You’ve changed again! Sixth time today:
Eloquent poisoner, splitter and joiner,
We appease you in some calm amalgam;
Chain you to the colder stone
To make you keep your distance from the bone.
As a child I read
In a magazine, in my grandfather’s bed
How you tainted fish in some Japanese sea,
Thereby making plasticine of children quite like me
And squeezed them out of all proportion, into misery:
I knew then that a substance could be my enemy.
Yet you fascinate the child at school
Glimpsed from the laboratory high-stool
(Throne of non-compliance with some chore);
Kids glancing from the raindrum roof
To a liquid ball, its own proof:
Planet perfect on the parquet floor.
Ambassador of Mercury, inner ringless one;
Not acme of some, but precursor of any
Impending wedding, disengaged
As each day’s beginner;
A reflective sinner presaged by many
To be dearest to your God, my Sun.
The road to God knows where ... Brendan O'Brien 
Nice.
Thanks, RB … you’re back on these shores? How was the USA?
Thanks also for the Kahlo postcard, in case you didn’t see my comment on MyT (which made no sense … I’m so used to instant communication that I assumed you were still in Mexico … doh!).
Back in Belfast. For a week or so. USA? Well, I can give an informed comment on Newark airport. Brenadno, can you link me to that comment?
RB:
http://my.telegraph.co.uk/hibernacle/brendano7/34/racism-essentially-its-just-plain-silly/#dsq-content
Knock! Knock! You seem to be quiet lately. I hope all is well, Brendan.
Hi Levent … yes, all is very well, thanks. Two reasons for my quietness here: (1) I’m swamped with work and (2) the number of comments has fallen dramatically … it’s harder to be interested when other people aren’t!
:))
I was not accusing you. I haven’t seen you on Myt either, and just wanted to ask.
I know you weren’t accusing me, Levent. Thanks for asking. 🙂
I’m here, but I understand the problem, Brendan. I enjoy visitors on my page but I didn’t start out to do anything other than post old stuff. I quite enjoy the peace and quiet in some ways.
I’m slightly disenchanted with MyT though at the moment. I’m tempted to leave it to the nasties but I do have this rather stubborn streak which still tempt me back. There are still some good bloggers there but they are shouted down by a small but very vocal minority.
I dare say this will change in time but it is a bit of a snake pit at the moment.
Hello, Araminta … nice to see you. There were several new comments here this morning, all with my name and avatar but not from me … in other words, my stalker (also active on MyT this afternoon) was using his new IP address (which he also used to make comments on my name on Bubbles’ gardening blog … it’s in the Bedford/Milton Keynes area, like his others).
I feel the same way as you about MyT, and also have a stubborn streak. The main problem at the moment is the moderation, I think … the site has been handed on a plate to the likes of Bubbles, Larry, Badger, help ma boab, alanh, Rosie and Ex-P, not to mention the Bedford stalker. It does not bode well. But it’s only blogging, of course.
Well yes, there is that, it is only blogging, but why do these people take it so seriously?
I suppose one can always press the off button but that is not really the point.
I prefer to think of the people I “talk” to as real people but frankly I’m beginning to wonder. 😉 All goes to show that this “care in the community” business is a miserable failure.
🙂 It’s interesting from a psychological perspective at least … group dynamics, and every sort of erroneous mentalizing known to man or woman.
A gang, even an inchoate one, will use every tactic in its repertoire against a perceived enemy, and every gang member will take on a different role.
Other people’s minds … that’s where the world’s problems lie. 🙂
Ah yes, group dynamics. Now if to you take a small but like minded group on a closed site who are necessarily by virtue of feeling somewhat like outsiders in the real world, and fear the threat of expulsion from the group if they do not conform, then it is a recipe for the sort of thing we are seeing here.
No checks or balances, they wind each other up until the unthinkable becomes “normal”.
It’s like a cult, and like extremists everywhere they justify their actions because they truly see it as a crusade.
The trouble is the more you challenge them, the more convinced they are of the rightness of their cause.
Tricky really but where will they stop?
Yes, that’s true. Insecure people form groups, formal or informal, as a form of self-aggrandizement … to be part of something larger. They will often say ‘we’ when they should say ‘I’. Ultranationalists etc. are the same … all based on compensating for personal weakness.
Then a kind of groupthink takes over. It is wll documented that groupthink has been responsible for a lot of bad decisions. 🙂
Mercury does not change. Its mercurialness is always the same. Rather boring really.
Concerning the subject of what may be seen as ‘groupthink’ – remember that many people come to their own conclusions and then find that others think the same thing. Shared thought is not necessarily bad thought. Unless one dislikes the concept of democracy of course – always a possibility.
You’re pretty mercurial yourself, Cymbeline.
Well I nevver!
And sorry about being boring. I can’t help it.
I don’t think either you or mercury/Mercury are boring.
How kind you are, always.