Ron the Bus is a local 'lej' where I live, in Heolgerrig.
   At a time when genuine characters are hard to find, he stands out.
   But after 27 years working for the locally-owned buses he was made redundant with no pay-off at all and only the promise of a taxi job for the firm who took over.
   Now he's working for another company on the taxis around town and always toots his horn when passing.
   Before he was a bus-driver he worked on the milk rounds with his twin brother Rob ( confusing, eh?) in the village.
   If anything went wrong they'd say it was the other's fault, so when we were regularly woken early on Saturday mornings to pay the bill, I hastily threatened a bucket of cold water as retribution.
   At the time, however, I thought there was one of them and didn't know twins were delivering, so when the answer came - 'It wasn't me , it was my brother!' later in the week, I thought it was a ruse!
   Ron doesn't live in Heolgerrig, but knows everyone by name, classically shortened to 'Shar', 'Kar' , 'Jule' and 'Bri' etc.
   He doesn't seem to have changed over the years : teeth that would take a dentist a lifetime to fix, cackling laugh like a hubble-bubble-toil-and-trouble impersonation and the constant teasing about customers' age.
   He's always been so much more than a bus-driver.
   He bought food and papers for pensioners and delivered them. He stopped outside homes and went in for a quick cuppa. He helped every journey with bags and buggies.
   Ron, of course, could also be infuriating.
   He'd sometimes stop at the Post Office or Stores to get his shopping, leaving you stranded in the bus and waiting.
   However, he's is full of interest in people's lives and, with me , particularly the career of my older daughter Bethan, because Ron is an enthusiastic supporter of Plaid Cymru.
   In a town dominated by Labour he recalls the days of the Plaid Council and Emrys Roberts, who came close to winning the Parliamentary seat when S.O.Davies retired.
   He has no time for Labour's arrogant hegemony and their inevitable backing for a ludicrous and expensive monarchy.
    If you want a second-hand car Ron is also a person to see and seems to have plenty of contacts.
   Also, many evenings he'd drive a taxi for another firm and I've used him for longer journeys.
   At one time, he'd even ferry the Red Poets back and fore to our gigs in glamorous places like Tredegar and Pontlottyn.
   Most adore Ron and hundreds of pounds was raised as a goodbye gift.
   However, on one journey home (with a different driver) the bus was packed with Ron-haters. It was the first and only time I'd encountered such venom.
   They all had malicious tales about him : how he went to sleep in the bus at the top of the hill and it was late ; how he took breakfast and lunch in a woman's house while on the job.
   Of course, the buses were erratic, to say the least.
   Many were late or never showed up; they often broke down, leaving drivers like Ron stranded and passengers desperate.
   Yet all the drivers, not just Ron, would stop where you wanted and assist anyone who needed help.
   Now the buses are on time, but the rules strictly adhered to.
   Heolgerrig has lost Ron and it seems like an era has ended.
   When you stopped hearing Welsh spoken on the buses and then in the Post Office, these too were eras ending.
   Characters are side-lined, move on and the place loses its identity.
   I'm delighted that Heolgerrig photographer Robert Haines ( whose work was recently exhibited in Redhouse) has captured that world, because it's so precarious.
   At the bottom of the hill Trago Mills ( owned by a prominent UKIPer) grows at a rapid rate.
   Who knows what will become of our town centre after, part derelict and part rejuvenated.
   Ron's like one of the few , surviving local businesses: personal, caring, yet threatened.
   But he is still around, still driving his taxi and, if you're ever lucky enough to catch him, it'll be a memorable journey.


    
THA  DRIVER!
 
Im ! Im b’there! Tha driver!
 
Im with-a graveyard teeth
an a bloody cackle
like-a witches off of Shakespeare.
 
Ee took us t Daffodils ee did
an not inta town,
thinks ee’s funny ee does,
a proper clown.
 
Jest coz we all got bus passes,
ee’s always goin on bout ower ages.
 
Took us t the Ol Folks Ome,
stopped outside an said –
‘Right yew lot! Get off yer
coz none of yew’s paid!’
 
Yeah, im b’there!
Im elpin with-a trolleys an push-chairs.
Thinks ee cun get away with it
jest coz ee knows ev’ryone.
 
Well, ee don’ know my name! ​

    

   Over the years I've seen many of the bands and singer-songwriters whose music I love so much.
   Most have delivered truly memorable performances, well worth the expense which makes concerts prohibitive to many.
   Christy Moore has always been outstanding, as has Loudon Wainwright ; Leonard Cohen was witty and uplifting contrary to all the stereotyping. Van Morrison was profoundly disappointing and Bob Dylan appalling, as he proceeded to murder his own classics one by one.
   My main ambitions are to see Tom Waits and Robert Wyatt and I'd travel far to do so, but Waits hardly ever tours and Wyatt never.
   Seeing Paul Simon recently at the Motorpoint in Cardiff I became increasingly aware of the significance of his songs in my life.
   I once wooed a girl when a teenager by singing 'Bridge Over Troubled Water' while we stood on a small stone bridge over a stream. It worked, though she never supplied the harmonies.
   I used to be mistaken for Art Garfunkel in the days when 'Bright Eyes' was top of the charts and , in my first teaching practice, the kids all said - 'Sir, you do look like Art Garfunkel, you do!'
    But now he is bald and bespectacled, so.......... 
   With another girlfriend, when a student, we sang 'America' together on a bus travelling up the Ceredigion coast to Aber. Fitting somehow!
   But unlike my constant attention to new releases from Waits and Cohen, I'd drifted away from Simon.
   Sure, I'd loved 'Graceland' and also many of his solo songs in a 'Best Of...' I possessed ; yet, I still clung to the early ones which I'd sung to my children as lullabies, like 'Scarborough Fair' ( a traditional song, of course), ' Sounds of Silence' and 'El Condor Pasa'.
   Then, amongst a good deal of mundane 'legends' and 'amazing' dross, I heard him on the last series of Jools singing 'Wristband' from his new album 'Stranger to Stranger'.
   It's a great song, driven by the rhythms of flamenco, melded onto jazz : it takes a simple idea and broadens it gradually into a symbol of society and the way certain people are excluded.
   From there to the cd itself and adoring its wide embrace of flamenco, jazz and the peculiarities of classical composer Harry Parch, with his strange array of home-made instruments.
    'He won't be doing anything from the old days', someone warned me about the concert.
   Luckily, they were wrong.
   At first the audience all appeared like us : a conference of retirees and 60s revivalists stuck in our seats.
   When the music was about to begin it changed and filled up with younger people ( by that, I mean under 40).
   Whenever we refer to the greatest singer-songwriters the names of Dylan, Cohen, Joni Mitchell and Lennon & McCartney spring to mind.
   Yet Paul Simon surely belongs up there and the concert was a testament to that, a succession of fascinating versions of his songs always embellished, never mangled.....except the Simon & Garfunkel ones.
   He sung those simply, accompanied only by his own intricate guitar-playing....'America', 'The Boxer' and 'Homeward Bound', muted singalongs. These were contrasted by the rousing ones,tempting  the audience to their feet and gradually one single gyrating dancer was replaced by aisles of  grey channels drifting towards the stage.
   Subtly, slowly, the whole arena began to move to the pulsating rhythms of 'Graceland', 'Call Me Al' and 'Mother & Child Reunion'.
   Astonishingly, this was his first ever gig in Cymru and he should really have played 'Frank Lloyd Wright' as a celebration.....but still, a minor quibble.
   Cries of 'We love yew Paul!' soon turned to 'Why aven yew come yer before?' But all good-natured.
   Just as surprising was that he only played three from the new album all night, when it's clearly his best work for a long time.
   His band were wonderful, switching from Latin American to South African to jazz interpretations with consummate ease and skill.
    Just as we were about to leave after a couple of encores, he sang 'Sounds of Silence' - ' Hello Darkness my old friend.....'
    Deep affection for the man and his music.....tidings of the sea at twilight.


                                  GREY    WAVES

In the dusky light below
the grey waves move forward
approaching the stage ,
as he urges musicians
into Latin and African rhythms
the crowd begin to dance
and their arms sway
like anemones in the tide.
​

No flood or tsunami this,
no sign of barriers raised,
or hurried encroachments ;
the silver tips lap
at the shores of an age,
by a man and his band,
Sirens and the island. 

 A few weeks ago I shared an article written by the Guardian's USA correspondent Ed Pilkington on Facebook.
   A couple of people noticed and nobody commented.
   Being cynical, if it had been about an Iranian poet persecuted for his writing, the result may well have been different.
   With the US elections upon us ( well, them) and the choice between a bullying bigot and Wall Street wangler, it is sad to reflect on paltry changes Obama has made.
   With the use of drones to attack people in countries which the US are not at war with, his use of stealth warfare caused many innocent casualties with minimal condemnation.
   He might've railed against gun laws, but has done nothing to disturb the NRA's grip on a society where they are often as available as candy ( notice appropriate Americanisms).
   As police killings of unarmed blacks increased, he seemed totally helpless.
   Guantanamo remains functioning, with many innocent inmates awaiting release and, above all, the gap between rich and poor in the US remains as wide as ever.
   However, Pilkington described one case alone in his excellent feature, that of Puerto Rican activist Oscar Lopez Rivera, who still awaits a presidential pardon and is looking unlikely to get one.
   He is the world's longest serving political prisoner and the article exposed just how appalling his treatment has been.
   He is now 73 , having spent over half his life behind bars.
   He killed no-one, yet was sentenced, in 1981, to 55 years in prison. At that time, the average sentence for murder was 10.3 years!
   He is still a Puerto Rican nationalist, desiring independence for what he calls a 'US colony', a state where the people cannot vote in this presidential election despite paying taxes.
   'No taxation without representation' - doesn't that slogan sound familiar?
   Two decades ago he and fellow freedom-fighters renounced all forms of violence, even though they only ever carried out bombings against properties ( much like Meibion Glyndwr).
   His sentence stretches until 2023, when he will be 80.
   He's left wondering if Obama will act, but is not optimistic.
   Pilkington's article is full of the righteous indignation of Rivera, but is also poetic.
   It describes how Rivera recalls the beautiful monarch butterflies of his younger days and how they made the long and arduous journey thousands of miles from Canada to Mexico.
   Rivera has said that one day, when he is free, he'd love to follow that migration southwards ; but for now, it only lives in his memory.
   In his cell he paints avidly, bringing colours into a grey world.
   He has support from many diverse sources, including Desmond Tutu and Jimmy Carter and, interestingly, compares himself to Mandela, though the latter never renounced violence on his release.
   What changed his life and made him join the FALN ( Puerto Rican freedom-fighters) were his experiences in Vietnam.
   He went there with a similar view to Wilfred Owen when he joined up to fight in the 1st World War ; he believed it was a crusade for democracy and a better way of life. He rapidly realised that the US were the aggressors and he was instrumental in carrying out their brutal oppression of the Vietnamese.
   He made that vital connection between this imperialism and the same one that kept his people subjugated.
   Such a brave man , he states - ' Hope, that is one thing we can never lose.'
   If Obama fails to pardon Oscar Lopez Rivera it will be another US crime against humanity.


                           OSCAR   LOPEZ   RIVERA

When I was a child
they settled on my hands,
the swarms of monarchs
travelled south to the warm.

They had waited for the drop,
for that particular angle of light
and followed the pollen trail
thousands of miles south.

One day I want to fly
with them and away
from this cell where colours
disappeared into grey.

Puerto Rico, fragile, leaf-veined
but bright orange winged ;
I found you in Vietnam jungles,
a people they would pin.

Now I bring the colours in,
cut out landscapes from magazines
and try to find the mixing :
still cannot see that migration.

My island itself a butterfly :
small yet remarkable
and one day making that journey
across America, into history.    
   

   What did I know about the city everyone said they loved?
   The brilliant US band Sleater-Kinney from Portland Oregon ( a Marmite town, if ever there was one) have both album and song entitled ' No Cities To Love'.
   Maybe they haven't been to Berlin?
   I lived in W. Germany for a year in the 1970s and never went then.....Amsterdam, Hanover, Dusseldorf and Dortmund, but not that island in the Eastern sector.
   I was keenly aware of its significance with the Wall and Hitler, but the latter wasn't even discussed in a German 'gymnasium' ( Grammar School) let alone allowed on the syllabus!
   Strangely, my stepfather and mother had visited there for some time on business in the early 70s.....even more curious given that he worked for an American multi-national.
   They brought me back weighty pamphlets. My mother was a Stalinist, yet full of contradictions : her ambition being to own and rent out houses to students.
   Explaining to one person at a poetry event that I was going, she announced that she had whole sections of the Wall in her attic!
   It has fascinated me since my wife acquired a series of 50s and 60s photos of that city : guards on the Wall, bathing at a lake and the symphony orchestra.
   Yet, as a tourist, you can't expect to sense more than the surface.
   In Paris,  we loved hopping on and off the river taxis, seeing the sights by the Seine. But even then, before any atrocities, there was much tension with police and troops armed and once confronting a Middle Eastern man sitting on the banks of the river.

   The best laid plans of mice and men......I felt like a wee, timorous beastie after I'd booked the wrong luggage category ( panic, cramming and ultimately extra payment) and the taxi at Berlin failed to show up ; my phone not adjusting to the Continent and the firm not reaching me.
   Eventually, we passed though this city of cranes en route to the East near the River Spree.
   I struggled with my limited Deutsch, every time thinking Cymraeg, so 'diolch' instead of ' danke ' and 'na' for 'nein'.
   ( Luckily, my wife's an ex-German teacher and as long as I could combine the words 'bier' and 'grosse' I was alright).
   Our Middle Eastern taxi driver was a rugby fan and admirer of our egg team, however national identity was soon established with references to 'soccer' -
German bloke in lift - Where are you from?
Us - Wales.
Him - Ah yes, you have one great footballer.
Me - We  have a great team!
  ( Thinking Williams, Allen, Ramsey and so on ....who's that other?).
   A booked visit to Reichstag dome was cancelled with no explanation. Maybe they were afraid I'd write a poem about the opulence of their kindergarten?
   On the way to our hotel we'd seen sections of the Wall covered in graffiti art. I wasn't surprised it was so low, as I'd seen those black and white photos.
   Berlin's so full of the weight of the past you wonder how it can move forward, but there is much re-building.
   In recent elections I read that both far left and neo-Nazis had polled about 14%, so the city reflects the polarised politics sweeping through Europe, where reformism has failed so many.
   The famous Brandenburger Tor was the focal point for demos and , when we were there, a group of Kurds and their German supporters were attacking the brutality of the Turkish state.
    So much to pack into a couple of days : sheer volume of history and knowledge settling in my mind as scenes and fragments.
   My son had recommended staying in the East ; my older daughter fixed two tours in advance and younger one ensured that we only stayed still to eat and drink!
   The rapid ascent and descent of the cathedral dome followed by a rush to catch a boat which I nearly missed as I hadn't spotted the right company, was suitably frenetic.
   Weather can't be planned ,though it was perfect : slightly cool and hardly a drip.
   Leaf-fall and no sign of the manic leaf-hoovering I recall from living in Germany in the 70s.
   The Jewish Museum, with police presence outside, was like being inside a large sculpture. I enjoyed the audio tour and would've favoured it elsewhere if only time allowed.
   The history of the Jews in Germany is one of persecution throughout the centuries, yet eventual integration, so that thousands died fighting for what they believed a righteous cause in the 1st World War.
   The growth of anti-Semitism in the 20s was terrifying, but as with the harrowing exhibition Topography of Terror, the actual images of the concentration camps were avoided, as were the intimate details.
   The architecture of the building continued to captivate : all lines at angles, except the Garden of Exile with olive trees growing at the top of stone columns.
   We put paper pomegranates on a wish-tree and both  myself and my wife wished for peace in the Middle East ( I qualified it with a desire for a Palestinian homeland).
   Our afternoon walking tour, which took four hours, was undoubtedly the highlight.
   The guide from Dumfries, now living in Berlin, explained everything with much erudition and passion : ostentations of the Prussian monarchy,  vile actions of the Nazis and the constant oppression of the Wall itself to the fore.
   She was understandably cynical about the engineered attractions of Checkpoint Charlie, with its photo opportunities.
   I was amazed to see the Trabant ( car of the DDR) elevated into museum status and a symbol sold as many models to tourists.
   To be there is to be aware of the sheer length of the Wall and bravery of people who managed to escape using tunnels, balloons and , in one case, a Heath Robinson zip-wire.
   Of all the museums, the most effective was the DDR one, by the River Spree.
   It is very popular and occupies a small space, but is full of pictorial stimuli and hands-on exhibits.
   My younger daughter even had a go at driving a Trabant ( simulated) and managed to crash into a lamp-post straight away......but how can I, a non-driver, pass judgement?
   The balance was excellent.
   There was no blatant propaganda and the positives of the Stalinist regime were shown, with all the basics provided in terms of jobs, housing and food ; these contrasted by the over-riding totalitarianism and complete intolerance of any criticism.  
   The reconstruction of a typical East German apartment only showed how well off the majority were materially compared with Valleys' contemporaries, many of whom  lived in terraces without outside toilets and definitely no central heating.
   Berlin's history has been crucial to the 20th century : with the rise and fall of the Nazis and the Wall symbolizing the Cold War.
   The many parties of young people listening ( or fidgeting) in its museums testify to the way the country has altered since I was living there.
   If Britain still tends to glorify its militarism, that is not the case with Deutschland.
   Of all the cities I've been to, it's the most inspirational.
    
  ( This poem is part of a six poem sequence about the city ).

                                  OTHER  WALLS

'Back in the USSR'
I sing to myself
openly and loudly
and change the words -
once a Winston Smith
smuggling them in.

At least I have a job
and pension coming,
a holiday a year,
boat on the horizon ;
have friends who struggle
just for food and rent.

Things weren't so different
as they make out :
there are other walls
built between the bosses
and the shop-floor,
surrounding wealthy tourists
who buy models
of our quaint cars.

No empty shelves
accusing us like beggars
washed up today in gutters ;
so many choices
so slim a pocket.

The walls aren't as perilous,
no-one is shot,
yet some of my companions
point loaded eyes
at darker strangers;
and I want to wander back.