Now that the Ben Higgins Lauren Bushnell wedding is on once again, many are wondering why Higgins called it off in the first place.

In the previous episode of the reality show, Higgins decided to call off the wedding. Many were shocked with his decision, including his fiancee. Bushnell admitted that she was totally blindsided by Higgins when he revealed during their therapy session that he wanted to postpone their wedding.

At the time, Higgins said they felt an enormous pressure on their relationship since The Bachelor finale.

When asked about how their respective families reacted on Higgins’ decision to call off the wedding, the 28-year-old software sales rep admitted that most of them already knew and their families were not surprised by the emotional episode.

In Ben & Lauren: Happily Ever After? finale Tuesday night, Higgins revealed to his fellow Bachelor stars that the wedding was off and he and Bushnell have been in couples therapy. Everyone was shocked and saddened. The group, however, still managed to pull their emotions together and made a dinner plan for the couple.

They also decided to surprise Higgins and Bushnell with a montage of their journey together showed on a screen atop the Marque. Higgins then called Bushnell to meet him at the top of the Skyfall Lounge, overlooking Las Vegas. Higgins then told Bushnell that he still wanted to be her husband.

“I know that these last couple of weeks have been hard and confusing and tiring and sometimes something we both can’t understand. But through it all, I want you to know that I never thought for a second I could live a day without you in my sight. Lauren, I’m gonna be your husband. Lauren, you’re gonna be Mrs. Higgins.” Bushnell asked if Higgins’ words mean the wedding is back on. He replied yes.

Ben Higgins Lauren Bushnell first met and fell in love in The Bachelor 2016. Higgins popped the question at the season finale. Shortly after, the two moved in together in Denver. However, split rumors continue swirling around their relationship.Read more at:http://www.marieaustralia.com | www.marieaustralia.com/****-formal-dresses

NO. 31 O'HIGGINS ROAD, CURRAGH CAMP, CO. KILDARE.

I climb a stair
that isn't there

stand on a landing
in mid-air

each step I take
creates the next part

of the vanished house
lost to time

as see through
as a cartoon ghost.

This was
(still is) for me

No. 31
O'Higgins Road

my world
the universe of me.

What was once
my bedroom...is now a cloud

a window
become a moon

night and its storm
sit in our living room

a bird tiptoes
down the stair

flying through
nine year old me

reaching for the light switch
to turn on

what isn't there.

NO. 31 O'HIGGINS ROAD, CURRAGH CAMP, CO. KILDARE.

I climb a stair
that isn't there

stand on a landing
in mid-air

each step I take
creates the next part

of the vanished house
lost to time

as see through
as a cartoon ghost.

This was
(still is) for me

No. 31
O'Higgins Road

my world
the universe of me.

What was once
my bedroom...is now a cloud

a window
become a moon

night and its storm
sit in our living room

a bird tiptoes
down the stair

flying through
nine year old me

reaching for the light switch
to turn on

what isn't there.

PARNELL'S FUNERAL

UNDER the Great Comedian's tomb the crowd.
A bundle of tempestuous cloud is blown
About the sky; where that is clear of cloud
Brightness remains; a brighter star shoots down;
What shudders run through all that animal blood?
What is this sacrifice? Can someone there
Recall the Cretan barb that pierced a star?
Rich foliage that the starlight glittered through,
A frenzied crowd, and where the branches sprang
A beautiful seated boy; a sacred bow;
A woman, and an arrow on a string;
A pierced boy, image of a star laid low.
That woman, the Great Mother imaging,
Cut out his heart.  Some master of design
Stamped boy and tree upon Sicilian coin.
An age is the reversal of an age:
When strangers murdered Emmet, Fitzgerald, Tone,
We lived like men that watch a painted stage.
What matter for the scene, the scene once gone:
It had not touched our lives.  But popular rage,
Hysterica passio dragged this quarry down.
None shared our guilt; nor did we play a part
Upon a painted stage when we devoured his heart.
Come, fix upon me that accusing eye.
I thirst for accusation.  All that was sung.
All that was said in Ireland is a lie
Bred out of the c-ontagion of the throng,
Saving the rhyme rats hear before they die.
Leave nothing but the nothingS that belong
To this bare soul, let all men judge that can
Whether it be an animal or a man.
The rest I pass, one sentence I unsay.
Had de Valera eaten parnell's heart
No loose-lipped demagogue had won the day.
No civil rancour torn the land apart.
Had Cosgrave eaten parnell's heart, the land's
Imagination had been satisfied,
Or lacking that, government in such hands.
O'Higgins its sole statesman had not died.
Had even O'Duffy -- but I name no more --
Their school a crowd, his master solitude;
Through Jonathan Swift's clark grove he passed, and there
plucked bitter wisdom that enriched his blood.

Amanda was a Panda
She was a lovely lass,
Although she had two ******* eyes,
She retained an air of class.

She ambled into the Bamboo Bar
To have lunch with Panda Pete one day,
And he looked into her eyes
And to her he did say.

"Oh Amanda with your ******* eyes
Will you please be forever mine,
And promise that you will never
Let your panda arms entwine,

Any other bloke panda
In this bamboo land,
Please oh please Amanda,
You've got to understand

For me there is no other
You're the only girl for me,
You remind me of my mother,
And so we're meant to be,

Together as a couple we'll be
With our four eyes of black,
Oh darling please look at me
Why have you turned your back?"

She answered very clearly
She said "because Pete I'd rather,
Find another Panda really,
To be my childrens father."

Now Panda Pete was really sad
He felt total and utter rejection,
So he sloped off before he got mad,
To a future of dejection.

He slunk out of the Bamboo Bar,.
Back into the forest outside
And jumped into his panda car
And took off for a long lonesome ride.

Tom Higgins 07/05/2014

party zone with sue longways



hi everyone, my name is sue longways and what a night we have for you

you see i will start with a great song, here it goes

one look in your eyes makes me feel oh continental

diamonds are a girls best friend

parties are fun for girls and also guys yeah

we have diamonds which is a girls best friend

me, sue longways is partying every day and night oh yeah

diamonds oh diamonds are a girl’s best friend

and now here is sue about to interview kendoll from scullin

sue’   hi everyone welcome back to party zone and as you might be aware

the GWS footy team beat hawthorn and sydney beat melbourne

a win for sydney against melbourne and what a walloping win for the canberra raiders

and ken doll how did you feel about those victories

kendoll’  well, it was great to see the swans and GWS, and the mighty raiders, well, that is a shock result

for them, and i was glancing the internet, and i saw belconnen magpies first grade side

nearly got a 200 game

sue’  yeah you were telling me back stage

kendoll’    and another thing, as i was watching the swans, the warriors beat the sharks and the cowboys beat

thje bulldogs and

sue’   yeah talking about rugby league, you promised us, you will sing the green machine song in a tu tu if they beat the titans

so why not try it

kendoll’  ok i will just get my tu tu

ken doll puts his tu tu on with a bit of a laugh

kendoll’   we’re the bad and mean green machine,

fearsome men from the ACT

don’t try and stop these men in green

or we will hit ys hit ya hit ya, till you see green

sue’  how do you feel mr kendoll

kendoll’   i feel great, UP THE RAIDERS, SWANS AND DOCKERS AND GWS, what a great performance these teams

played for us tonight

sue’  thanks kendoll and now we will go to tina dermott from casey, tina, how are you feeling tonight

tina’   i feel like singing

not a dime i cannot pay my rent

i can barely make it through the week

saturday night is party night i want to meet a girl

but right now i cannot make my ends meet

i am always working slaving every day

gotta get a break from that same old same old

i need a chance just to get away

this is what i say

i need nothing but a good time

how can i resist, i saw belconnen magpies

almost get 200, i feel really really pumped, oh yeah

sue’  yeah it was great to see the magpies get 196 points today, and it was also great to see the raiders get 56

tina’   yeah, and i just came from the sports bar, and fremantle dockers beat essendon, i feel like singing

freo, oh free heavho

free way to go, we beat the bombers easily so

free way to go, we’re the mighty fremantle dockers

free way to go, we’re the best team oh yeah we are so

free way to go, we are the free dockers

sue’  yeah go the mighty dockers and thanks tina, go the  dockers and now we have larry king jar with us

larry’  yeah sue, i feel like old 80s trash so i will sing old 80s trash

last night i was dreaming

i was locked in a prison cell

when i woke up i was screaming

calling out your name

and the judge and the the jury, put the blame on me

they won’t go for my story, they will lock me away

only you can set me free, cause i am guilty, guilty

guilty as a guy can be

dreaming yeah makes me feel so ALIVE, oh yeah

of love in the first degree

sue’  yeah, that is a wonderful song, thank you larry and now here is marcus from higgins

marcus hi sue, and i am singing my song, we’re not going to take it, the lines to get in civic nightclubs

you see we have the right to get in there

ya know party on saturday night party night yeah

i can’t understand why this line is taking so **** long

and there is some weird odour, smells like a combination of dirt and snot yeah

yeah it is the person next to me, boy does he really pong

i said i am not going to take it, i really am into breaking point

i can’t take these nightclub lines no more

my mates call me a little girlie others said i was an oldie

i can’t take these nightclub lines anymore

sue’  way to go marcus, the nightclub owners should allow heaps of people in, but then your packed in like sardines, what can we do

and our last guest is fred from gar ran

fred’  yeah, i will sing hallueiah

i hear the swans and the giants did win

and the raiders and the cowboys won

we don’t really care for losing do, us

go the mighty free ,man, and adfelaide, who are the pride of SA

yeah, this is the big moment we sing halleiah

sue’   ok dudes, i hope you enjoyed party zone tonight. if ya want to meet these people, pop round to the city club before 2 am ok

ands PARTY HARDY won’t stardy

AROUND me the images of thirty years:
An ambush; pilgrims at the water-side;
Casement upon trial, half hidden by the bars,
Guarded; Griffith staring in hysterical pride;
Kevin O'Higgins' countenance that wears
A gentle questioning look that cannot hide
A soul incapable of remorse or rest;
A revolutionary soldier kneeling to be blessed;
An Abbot or Archbishop with an upraised hand
Blessing the Tricolour.  "This is not,' I say,
"The dead Ireland of my youth, but an Ireland
The poets have imagined, terrible and gay.'
Before a woman's portrait suddenly I stand,
Beautiful and gentle in her Venetian way.
I met her all but fifty years ago
For twenty minutes in some studio.

III
Heart-smitten with emotion I Sink down,
My heart recovering with covered eyes;
Wherever I had looked I had looked upon
My permanent or impermanent images:
Augusta Gregory's son; her sister's son,
Hugh Lane, "onlie begetter' of all these;
Hazel Lavery living and dying, that tale
As though some ballad-singer had sung it all;
Mancini's portrait of Augusta Gregory,
"Greatest since Rembrandt,' according to John Synge;
A great ebullient portrait certainly;
But where is the brush that could show anything
Of all that pride and that humility?
And I am in despair that time may bring
Approved patterns of women or of men
But not that selfsame excellence again.
My mediaeval knees lack health until they bend,
But in that woman, in that household where
Honour had lived so long, all lacking found.
Childless I thought, "My children may find here
Deep-rooted things,' but never foresaw its end,
And now that end has come I have not wept;
No fox can foul the lair the badger swept --

VI
(An image out of Spenser and the common tongue).
John Synge, I and Augusta Gregory, thought
All that we did, all that we said or sang
Must come from contact with the soil, from that
Contact everything Antaeus-like grew strong.
We three alone in modern times had brought
Everything down to that sole test again,
Dream of the noble and the beggar-man.

VII
And here's John Synge himself, that rooted man,
"Forgetting human words,' a grave deep face.
You that would judge me, do not judge alone
This book or that, come to this hallowed place
Where my friends' portraits hang and look thereon;
Ireland's history in their lineaments trace;
Think where man's glory most begins and ends,
And say my glory was I had such friends.

i know of Knausgård -  sure, and i share this concerns for
the art of taking to lumber and chopping,
  as novelists tend to do, write with an axe,
philosophise with a hammer...
          metaphor turned into imagery
counter-turned into literalism...
   i once imagined him not being there -
i once wrote ich kampf, stressing
that it was an indefinite expression
of expression, primarily due to the content
of the pronoun... and i was referring also
to the definite expression (much obliged,
atheism, a- without, and the- with,
or indefinite and definite articulation) -
the English eye sees one stance as definite,
and another as indefinite, and juxtaposes
the two interacting...
                          they duly interchange...
i can say ich kampf and say i internalise
verbs: a movement of the hand,
   a strutting or a waltzing circumstance
of owning a body... that's what it's indefinite...
that's why Sartre slithered in counter to
his expanse in philosophy: because i really loved
his novels...
                          but in terms of a mein or
a mit (including me) struggle i find not
ease... no one dares to devalue ****** as a human,
not talking about the past history in purely human
terms urges the postscript of a dictator,
it actually elevates him to a godly status...
           not realising the human is to make flaws
of what the en masse does: raises him to a godly status...
     Zeus had a beard... not a Charlie Chaplin moustache...
right now he's laughing in his grave...
                      old Aldous ******...
   and aren't dictators born because people find their
surnames a little bit funny? it starts so
innocently...          and then it morphs...
   and it becomes an unstoppable morphing...
    yes... i know of a certain number of fellow
      contemporaries... because i want to? no,
because i have to. like rewatching the 2015 film
android - some films you have to rewatch...
   what's being debated? autism and artificial intelligence...
   hyperactive autism, i grant you that...
        it dawned on me... at autistic person could
fake a normal human response treating it as
      artificial... artificial also means mimicked -
  it means that "smart" guy at a bar reciting poetry
he hasn't written... artificial intelligence or the study of it
or even creating it has nothing original about it...
it's not groundbreaking in the same sense that
discovering champagne or penicillin is...
or l.s.d., because these examples have the magic of
being discovered by chance... humanity has been
artificially simulating intelligence since time
immemorial... it's that natural consequence of not being
endowed with a peacock's array of feathers
   to create a soothing, and sickly gentle wind of a woman
resting in a hammock under the shade of a palm tree...
artificial intelligence was inherent in us...
       it's the unravelling of the historical noumenon of man,
the per se that has only crept up on us,
   and before the reality of such a foundation being
established... the humanities create the "prophetic"
citations of it being true: in the "near" / impeding future.
    if god is a noumenon, then man cannot be a
phenomenon... but he is and paradoxically the two
of mutually compatible on a basis of exclusive rather than
an inclusive naturalisation...
               we are talking nature:
  we are talking god naturalised by the medium
suggesting: for i am bound to create obstacles and test
the body, rather than the mind of man...
    as so is man, also naturalised by the medium
of the elements, saying: for i am bound by a body,
   and have to utilise the body first, to overcome the wind
and the snow and the furthermore, until i reach
the labyrinth of the mind...
  and man has done just that, he has bypassed the struggles
of the body, and created entertainment using
the body that once struggled against the elements...
   for he has created the god Minotaur: and the psychic
labyrinthe... as with the Titans whom the gods
usurped, so too comes the twilight of the gods...
but being usurped by demigods...
       Minotaur was a demigod... who usurped the gods
of the trinity that were Zeus, Poseidon and Hades...
        for only the Greeks could create a Judaic bewilderment
as to why a sign was given unto an infant...
           but that's getting technical...
the film, android (2015)? it supports the misconception,
the anguish of a highly functioning autism...
      whereby showing a woman's carelessness in the realm
of adaptability with what some would claim to be
the beginning point of: overcoming the elements...
sure the odd tsunami and earthquake...
   but there's also the tiger, and winter, and parasite,
   and diseases of so many variations...
              man has not been endowed with complete
control over his surrounding... but in becoming partially
overlord of the ones tamed, he has created a mental
labyrinth... a world of such complexity that will
inevitably produce instances of autistic genius...
                 artificial intelligence is already imbedded in us,
just as cloning and Islam has already existed
(Christianity is too schismatic to be considered a cloning
definition... and Judaism as a monotheistic principle
has a heresy embedded in its orthodoxy that it simply
ignores: reincarnation... the Malachi heresy...
  that a second Elijah comes... and god becomes a half)...
   we see artificial intelligence everywhere...
        if the myth goes that woman fed man the original
lie of Eden... then man has nothing else to do than
attempt to polymer that one single lie...
       and repeat it... a reverse intrusion to what "could"
have been an utopian splendour.
      we all see artificial intelligence rummaging about
in the choices people make... it's called lying
   to gain access to a ****** gratification...
  or as i like to call it: a way to compensate our falling short
of the norm, a norm that focuses upon creating
   the most complex startup a Silicon Valley genius
can't comprehend... a family.
    these times prescribe such a bewilderment...
              families are artefacts of what some believe
precipitated into barbarity so close to us: the 20th century...
        and all those arguments you hear that might
discourage the opposite ***, as in damning your parents
for a piece of seashore **** fest of the *****?
   probably came from a person born from a surrogate
mother... well... an incubator, a very expensive *****...
   homsexuality created the evolution of prostitution,
once bound to the genitals... now bound to the womb...
     i.v.f. kids calling natural kids ******...
   i never liked the matrix movies in all honest...
but we're seeing the reversal of the original idea...
                 in the matrix of knowledge... hearts become
piñata: chockies sweet, sensations abundant,
  the spectrum is yours.
                but this poem isn't really about that...
i can sip a whiskey and actually find these things when
i start to utilise these symbols... it sometimes happens
that they fall through... all i was really thinking about
is the "theoretical" score of 147...
                      i'll call them billiards rather than *****
to excuse a "he-he" Michael Jackson laugh at a chance
of "nuance"...
       yellow (2), green (3), brown (4), blue (5), pink (6), black (7)...
and plenty of red (1)... points in bracket respectively...
                  of course from childhood memory i sided with
ronnie... also from Romford... an obscure town in Essex
that oversees the shard and canary wharf from
a distance...                    but watching snooker as a child...
          not too bad at pub-snooker: i.e. pool...
and that game show when snooker was hot back in
the 1990s... big break, with jim davidson as host...
    and of course: john virgo as the rejuvenated
                         ghost of alex higgins... this whiskey
swiggly is on me al.
                 but this final... ****! at one point it was
a century after a century...
                     chess with mathematics, trigonometry
and Pythagoras in motion...
                                    the gods playing with saturn
and jupiter neptune planetary arrangements...
            i can't word it properly... but it'll definitely sound
better than a concussion after too much rugby and
the rough-stuff of "manhood" strutting with bulging
muscle tensions... rather than this Japanese warrior-monk
in a waistcoat and bow-tie swirling a stick in the air...
           i just thought of one thing...
15 wildebeests on an African savannah...
       out comes one lioness...
    and she nibbles at the pack... and she picks off
the weakest of the 15 wildebeests...
              she nibbles the pack before the pack breaks away...
         she looks left (red) and then looks right (yellow,
green, brown, blue, pink, black) -
                      and she picks at the pack, one by one
they fall... but there are two games going on...
   there's the no-man's land snooker where the game is
about entrenchment, and snookering the opponent
for a foul... and then there's the tsunami snooker...
which kinda looks like one person playing chess...
     with no opponent other than a chance mistake...
misjudgement on the case of instinct and how they ******
well know what angle to fudge the white lioness
                onto the billards... and with what force...
      tsunami snooker, or cascade snooker is basically
a monologue...
                             after seeing 3 centuries in a row
you get to crave classical snook -
                                       the mind games of safety shots...
   and teasing, and tempting, and teasing, and tempting,
before the Rubic cube unravels itself,
   and you find that light at the end of the tunnel...
                        and the black pops into...
i'll be honest, i haven't watched snooker for a long time...
        maybe that's why i feel so enthusiastic about it...
       it's sometimes good to be fed this mundane diet
of sport-fanaticism that football is in accordance with
religious dogma... it's a good thing...
             then you end up watching a game of snooker
and all these things start firing up your brain...
   and you end up saying:
      the Taj Mahal can be there for all i care...
the Grand Canyon can be there for all i care...
                    such things don't really require a photograph
with my gimp-face trying to make other people jealous
by actually being there: only to take a photograph,
rather than feed into the air and the thrill of being there...
        as they say... it's a small world after all...
better get used to it being much bigger inside your head.

me and my drinking? no... in the next sandpit with christ saving all the retards so heath ledger can **** himself, because the best defence people have against their ****** escapades are a bunch of retards limbless, a crucifix, and the modern trend of premature depression with nothing accomplished and the torture of the immobile christ only trying to provide moloch babies ****** herders: while the rich worry about lip-gloss and gucci spectacles of torn shirts that cost a mammon's tonne but were lighter than an autumnal leaf: yeah, blame the retards on sane people's *** mistakes for saint ******. your choices obstruct my will: fated loathing is my compromise; and by god i hate to be a moraliser.*

i drink to excess when a populist
wants to speak,
and poetry becomes just
another art of the privileged
and i become simply ***,
god give me a life where i don't want
to write, a night without national socialism
and global capitalism:
where's the next competition, mars?!
i used to like playing silverchair's shade
with my guitar, my guitar became an acoustic
5 string rhythm which was hardly a bass...
so i stopped playing...
it's talk about moral darwinism when
a tsunami or a tornado has no darwinism involved:
force of nature, some theories had to fail.
i'm more accepting a retired drunk footballer in me
or an alex hurricane higgins in me that
i wish to delve into poetics:
when the next informal figure of speech
to buy an iron or a jumper? when? oh, never...
never?! ****.
***** acting killed off *** of the usual people,
i knew on the basis of numbering fake *******
that switched sides....
they call objectivity superior to subjectivity...
but in relation subjectivity comes from having
a talk about it, not automatons disposing it...
have talk about ******* and all you can think
of in your little nerd brain is the foreseeable pay-rise
of garbage men... hence?
subjectivity comes from overbearing certain objects
for rhetorical purposes...
and leaving other objects automatically based
like sewage...
objectivity says: this many objects exist
but i don't talk about most of them...
subjectivity says: this many subjects exist
but i dare not see most of them as related to
a specified object for argument that's nonetheless there:
acronym tangle of being relevant, otherwise not...
politics... in rhetorical terms there's a superiority of
one against the other...
i see a fern... can i explore it subjectively? no.
can i explore the fern objectively? yes....
there's a tree next to it...
how does that make feel? it makes me feel like:
i exist, i think, therefore i philosophise by faked doubting
like a woman faking ******... mind that:
men are more nautically optical when it comes to pleasure,
women close their eyes when *******,
they internalise what's otherwise exposed masculine
genitalia forced like a beauty hernia -
male eroticism is optic, female eroticism zeniths are
internalised for the bred fact of being both vaginal
and womb, so scary the eroticism dies when
the foetus replaces the post-virginity fancy of the phallus;
but still the ****** actresses that destroy marriages,
but none can destroy the joke:
lips got the treatment of balloon augmentation
and clitoral lips got islam: the former puffed up
and the latter got the snip-factor for less oral ***.
now will you please play me the arabic trombone?!

The Raiders show raiders v st george at GIO Stadium

    with johnny brown and Sue Longways




johnny’   welcome dudes to GIO stadium to this match between the dragons and the raiders and this is going to be a

great match, the raiders are 11th and the dragons are at 14, and whoever wins, I can guarantee it will be a spectacle

and i have Pete from Hawker with us now with a poem for us, hoping to get the Raiders into top swing

Pete”    ok dudes let’s swing it

you see the bad and mean green machine, big and strong and fast and mean

you see you shouldn’t try and stop these men in green, cause we are 3 positions higher than the opposition

Johnny’  well, short but sweet, and have you been worried about form in some matches

Pete’   well, yes, but that makes no difference, the raiders are going to win dudes, i will sing it again

you see we are the bad and mean green machine, big and strong and fast and mean

you see you shouldn’t try and stop these men in green, cause we are 3 positions higher than the opposition

Johnny’   well thanks Pete and now here is Sue Longways with another fine poem from the crowd

Sue’   thanks Johnny and what a great atmosphere here at GIO Stadium today, a great twilight match, and everyone

is in fine voice to cheer the raiders to beat the dragons tonight, and here is John Barten from Queanbeyan and he hates

how the Raiders went to Canberra all those years ago, so he sings a dragons tune

John’   go the dragons go the dragons

go the mighty dragons team

you see it’s only early in the season

go the mighty dragons cause the raiders moved here

I know we shouldn’t hold a grudge, mate, but i am and there is nothing you can do oh no

go the mighty dragons and i will go for them till the Raiders go back to Seiffert Oval, dudes

Sue”   thanks John and now here is Harold from Lyneham

Harold’   i am the bad and mean raiders fan

we supply the best coming out of the can

you see i go to the footy with mates george and dan

you see we’ll hit ya hit ya hit ya the mighty green machine

Sue’  thanks Harold and now here is the Raiders team, bring on the team

Jordan Rapana and Sisa Waqa and Jarrod Croker and Jarrad kennedy and edrick lee and blake austin and Mitchell Cornish


and Shannon Boyd and Josh Hodgson and Dane Tilse and Josh Papali and Sia Solicia and Shaun Fensom

and the 4 interchange players  Josh McRone and Frank-Paul Nuuausala and Paul Vaughan and Luke Bateman

and now here is Ken from Symonston with his poem

Ken”   i have been coming out to the GIO stadium every time we play

you see it’s fun when we win, but when we lose, we certainly do ****** pay

and the main thing about it is, we beat the easy teams and beat the hard teams but never at the best time

come on Raiders, it’s surely the time to win, oh ****** yeah


sue”   thanks Ken and now here is Rob with his jingle

Rob”     Run Raiders run

as we charge onto the GIO stadium yeah

run raiders run you see we have the team, we’ll win oh yeah

yeah we will come a running, and score a hundred tries

yeah that will be so cool,

run raiders run, oh yeah the Raiders are the team to beat i hope

run raiders run

they are the team that will thrash the opposition yeah

you see we won one and lost one

run raiders run

yeah the mighty raiders, will be our son of a gun

Sue”    thanks Rob for that and now here is the dragons team


first is Peter Mata’utia and Etonia Nabuli and Dan Nielson and Dylan Farrell and Jason Nightingale

and gareth Widdop and Benji Marshall and Leeson Ah Mau and Mitch Rein and George Rose

and Tyson Frizell and Joel Thompson and Jack de Belin

and the interchange men are trent Merrin and Heath L”Estrange and Rory O’Brien and Mike Cooper and Jake Marketo

and here is Mike from Jerrabomberra with his jingle

oh yeah those dragons yeah, they win more than the raiders yeah

they supply all the tries, in fact more tries than the locals, why don’t they win the grand

well i think i know, it’s because we lose our playing ability after thrashing the raiders here and anywhere

so go the dragons, go the mighty dragons, the right team to win the match

sue’   ok thanks Mike and now here is Keith from Latham with his song

carn the carn the carn the mighty raiders team, please dudes don’t make us say **** mate

make our raiders team win, carn the raiders carn the raiders, watch our team win well

on our home ground see, go the mighty raiders for a great victory

ya see i live in Latham and in my lounge room i have raiders cushions and raiders tables and heaps

of videos too including the great grand final victories in ’89 and “91 and the great ‘94

they haven’t won a grand final since in the first grade oh no

but if they win a few games where they don’t drop the ball too much

they will play so ****** hard, GO THE RAIDERS, DUDES

Sue’   ok that is it for me, and now back to Johnny

Johnny”  thanks Sue for telling us the teams and letting us hear some great home truths, let’s hope the

Raiders can win tonight, and now here is ?Bob from Cook with a jingle

Bob’   go the raiders go the raiders, do ya reckon we have the stamminer to win today

go the raiders go the raiders, should we win, should we win

twinkle twinkle raiders pack, how i wonder whether you’ll win

up above the GIO park tonight, make sure we clean this game free of fights

twinkle twinkle raiders pack, go the raiders through and through

Johnny’ thanks Bob and now here is Ernie from Higgins with his rhyme

hey ****** ****** the dragons are ready, are they going to win

all have the raiders put all their dropping the ball crap in the flaming bin

Shaun Fensom laughed at this little rhyme, as hopefully the raiders grab the 2 points

Johnny’  thanks Ernie and first my tip, well to the ladder, i say Raiders, on current form, well raiders be 6, could be more

and who do you support Sue

Sue’    well to the ladder, the Raiders, but on current form, dragons by 2, but i could change

Johnny”   ok, we’ll be back at half time, ok, here on the Raiders show

GO THE CANBERRA RAIDERS

NO. 31 O'HIGGINS ROAD, CURRAGH CAMP, CO. KILDARE.

I climb a stair
that isn't there
stand on a landing

in mid-air
each step I take
creates the next part

of the vanished
house
lost to time

as see through
as a cartoon
ghost

this was
(still is)
for me

No. 31 O'Higgins Road
my world
the universe of me

what was once
my bedroom...
is now a cloud

a window
become
a moon

night and its storm
sit in
our living room

a bird tiptoes
down the stair
flying through

nine year old me
reaching for
the light switch

to turn on
what isn't
there

Above the beaches of Normandy
In ordered rows they lie.
They came to fight for freedom,
And for that many had to die.
They also lie in rows in Libya,
In Italy and Greece
The soldiers of democracy
Who died fighting for the release
Of millions locked in a tyranny
Oppressed by an evil mind
They died so that enlightenment
Could guide the future of mankind.
And in the East many more
Monuments stand in memory
Of the many millions of bravehearts
Who died in the fight to be,
Rid of the monstrous evil gang
And their racist and murderous ideaology,
Which planned genocide for these people
In order to steal their whole country.
And here we are almost seventy years
Since the end of that terrible war
Looking at election results which ask
What was all that dying for?
People in free democracies purchased
With those millions of victims blood
Have voted for the same ideaology
That will trample in the mud
All the freedoms for which they fought
And for which they gave their lives
It is as if history has never been taught
And that sheer ignorance above all else,thrives.

Tom Higgins 27/05/2014

In Flanders fields the poppies blow,
Between the crosses, row on row'.
So wrote the poet John McCrae,
Recording the reality of his day.
Now after ninety four years have gone,
The use of the poppy has now moved on.
Instead of remembrance of the brave,
It sends addicted millions to an early grave,
And today our young troops fight and die,
Without anyone asking the real question, why?

In Helmand's fields the poppies blow,
Beside the compounds where they grow,
Surrounded by hidden IED's,
Planted to **** and maim with ease,
The brave young men sent on patrol,
Hoping they return alive and whole,
As they risk all to do their duty,
The poppy crop provides illicit *****,
That funds the continuation of this war,
In which no one can say what we're fighting for!

Tom Higgins 12/11/2012

I

Under the Great Comedian's tomb the crowd.
A bundle of tempestuous cloud is blown
About the sky; where that is clear of cloud
Brightness remains; a brighter star shoots down;
What shudders run through all that animal blood?
What is this sacrifice? Can someone there
Recall the Cretan barb that pierced a star?

Rich foliage that the starlight glittered through,
A frenzied crowd, and where the branches sprang
A beautiful seated boy; a sacred bow;
A woman, and an arrow on a string;
A pierced boy, image of a star laid low.
That woman, the Great Mother imaging,
Cut out his heart.  Some master of design
Stamped boy and tree upon Sicilian coin.

An age is the reversal of an age:
When strangers murdered Emmet, Fitzgerald, Tone,
We lived like men that watch a painted stage.
What matter for the scene, the scene once gone:
It had not touched our lives.  But popular rage,
Hysterica passio dragged this quarry down.
None shared our guilt; nor did we play a part
Upon a painted stage when we devoured his heart.

Come, fix upon me that accusing eye.
I thirst for accusation.  All that was sung.
All that was said in Ireland is a lie
Bred out of the c-ontagion of the throng,
Saving the rhyme rats hear before they die.
Leave nothing but the nothingS that belong
To this bare soul, let all men judge that can
Whether it be an animal or a man.

                II

The rest I pass, one sentence I unsay.
Had de Valera eaten parnell's heart
No loose-lipped demagogue had won the day.
No civil rancour torn the land apart.

Had Cosgrave eaten parnell's heart, the land's
Imagination had been satisfied,
Or lacking that, government in such hands.
O'Higgins its sole statesman had not died.

Had even O'Duffy--but I name no more--
Their school a crowd, his master solitude;
Through Jonathan Swift's clark grove he passed, and there
plucked bitter wisdom that enriched his blood.

THERE is something terrible
about a hurdy-gurdy,
a gipsy man and woman,
and a monkey in red flannel
all stopping in front of a big house
with a sign "For Rent" on the door
and the blinds hanging loose
and nobody home.
I never saw this.
I hope to God I never will.
  
  Whoop-de-doodle-de-doo.
  Hoodle-de-harr-de-hum.
Nobody home? Everybody home.
  Whoop-de-doodle-de-doo.
  
Mamie Riley married Jimmy Higgins last night: Eddie Jones died of whooping cough: George Hacks got a job on the police force: the Rosenheims bought a brass bed: Lena Hart giggled at a jackie: a pushcart man called tomaytoes, tomaytoes.
  Whoop-de-doodle-de-doo.
  Hoodle-de-harr-de-hum.
    Nobody home? Everybody home.

Basil is a fruit bat
Who flies through the trees,
And flying is what fruit bats do
With the most consumate ease,

He flies until he comes to
The place he's looking for
Where the figs grow in abundance
And he feasts till he can feast no more.

Now I wonder what then happens
When nature's functions call
And when he's hanging upside down,
Where does his wee and poo all fall?

Tom Higgins 12/05/2014

Snow White, she once took
seven little men to bed.
She only ever did it once,
at least that's what she said.
Now of these seven
six of them were not known as happy,
and another of them, normally,
well he was rather snappy.
So she thought what might work,
would be good old rumpy, pumpy,
guaranteed to cheer up
even that little old sod Grumpy.
The next morning the change in them
was really quite dramatic.
Even old Grumpy had changed his name,
he said ' just call me Mr Ecstatic.'

Tom Higgins

Francis Bacon was a pig
He grew to be very big
And when he reached his maximum
The man from the butcher's then did come,
And hit him very ******* the head
And Francis Bacon was then dead.
The man then proceeded to
Chop him up, first into two,
Then he merrily carried on
Till what had been Francis was all gone.
He was now like a meaty jigsaw puzzle
From his tail to his snouty snuzzle,
Ham, pork and bacon he'd become
Joints,and chops, and also some,
Big pork sausages hung in loops,
And his bones were boiled to make soups,
Then the bones were sent off to,
A factory where they made glue,
So if a moral to this tale you seek -
"You can eat all of a pig except its squeak."

Tom Higgins 15/05/2015

REVISITING NO. 31 O'HIGGINS ROAD,
CURRAGH CAMP, CO. KILDARE

Time, that great
wind blew

away all the windows
doors and walls

of the home where
I had learnt to read

until now no house
exists at all.

Only the empty space
that a bird flies through.

I keep the roof
over my head

just to spite time
the one I drew with crayon

it still persists
in the child's mind.

My short-sighted dyslexic eye
can still see such things

a herd of brontosauri
moving from sentence to sentence

across a wilderness
of pages.

My finger tracing the sound
of a name

R.M. Ballantyne
my mouth trying to do the same.

Time too has taken
away the boy

and by some strange alchemy
made me an old man.

But the child's mind
laughs at this trick

the mere aging
of flesh.

The child that
cannot die.

The house that doesn't exist
except for my crayoned purple roof

and a name I still like
to sound.

"Come words!" I command them
as they gather me

hold me like flowers
held in a hand.

The herd of brontosauri
moving now from

one page
to the next.

I just heard it on the news
That the votes of those
With narrow minded views
Have gained for those people
For who they vote
A large hand around
The "European's" throat,
And that this selection
Has led to the return
Of ideas that caused
Europe to burn.
The hatred and xenophobia
That I thought forever
Gone from here
Has once more reared
It's mindless head,
How many this time
Will wind up dead?
Because of the choices
People make
Having listened to voices
That will take
Millions into misery and war
Do they understand
What they voted for?

Tom Higgins 25/05/2014

i. Arc.tic Eur.ope mark.ings wo.ven to lea.ves –

8 Salix Boloria nails whisper the
rocky, submarginal dark –

triangles of Alberta and most wide –
arctic willow (except, occasionally,
other spots of Discal cell) Numero Uno, we've parallel branch
( n. )
with basal spot
invaded by the darker
adjacent colors or silvery white;



























ii. Fo.od pl.ants l.ight Ka.nsa.s


defined Oakland or the apex clasp
inner face of Valva
Texola Higgins. Food?

Brooded multiple orange
various species, obsolete cells

Yellowed cast; transverse lines..............(...)
9 Chlosyne wings; dark Maculation
Virginia portion

























iii. re.d ex.tend.ing


multiple orange (except Vesta Millicta)
Athalia Ambigua

Callophrys south
brooded flowers
connected wing

tooth like line
but central gray
new Juniperus

Water, as most of you will know,
Has the chemical formula H2O.
Now this essential liquid is, as well,
In its natural form devoid of smell,

And also in its pure state
It's clear and clean and really great,
For keeping living things alive,
As without it nothing can survive.

Yes it really is such magic stuff,
Because without it things are really tough,
And it often makes me stop and think
Each time I pour myself a drink.

What would I do if it all dried up?
Turn on the tap, but an empty cup.
Nothing from the pipes emanating,
Panic, as I'm not used to waiting.

This is not how it is for me
I live where rain falls frequently,
And I can drink, shower and bathe too
As often as I'm wanting to.

But in other parts it rains only rarely,
And people there, well they can barely
Find enough water for their needs,
To drink, to wash, to nurture seeds.

For them life is infinitely harder
They've learned to live with an empty larder,
And simple hygiene is so hard to achieve
When the detritus of living, they have to leave,

Lying, rotting, stinking on the surface all around
Polluting any water source in the ground.
Because of the extreme poverty of these 'others',
On my TV screen I have seen the faces of the mothers,

Whose children died because there has never been
Access to water which is drinkable and clean.
Yes, something that we take for granted,
Because we were born, where we were planted!

Tom Higgins

REVISITING NO. 31 O'HIGGINS ROAD

Time, that great
wind blew

away all the windows
doors and walls

of the home where
I had learnt to read

until now no house
exists at all.

Only the empty space
that a bird flies through.

I keep the roof
over my head

just to spite time
the one I drew with crayon

it still persists
in the child's mind.

My short -sighted disxyleic eye
can still see such things

a herd of brontosauri
moving from sentence to sentence

across a wilderness
of pages.

My finger tracing the sound
of a name

R.M. Ballantyne
my mouth trying to do the same.

Time too has taken
away the boy

and by some strange alchemy
made me an old man.

But the child's mind
laughs at this trick

the mere aging
of flesh.

The child that
cannot die.

The house that doesn't exist
except for my crayoned purple roof

and a name I still like
to sound.

"Come words!" I command them
as they gather me

hold me like flowers
held in a hand.

The herd of brontosauri
moving now from

one page
to the next.

The cowards came in the night
All were heavily armed,
To ****** and burn and kidnap,
But not one of them was harmed.

They always make sure their victim
Has no means of self defence
That is how they operate
And to them its just common sense.

Why would they pick on someone
Who is able to easily fight back
Because they are armed and trained
To beat them if they dared attack?

No, not for them the hard fight
With men who are trained to ****,
They prefer to attack little girls
And take them against their will.

So these hard men of the group
Which calls itself Boko Haram
Tell me in what do you really believe,
Because your actions are not of Islam.

Tom Higgins 14/05/2014

If you give a man a fish,
He will feed his family for a day,
But if you teach him how to fish
He will feed his family until the day
The fish have all been spirited away
By the massive fleets he can see
On the horizon of his country's sea,
And now his family's nutritional need
That up to now he could feed
Has been overridden by corporate greed.
Then the nations whose fishing fleets
Take away the fish he eats
All become very irate
When he's forced to be a pirate.

Tom Higgins 23/05/2014

Big bang happened, time began,
Now here we are, the sons of man,
Discussing whether a supreme being,
Of such might and wisdom all seeing,
Could possibly be around before,
Any time existed, and what's more,
Could pick a tiny isolated planet,
And with a vast array of zoology, man it!
Now that is more than incredible,
If it was pie it would be inedible.
The thought that out of billions of galaxies,
He chose one tiny planet for the people he's,
Made in his own likeness to do his bidding,
No really he must have just been kidding,
And out there among those trillions of stars
There are billions more Earth's, where there are,
Trillions more like you and me,
Discussing how they came to be!

Tom Higgins 18/10/2012

There is so much information all around,
And pearls of wisdom can be found
Everywhere on this internet,
But with all my seeking I have not yet
Found the source, she is such an elusive girl
That fount of all knowledge the Mother of Pearl !

Tom Higgins

All aboard this ship of fools,
all aboard she's sailing,
all aboard this ship of fools,
for we are going a' whaling.

From the harbour our course we keep,
for the distant Antarctic water,
to find the leviathans of the deep,
and begin our ****** slaughter.

All aboard this ship of fools,
all aboard she's sailing,
all aboard this ship of fools,
for we are going a' whaling.

We say there is a scientific need,
to study these magnificent beings
we harpoon them, and watch them bleed,
as before our ship they're fleeing.

All aboard this ship of fools,
all aboard she's sailing,
all aboard this ship of fools,
for we are going a' whaling.

And still our leaders, they entreat
that we do this for the good of science,
but really it is for their meat,
that we **** these gentle giants

All aboard this ship of fools,
all aboard she's sailing,
all aboard this ship of fools,
for we are going a' whaling.

Tom Higgins.

I have always had an interest in
Interests I find interesting.
Interesting interests of the kind
That stimulate the interest of my mind.
And when an interest, of interest interests me,
I stay interested in it permanently
So an interesting time I have had,
Because having so many interests drives me mad.
I’ve never had an interest in just one thing,
That’s never been sufficiently interesting.
For I find interesting interests everywhere
That my interested eyes care to stare,
Or my interested ears care to listen
I find the interesting gems that sing and glisten.

Tom Higgins 08/03/2014

The day is grey, the clouds hang low, and, in the air, a winter chill.
Upon the beach called Omaha an old soldier stands; a promise to fulfill.
Full Seventy years ago this man, weighted down with gear and kit,
raced across this wet grey sand, and, by some miracle, remained unhit.
Friends who’d survived that longest day, and all the long days after it,
had purchased the bottle held in his hands. As the last man standing
he had charge of it:

His eyes, watery from the wind, Looked at the bottle in his hands:
A Dom Perignon Brut Champagne, the 47’ vintage year.
He thought about his comrades gone. Surely they were heroes all
Who spilled out from the Higgins boats to breach the ***’s Atlantic wall.
He felt the presence of the ghosts, all those who fell upon this shore.
Boys, really, almost all eighteen, who’d died
answering Freedom’s call .

He tore the foil with old gnarled hands; His Arthritis made a chore of this.
Thin wire held the cork in place and was so difficult to untwist.
Once free his placed his thumbs upon the curved underbelly of the cork
The cork shot free across the sand and bubbly foam
chased after it.

He was not a religious man, it seemed impious for him to pray
Though he recalled so many had, that day they bled their lives away.
How best to honor these fallen men? Who had pledged their lives, each to each.
It was then he turned the bottle down and poured the contents
on the beach.


Some would declare it sacrilege to let that vintage go to waste.
The old soldier smiled and felt at peace.
He’d seen the vintage of 26’ poured out in buckets
In this very place..

It All Began With A Bang.

Now here's something to make you sing
To make your heartstrings twang,
It is a story of young love,
That started with a bang.
Now by "a bang" I don't mean
What a lot of you are thinking,
I simply mean it started well
One night when Fred was out drinking.

He was in his local rub a dub dub,
"The Coney's Burrow" was its name,
And a lot of blokes who used the pub
Simply went to have a game
Of dominoes or darts or cards,
Whatever took their fancy,
Or chatting up the landlord's wife,
A brassy blonde called Nancy.

Other girls were rarely seen
To enter into the place
It was in a tiny little village
Hidden from the rest of our race.
It was in a time when history
Was being written in the skies
By lots of warring aeroplanes
Buzzing round like flies,

A time when most young men and girls
Were all away doing their bit,
But poor young Fred was left behind,
They said he lacked the wit.
But he was fine behind a plough
On his family's farm
Where he could help win the war,
Without coming to any harm.

So time passed by so slow for Fred
Each day merging with another
He wished he could meet a nice girl
With a smile just like his mother
He did not want to live all his life
Ploughing a lonely furrow
He wanted to find himself a wife
That's why he went to the "Burrow".

One Friday night whilst having a pint
There was a roaring from outside
They all rushed out to see what it was,
And poor Fred nearly died,
A great big Heinkel bomber
was falling injured from the sky
trailing smoke and flames behind
As it spiralled down to die.

It crashed into a farmhouse
On the far side of the wood
And everyone ran to see
If they could do anyone any good.
The scene which lay in front of them
Was one of sheer destruction
And there was no one there just then
To give orders or instructions,

So Fred he took it on himself,
No one told him what to do,
To run into the flaming ruins
His instincts told him to.
He ran up some stairs where he heard
A cry for help from in a room
He crashed through the door and looked around,
And in the flickering smokey gloom,

The little cry he heard again
This time it sounded more manic
He shouted "I am here for you,
You'll be fine so please don't panic."
And then he saw smallish hand
Waving from under a bed
He reached down and grabbed hold of it and
The sweet little voice then said,

"Oh thank you , thank you you brave soul
You risked your life for me,
If you'd not come in through the fire
Then pretty soon I'd be
In a situation much more dire
Than the one I now can see."
" We must go now he said to her,
Quickly we must flee,

If we are to live another day
Then like lightning we must be."
He picked her up and carried her
Out from that smoke filled room
Onto and down the burning stair
Then through flames and scenes of doom,
Out into the crisp cool air
Of the English Autumn night

And he set her down upon the ground
And was astonished by the sight,
This vision of beauty it did astound,
He stood rooted to the spot
He stammered "y you'll bbbe alright now."
And that's as far as he got
She put her finger to his lips
And gently she said "shush

We have all our lives in front of us
So there's no need to rush."
They were married in the village church
Six months after their fateful meeting
The crowds came from miles around
And the guests filled all the seating
Standing room outside many more found
Was the order of the day,

And the vicar blessed and the choir sang
And everyone knelt to pray
That this union would last and never end
Until their final day.
That is how the story ends
They remained in love for life,
And Fred always thanked that bomber
For finding him a wife.

Tom Higgins 05/05/2014

I'm twenty three and just back from their war
With no idea what I've been fighting for.
I've not been myself since I got back
Trying to live within a panic attack.

I know one thing for sure, that my family
Always have, and always will love me,
And I know that they can see that I
Have become a totally different guy

To the happy young man I used to be
Before I saw the things I came to see,
But no matter what they do or say
I still look with dread on each new day

Since my best mate died in Afghanistan
Blown to bits by the Taliban.
"Bad luck" they said that he had to die.
I've never let anyone seee me cry,

That isn't how a soldier behaves
No matter how many go to early graves.
So now here I stand, mentally torn
Wishing that I had never been born

Into this cruel, unthinking world
Where every time the flags are unfurled,
The politicians spout more lies which we swallow
Then we flock together as we follow

These Judas goats who lead the sheep
To slaughter and everlasting sleep.
Inside I feel I have reached the stage
Where the fires of hurt have begun to rage

Against what is left in me to fight the pain
Do I want to face this all again?
Another day with my best mate gone
Do I really want to linger on

Asking every time I awake
Why was it him not me they had to take?
I just feel I can no longer cope
Does the answer lie in this length of rope?

Tom Higgins 16/08/2013

I remember dad sitting and reading
each evening after dinner
once he and me had washed up in the galley kitchen.

After, I remember him stripping down to the waist
and body washing at the sink, then completing
his evening shave.

I remember his big old badger shaving brush
and a shaving mug refilled with Old Spice.

I remember the odour, filling the kitchen
and sticking to him.

But mostly I remember him in his white vest
in the brown armchair under the warm standard lamp,
feet up by the fire, reading his books.

Wilbur Smith.
Alastair MacLean.
Jack Higgins.

The Sound of Thunder.
Ice Station Zebra.
Wrath Of The Lion.

Always a hardback. Always a loaner
from the regular family trips
to the woods and the library.

Always sitting in his heady mix
of Old Spice, Brylcreem and St Bruno,
reading and relishing the opportunity
to pass the book on to me
telling me of his envy of my first read
of the adventure he’d just finished.