Pratchett’s depiction of the Discworld
is bathed in a golden light of happiness
everybody joyously engaged
In activities normally depicted as unmitigated
Misery; does Pratchett realize how much the
positive attitude of his main characters
Contrast with his cynical omnipresent narrator
perspective, does he see the juxtaposition
between two aspects
His protagonists acting with integrity and his blasé
narrative voice, the dualism must cause a war
in his mind – verily, I suspect
That is happening at present, while Pratchett is
telling a world-weary tale of human nature, his
characters are presenting a morality play
He cannot subdue them, cannot force decadence
on his characters, they are whiter than snow –
how much does this irk him?
I would love to know...
Terry Pratchett ‘Unseen Academicals’ Doubleday 2009
poem by Margaret Alice
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Vivaldi
Being forced to listen to Vivaldi by
a compilation of classical music, his
musical themes & unwavering beat,
his notes like stiff-necked soldiers
marching on with robotlike idiocy
drive me insane
Awakening memories of ALL things that
irked me recently, the contrast between
the delight reading Pratchett and being
enraged by Vivaldi-effigies led to the
suspicion there is a poem on anger
waiting in the wings
Meantime, these cold notes on the deficiency
of three-dimensional holographic images as
simile of reality made me reflect on life’s
shortcomings - but Men At Arms is lying
next to me, their mischievous irrational
levity is waiting
To grab me again and whisk me away from
inadequate, imperfect and painful reality –
up to the heights of cloud nine…
“Men At Arms” – Terry Pratchett, Corgi edition
published 1994
poem by Margaret Alice Second
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More Than We Are
Came home singing, Sorrento, you said Here
comes Maria Von Trapp - little knowing that I
was being Leo Buscaglia, happy in knowing
about the Necrotelicomnicon* offering a Door
out of this World
I need these dreams because I had to check a
lease contract for my Calvinist colleague who
immediately queried every change I made – I
only did it because I am being paid; it has no
meaning to me
Whether the rental agreement stipulates lease
or rent or bank savings rates or bank rates for
savings; who cares, irrelevant – if she prefers
her own version I am happy to concur – why
ask me in the first place
She ought to know me by now, sounds are
important, not their dictionary meaning, the
sound IS the feeling, keep your definitions,
I will keep on singing, no need to let one
interfere with the other
The most important thing is to determine
whether I am Madame Butterfly, Carmen
or Christine; which role can I sing, how
far can we go, can we love like Leo
Buscaglia, can we
understand the difference between being
who we are - take up our own space or
try to be more than we are…
(Necrotelicomnicon - reference found in “Moving Pictures” – Terry Pratchett -
Corgi edition 1995, p.174)
poem by Margaret Alice Second
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This is Sublime
The tablecloth of time can be reused without
disturbing the cutlery and plates of events al-
though residual stains reveal inconsistencies
such as OOParts, Velikovsky’s discoveries,
mismatched historical periods are explained
by quantum’s Many Worlds theory; some-
where the apocalypse have taken place
Somewhere there is an Atlantis, earth is called
Gaia, someplace Biblical leprosy is nuclear fall-
out, in other places Mars is cleft by a meteorite,
in a parallel universe Earth is Tiamat, halved by
the passing of Niburu - everything imagined
happens somewhere; there is a place where
conspiracies and underground cities exist
Infinity gives you room for everything new, Terry
Pratchett uses James Bond and Tibetan Monks
containing a Lobsang in a story of Time where
the present equals the future and past and
procrastinators wind and unwind time while
anthropomorphic personifications stalk the
realms outside time – this is sublime!
Thief of Time – Terry Pratchett, Corgi Books,
2002, p.108
OOParts (Out Of Place Artifacts)
poem by Margaret Alice Second
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Probability Curves
The lovely little antichrist, Adam Young, says at the
end of ‘Good Omens’ by Pratchett, if he declences
Armageddon and the Apocalypse and the forces of
hell defeats humankind calling down the wrath of
the heavenly hosts
Only one gang would be left and soon its members
would fight each other: the only way to peace is for
all life to cease and who wants that? Adam defeats
the four horsemen cum motorbikers, of the Apo-
calypse; continues his lovely life
Discovering the delights of this universe with variety
infinite - a myriad opinions - all different, enriching,
any Doomsday Prophecy merely wishful thinking
on the side of fanatic fundamentalists who want
to dominate one victorious gang
It is impossible in this quantum universe, probablitiy
curves create fields of possibility - no prediction is
guaranteed, no end-of-world threat carries final
authority, no single creed can ever claim final
victory – we are free, Free, FREE!
“You cannot kill everybody who doesn't agree with you,
if you kill enough you'll soon be down to just you guys
disagreeing with each other… you can never get to where
you want to be by pushing against what you don’t want”
[Quoted from Abraham and Esther Hicks]
“Good Omens” Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman - Main
character called Adam Young instead of Daimien, never
undergoes influences of Evil Nanny and Hell Hound be-
cause the demon placed on earth to lead him into sub-
jecting the earth to the devil, lost track of him imme-
diately after his birth; he was raised as a rural happy-
go-lucky English boy who enjoys playing Spanish
Inquistition and dreams about the strange phenomena
of Charles Fort and wonders about spontaneous human
combustion; a whole universe of discovery waiting
for him, he will have no truck with
world destruction!
poem by Margaret Alice Second
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Scintillating Humour
French class is cancelled, I remain stuck in my
little space, faced with administration, Tim LaHaye
is ready to tell me about temperament and marital
presence, the last thing I want to hear today, a forced
break have me enjoying phrases by Terry Pratchett
like a gourmet enjoying culinary delights
The cool spearmint of Pratchett's scintillating humour
makes the heavy meals of Cataclysmic Egyptian events
more palatable while I'm spicing my Bibliotherapy with
the mixed chocolate and strawberry ices provided by
the temperament theories of Tim LaHaye
"Igneous had always found the general denial more
reliable than the specific refutation" - and I am even
more amused by "If you want to be successful in the
criminal world, you need a reputation for honesty"
Ohmygoodness, this is wisdom indeed, I love it!
Feet of Clay - Terry Pratchett - Victor Gollancz,1996
p.81
poem by Margaret Alice Second
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Only in our dreams are we free. The rest of the time we need wages.
quote by Terry Pratchett
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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All The Emotion Evoked
Now where shall I take the high tide of emotion
seeing that I have finished reading the story of
Tiffany Aching - the book is too short; the great
promise of it beginning when she demanded a
full-scale hearing while every element seemed
to be against her - which made me shudder on
her behalf - turned benevolent universe MUCH
too soon and with the odds not stacked against
her victory was too easy and she was given all
help, suddenly she was such a sure-fire winner
riding the tide and I no longer identified with the
protagonist - my heroines always have to suffer
much longer with more challenges to overcome
I was ready to face a lot of pain - just to find the
ride too short, too few obstacles, the bride-to-be
was a special witch great at dealing with ghosts;
all misunderstanding solved too easily - I prefer
complications and intrigues for a sweet heroine
but Terry Pratchett spun a beautiful tale - to be
embroidered - until it contains all the pain I can
imagine - he remains my favourite author - all
the emotion evoked will be used to experience
and recreate fairytales old and new in my head
I Shall Wear Midnight - Terry Pratchett -
What a Wonderful Book!
poem by Margaret Alice Second
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For animals, the entire universe has been neatly divided into things to (a) mate with, (b) eat, (c) run away from, and (d) rocks.
Terry Pratchett in Equal Rites
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Five exclamation marks, the sure sign of an insane mind.
quote by Terry Pratchett
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Pristine Beauty
The magic woven by Terry Pratchett in ‘Going
Postal' took my mind like a wave invading every
lonely space, filling me with a sense of delight
and the desire to keep on digging for meaning
Since I cannot be content with the mere fact that
I exist in the way Golems can, I have to assign
meaning to everything in order to prevent my
inner self turning from quiet and calm into
A raging torrent of existential dread and my spirit
from acquiring a waiflike quality, moving between
states of consciousness, too confused to choose
between moments of being to settle quietly
Long enough to enjoy the delight of existence as
escape from non-being, it took a while to drag my
mind away from a feeling of guilt about this holiday
and the concomitant fear that a short escape
From my robotic existence at the office might corrupt
my heart to develop a passionate longing for freedom;
confident enough to skip over disturbing passages on
Reacher Gilt, I hate his guts; loving the excellent mind
Pratchett assigns to Vetinari, sharing his trait of loving
ideas as principles: music as signet ideals, staves on
paper, notes safely ensconced thereon with no attempt
at execution to spoil its pristine beauty - just like him
I adore romance as an ethereal ideal formulated in en-
chanting writing but not any attempt at execution which
always falls short changing the idea into a hopeless
Don Quixotic longing for the impossible…
Going Postal - Terry Pratchett - Doubleday 2004
Quoted from p.78
************************************* *************
Painful And Joyous Reading
The library open, a miracle found several
titles interesting, normally everything seems
boring, I'm courageous enough to tackle ‘
Briar Rose' about the Second World War
And sisters fighting in ‘When She Was Good'
hoping to find insight into my relationship with
my twin sis, I'm ready to face abandonment in
Lynne Markham's ‘Getting It Right'
And two lives intertwined in ‘Faith, Hope and Ivy
June' - being adventurous I also bought two books
at second hand book shops - Graham Hancock's
Underworld - Flooded Kingdoms of the Ice Age -
Blazing trails where unconventional Colin Wilson
fears to tread, and ‘Mars Mystery' with its theme of
precession and the solar system orbit and carousel
movement about the Milky Way Galaxy's
Black Hole centre; hours of painful and joyous reading
before me - now I have entered the spirit of this holiday!
***************************************** **********
poem by Margaret Alice Second
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The trouble with having an open mind, of course, is that people will insist on coming along and trying to put things in it.
quote by Terry Pratchett
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Fantasy is an exercise bicycle for the mind. It might not take you anywhere, but it tones up the muscles that can. Of course, I could be wrong.
quote by Terry Pratchett
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Emotional Upheaval
Only Terry Pratchett can be forgiven for irreverently sending
an unrefined Sam Vines into the pristine company of Pride
and Prejuduce - calling this classic a silly romance
Vimes launches into a diatribe against the stifling gentility that
held rich people enthralled within a useless existence, tells
author Jane Austen to write about
Corpses, murder and war – a cross between Mickey Spillane
and Margaret Mitchell; I love his advice about earning one’s
own keep leading to self-esteem
Enjoy the psychological tension Austen described –without
much action she creates more excitement and emotional
upheaval than Mike Hammer and
Scarlett O’Hara combined – only Wuthering Heights and
Jane Eyre can rival Jane Austen in making me
experience hallucinations!
Snuff – Terry Pratchett; Doubleday 2011
pp 69-72
poem by Margaret Alice Second
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Far Away
I learnt the universe is infinitely huge; not
confined to the Milky Way Galaxy as I had
read in Arthur Mee’s Children’s Encyclopaedia
when I was small - there are infinite galaxies;
a stupendous discovery that left me high
with excitement
I was enthralled by Vincent Gaddis’ Invisible
Horizons and The Secret Life Of Plants early
in life, later discovering Charles Fort and his
rains of fishes and strange footprints which
just added grist to my mill
Erich von Daniken and Zechariah Sitchin
destroyed all fear of a prosaic life; the small,
Calvinist world of my youth with pain and duty
was reduced to a miniscule part of this
wonderfully exciting inter-subjective
illusion
Reading about Atlantis, Lemuria, Mu and
ancients astronauts gives me infinite delight,
I became an instant a Pyramidiot on discovery
of Graham Hancock, Charles Bauval’s and
Wayne Herchel’s theories – and I keep
reading Charles von Berlitz’s books
I love the mystery of the disappearance of the
Marie Celeste, the lost fighter pilots and ships
in Bermuda’s green mist, enchanted by accounts
of the Philadelphia Experiment and explanations
of crew men in deep freeze
I am amazed by occult mediums introduced by
Arthur Findlay and Arthur Conan Doyle’s support
for attempts to probe consciousness surviving
physical life; and I ponder Peter Wilcock’s
hexagonal distribution of galaxy
structures
I enjoy reading about extraterrestrial contacts,
octaves of colours, sounds and forms, Mayan
prophecies, astrogenetics by Maurice Cotterel
and Lyall Watson explaining Chladni’s figures
making geometric patterns in sand, grounding
Dr Emoto’s ideas on water crystals
I am amazed by quantum physics, quarks and Many
World’s theory, adore the holographic universe, am
thrilled by pyramids being built without identifiable
technology, by OOPARTS and ziggurats and
ancient alien visitors from the stars –
- and I must live in a prosaic world of boredom, no
accomplishment and squashed dreams – thank
heaven, Terry Pratchett saves me from all this by
recording, expanding and embroidering the ideas
and theories I love
Presenting by mouth of his youthful characters,
combining mystery and fun, speculation and free
imagination in one heady mixture that sets my
imagination alight, takes me on spiritual flights,
far, far away from this little life…
(Good Omens, Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman,
Corgi Books,2006)
poem by Margaret Alice Second
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Magic On The Quiet
Charmed by the wonderful wit of Terry Pratchett
in Carpe Jugulum, sharing Agnes Nitt’s admiration
for the Right Reverend Mightily Oats’ kindness in
helping Granny Weatherwax under the ruse that
she was helping him and Granny’s grudging res-
pect for a priest of Om no longer burning witches,
not burning in holy fire himself meaning he is truly
an honest man and bringer of light to dark places
The ramifications of the situations which reveal the
true nature of the protagonists who face them, form
a string of magical events that glisten and shine in
my imagination just as they do in Indra’s heaven
where every pearl reflects all the other pearls
The logical consistent action of Pratchett’s main
characters forming a musical theme that plays
through all his books, carefully camouflaged from
the regard of the casual passer-by who does not
pick up the shining strands to follow them to their
harmonious conclusions
Led astray by the science of materialism used to
lull unobservant connoisseurs into believing that
empiricism forms the basis of Pratchett’s edifice –
And I shall leave it at that, delighting in magic
on the quiet…
poem by Margaret Alice Second
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