Tag Archives: human rights

Bijoux

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Some think that what happened in the fall of 2027 in Washington D.C. is fiction, others, wishful thinking.

Dot, an ostensibly rich and flamboyant widow of sixty-five, left London via Heathrow and entered the US through Dulles International airport on a false passport. On opening one of her suitcases American customs found it filled with large ornate decorative hats; she explained, an aristocratic lady of importance, must have many hats.

Later, Dot visited a dog farm and collected a corgi, named Bijoux. It had been trained to be friendly to strangers, obedient and content to be carried in a baby-stroller. 

President Trump had already announced the construction of an arch celebrating his creation of world peace. It was expected he would crown himself ‘Emperor of the Americas’ at the official opening of his ‘Maga Arch’. 

For the next several months Dot was a regular visitor to the Ellipse (the land near the White House) where the arch was under construction, guarded by ICE agents, who assessed her as presenting no threat to the arch. She formed a superficial friendship with agent ZX5, who recalled, Dot? Sure, I liked her: kinda crazy, looked whacky, every day a new hat, like something from the fresh fruit counter at Calomiris and Sons. The dog’s baby stroller flew a Stars and Stripes, and a MAGA flag.  Even her fucking dog had a MAGA coat. 
What sort of a dog?
Corgi. Said she’d been a lady-in-waiting to Queen Elizabeth; Bijoux was left to her as a thank you gift. 
What sort of a coat? 
Big. I asked her why it needed a coat when it’s in a stroller?
Said it was frail. Fat as a little pig. Frail? No fucking way.
Anything else about the coat.
It looked like it was stuffed.
Stuffed? With what?
Hell, I don’t know.
Wasn’t it examined?
Nope, not by me. She was just a lunatic in hats; harmless; never blasphemed.
Did you tell her what days the President visited the construction site.
For sure. She worshipped Trump, like he was a god. They cooed like turtle doves.
What did he think of her? 
I don’t know; I’m a nobody. Trump loved Bijoux, liked to lip kiss the ugly fucker.
What happened on that day?
Trump’s inspecting the arch when Dot rocks up. She pulls the corgi out of the stroller and shouts, Donald! Bijoux needs a hug! Carrying Bijoux, she runs to the President who’s waiting with outstretched arms. Dot trips. Boom! Fucking boom. All fucking blood and guts. Dot, Bijoux. – dead. President, clothes in shreds, hair on fire, gibbering with severe PTSD as his arch crumbled.
Was the bomb in her hat?
Nope, reckon it was Bijoux. 

This note was found in the baby-stroller:

In a democracy the people’s government must uphold the human rights of all notwithstanding: age, ethnicity, gender, sexual orientation and includes those seeking asylum and citizenship resulting in the right to life, liberty & the pursuit of happiness. 

These were not Trump’s values. 

I hope you enjoyed this story. Please feel free to pass it on to others who may be interested. You can read my previous 500 word stories on my website www.philcoskerwriter.com under ‘Writing’.>>>More

When Ghosts Gather

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In this infinite space, silence is deafening, darkness thick as black strap molasses, and stinks of burning sulphur. 

Who are you? 
Where are we? 
I don’t know. 
You, dead like me? 
Yes, I’m Ibrahim, I’m Palestinian, and you? 
Ukrainian. I’m Victor and dead, along with my family, since 1933. I’ve not seen or spoken with another … I was going to say person, for years. Why meet you now? 
No idea. Are we ghosts? 
Must be. 
Ghosts. Bit of a shock. Where is here? 
No idea. 
You, died in1933? Impossible. This is 2025; you look thirty, like me. 
Maybe, time doesn’t exist here. 
How did you die? 
Genocide. Starvation, on the orders of Stalin, along with four million other Ukrainians in the Holodomor. 
Why? 
We disobeyed him. And your death? 
Genocide, just like you, along with my family and many thousands of other Palestinians were starved to death by Netanyahu’s Israeli government. 
Why? 
It’s a long story. In 1947, Britain and its allies, who’d defeated Fascism gave away Palestine, our country, our land, out of guilt for not stopping Hitler from murdering millions of Jewish people. Our land was stolen and now they call us the thieves.
We still fight Russia for our freedom. Stalin then, Putin now. He’s a murderous dictator and wants to re-establish the USSR’s empire. He claims Ukraine belongs to the Russian Federation and he’s waging war to steal it from us. We have a lot in common like killing our children.
Cynical bastards it kills tomorrow’s freedom fighters. 
Where are they, our dead children?  
Lost like us? 
Ghosts, yes. Lost? No. 
I wish.
Listen! Ibrahim shouts 
Look! Victor gasps. 

Fresh air swirls. Darkness vanishes. The void fills with twilight. The ghosts of children beyond number materialise; they are all intact as they were before their murder; babies are carried. The massed children chant, Peace! Justice! War no more!

Victor and Ibrahim gape as two girls walk forward.
Father, the first child speaks.
Is that you, My love? Victor sinks to his knees and embraces his daughter.
Ibrahim opens his arms, Come to me, Aisha. They kiss.
What are we to do? the two men ask. 
Stop war, the girls reply. 
How, we’re only ghosts?
We ghosts can haunt as we choose. Aisha says. 
Ibrahim says, Make peace not war. 
Victor adds. Do no physical harm. 
No need, Aisha says.

Simultaneously, the ruins of Palestine and the wreckage of the towns and cities of Ukraine are overwhelmed by swarm after swarm of the children’s ghosts as dense as a million locusts but totally silent. Soldiers, settlers, collaborators, government apparatchiks, and murderers panic; trapped, struggling for air, defenceless, realising their sudden impotence, and certain their victims, the massacred children, will hold them to account; ‘Just obeying orders’ not being an excuse. 

The Knesset and the Kremlin are totally inundated by ghosts. Netanyahu and Putin, seen as the embodiment of self-serving evil, are escorted by throngs of children to imprisonment and eventual trial for their crimes against humanity.

I hope you enjoyed this story. Please feel free to pass it on to others who may be interested. You can read my previous 500 word stories on my website www.philcoskerwriter.com under ‘Writing’.>>>More
© Phil Cosker 2025
Phil Cosker has asserted his right under the Copyright, Designs & Patents Act 1988 to be identified as the author of this work. All rights reserved; no part of this work may be reproduced or transmitted by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying or otherwise without the prior permission of the author.

Cross Purposes

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The Oakland Museum of California, 2025. A tour party is about to start viewing the ‘Dorothea Lange Collection’.

A man, wearing a MAGA cap, points at Lange’s photograph, ‘Migrant Mother, Nipomo, California, 1936’, and asks Leonid, the tour guide, Why’s that so famous?
Leonid sees the man’s name badge. Ok, Billy, I’ll try to explain. Dorothea Lange is one of the great social photographers.
Ah, a socialist, Andrea, another tourist, states.
Leonid sighs. No. This portrait of Florence Owens Thompson and her children, embodies the suffering of destitute ordinary people during the Midwestern Dust Bowl disaster when 300,000 people migrated to California in search of work and a future for their children.
She’s a failure with no shame, Andrea says.
You said she’s a migrant, September says, She illegal? 
Migrant not immigrant, Leonid replies. The photograph was taken at the height of the ‘Great Depression’. You all know about that, right? Leonid asks.
Sure do; was when Jew bankers stole our money, Andrea asserts.
That’s a lie and racist, Leonid objects.
You calling me an antisemite? Andrea responds. I got Jew friends.
Where’d she crawled from? Billy asks. Skid Row?
She was an American citizen, just like you, Leonid explains. Shall we move on, there’s so much of her work to be seen?
Why do that? Billy asks.
Why come here? Leonid asks.
To see what commie propaganda looks like before Donald closes the museum down.
That’s outrageous. Leonid says. 
You don’t create MAGA by celebrating failure. This place is subversive, Billy states.
Your badge says you’re Leonid. You Russian? September queries. 
Do I sound Russian? I’m British. 
If you were a spy, you wouldn’t sound Russian.
Are you Russian? Billy demands.
Ok, Leonid laughs. I’m Russian – I’m Leonid Brezhnev.
Told you! Andrea shouts. They’ll come for you, for sure.

Following fierce pounding, Leonid opens his apartment door and is confronted by two stocky men wearing face masks, baseball caps, stab-proof jackets, ICE* badges and prominently holstered automatic pistols. 
Well, if it isn’t the boys from the Arctic, Leonid laughs.
You Leonid Brezhnev?
Speak up, will you? You’re mumbling.
Are you Leonid Brezhnev?
I’m a British citizen and outside of your jurisdiction.
Like fuck you do, Pal. This is your jurisdiction, one of the agents says forcing Leonid’s face against the wall.
Are you Leonid Brezhnev?
I can’t speak like this, Leonid groans. Standing free, he continues, You been listening to those
dumb fucks in the museum?
You the dumb fuck, arsehole. Them, citizens doing their duty and looking out for commies, got it? Leonid winces from a sudden slap in his face, 
Are you Leonid Brezhnev?
Brezhnev died in 1982; he ran Russia. Let me get my ID, Leonid says, putting his hand inside his bomber jacket.
Don’t do that!
Look, Leonid says, here’s my … He doesn’t finish his sentence.
I thought he was pulling a …
He was.
There’s no gun.
Sure is.
Yeah, I see it now. 
He’s as dead as JFK.
Another mystery.

*https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Immigration_and_Customs_Enforcement

I hope you enjoyed this story. Please feel free to pass it on to others who may be interested. You can read my previous 500 word stories on my website www.philcoskerwriter.com under ‘Writing’.>>>More
© Phil Cosker 2025
Phil Cosker has asserted his right under the Copyright, Designs & Patents Act 1988 to be identified as the author of this work. All rights reserved; no part of this work may be reproduced or transmitted by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying or otherwise without the prior permission of the author.

Mary

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Mary has spent the last thirty years in Hull perfecting the art of invisibility. Though seldom seen or noticed, she’s fastidious about her appearance; always clean and smartly dressed, confounding stereotypes. During the day, she hides in whichever condemned property she uses as her temporary home. In the early hours of each morning, she forages for food. 

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Don McCullin

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Don McCullin

Don McCullin’s exhibition at Tate Britain is profoundly moving, perplexing, and, ultimately joyous.

The galleries were crowded. I had to go round one room in the opposite direction to avoid two people who, standing in front of the horrors of war, were laughing while happily talking about their recent holidays – were they blind?

I am familiar with many of McCullin’s photographs but in the majority of cases in reproduced form in magazines – it was inspiring to see his own prints made exactly the way he wanted.

By the time I reached the final room – that containing his landscapes and still lives – I was overwhelmed by the dedication and passion McCullin has used over so many years to represent the human condition in the worst of circumstances of war, famine and deprivation. His photographs capture the feeling of pain and suffering and it’s not just because the prints are dark – it’s because he feels, cares, and it comes across in his photographs so that I was nearly in tears. But then there was a moment of epiphany – I’ll come back to that.

What is both perplexing and saddening is that the lessons we learnt when we first saw the images from e.g. Biafra and Vietnam have faded. The men living on the streets of Shoreditch years ago are no different from the rough sleepers that now abound thanks to austerity and the destruction of the Welfare State. We are still responsible for war and the misery it causes – the Yemen and Syria to name but two. I found myself asking what was the point? Maybe the point is that the work exists, it was made, it was, is, true, evidence, and that we choose to ignore it at our peril.

His landscapes. The moment of epiphany. The realisation that in the ‘natural’ world, as rendered through his lens, there is beauty beyond measure.

McCullin has said

“So, there is guilt in every direction: guilt because I don’t practice religion, guilt because I was able to walk away while this man was dying of starvation or being murdered by another man with a gun. And that I am tired of guilt, tired of saying to myself: ‘I didn’t kill that man on that photograph, I didn’t starve that child.’ That’s why I want to photograph landscapes and flowers. I am sentencing myself to peace.”

Maybe the joy in these landscapes, this celebration of life and peace, would not have been so profound without the horror, without the guilt, and there would not be this beauty?

It was one hell of a price this man, this photographer, had to pay.

Thank you.

 

DRIVE YOUR PLOW OVER THE BONES OF THE DEAD

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Olga Tokarczuk’s novel is magnificent.

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The title comes from William Blake.

The blurb on the back cover is good but doesn’t do it full justice.

I couldn’t put it down.

There is so much to take from this work e.g. what Fieldfares can do to an attacking hawk; “Newspapers rely on keeping us in a constant state of anxiety, on diverting our emotions away from the things that really matter to us.” And insight and argument into the human condition in the this century and the dilemmas we all face and not just in Poland.

Please read this book

Mayday! Prime Midden May and baying Tory rats

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The Prime Midden May’s Tory rats scurry, saliva dripping, smelling blood, flesh ripping, lips licking, chewing, panting with excitement, gnawing, gorging on the destruction of the bleak and abused and deserted and deprived while chanting their failed neo-liberal crap, pissing on the underlings while laughing, feeding in their gilded halls, celebrating, turning humanity to commodity, untouched by conscience, racism peddling, indulging in the fantasy of a great and glorious England past, present and future, as the Midden May, at the wheel, out of control, flops the flaccid juggernaut of Brexit over the edge of the cliff to the tune of baying rats, secure in their sickening self-righteous security, clothed in the glistening armour of ersatz caring while fondling the ermine finery of privilege, daring the burgeoning poor to bite back or eat cake, as food banks offer no loaves and fishes miracles, fostering foreign toxic hate, as the Midden May and her squabbling Tory rats try to demolish the welfare state and privatise our NHS while weeping crocodile tears of austerity as the rich get richer and the poor even poorer.

Mayday! Mayday! Mayday! There is a vacuum. The Labour Party must develop policies, and not just rhetoric, to create a society for the many and not the few.

The Windrush Citizens

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Hi Folks

Yesterday Amber Rudd – the UK’s Home Secretary – apologised for the treatment and distress handed out to Windrush citizens turned into victims. Thank you for that – something that never needed to happen!

Many of these victims of racism have been made poverty stricken – Mr Thompson has been denied treatment for his prostrate cancer and therefore his life has been threatened. Even if I wasn’t a prostate cancer survivor I would support him.

I just signed the petition, “Home Office: Give Albert Thompson the lifesaving cancer treatment he needs.” I think this is important. Will you sign it too?
Here’s the link:

https://www.change.org/p/home-office-give-albert-thompson-the-lifesaving-cancer-treatment-he-needs?utm_medium=email&utm_source=petition_signer_receipt&utm_campaign=triggered&share_context=signature_receipt&recruiter=22107025

Thanks,
Go well,
Phil