NaPoWriMo Day 8 - Coal not Dole

In Today's Issue

NaPoWriMo Day 8
Coal
Coale Not Dole
That's Amaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaazing
Random Joke
Freebie
Finish with a Song

NaPoWriMo, or National Poetry Writing Month, is an annual project in which participating

 poets attempt to write a poem a day for the month of April.

Maureen Thorson, a poet and publisher of Big Game Books announced the project March 17, 2003 as an 

online project on her blog. She invited other poets with blogs to join her in the project and listed

the participating poets. Thorson has continued to run the project each year on her blog with more 

poets participating as the word has spread about the project.

If you want more information the please visit the site :-

http://www.napowrimo.net

COAL

I work in the dark, deep underground

I toil in the muck where all light is drowned

In the dirt and the dust

I hack and I pick.

Shovel and crawl

My blood it runs thick

My skin eats the dirt

Tattooed with coal

The carbon that eats

Right down to my soul

But now it’s all gone

On a political whim

We import our power

From some pseudonym

The men were so proud

To toil for their pay

To ensure we had the means

To turn night into day

They worked underground they worked in their sweat

We owed them more, forever in debt

The 1984 Miners' Strike was a last attempt by the mining unions to stop mining closures and the loss of jobs.

The biggest strike in the post-war era (at its height, 142,000 mineworkers were involved), it was also one of the bitterest industrial disputes in British history

The strike ended on 3 March 1985 with the NUM having failed to achieve concessions from the government

In March 1984 more than 187,000 miners came out on strike when the National Coal Board announced that 20 pits in England would have to close with the loss of 20,000 jobs.

It was the start of one of the most confrontational strikes ever seen, marred by picket line violence and clashes between police and miners.

Miners in Nottinghamshire, Derbyshire and Leicestershire eventually followed Yorkshire pits and came out on strike. 

But some miners continued to work and were branded as "scabs" by their colleagues when they crossed picket lines.

The Government branded the striking miners as "the enemy within".

When the strike ended 12 months later, it was estimated that the total cost had been £3 billion.

Over 11,000 people had been arrested, and around 5,000 miners stood trial for a variety of offences.

Many of the threatened closures took place in 1992.

Mining communities throughout the country were scarred, and many never fully recovered.

It was the end of the industry that had once been the backbone of industrial Britain.

Collapse of an industry

In 1984 there were 170 collieries in Britain, employing more than 190,000 people.

The last deep coal mine closed, in Yorkshire, in 2015.

The record for filling a 508 kg (0.5 ton) hopper with coal using a banjo shovel by a team of two is 14.8 seconds, by Brian Coghlan and Piet Groot (both New Zealand) at the opening of the Brunner Bridge, South Island, New Zealand, on 27 March 2004.

If you think about it, your belly button is your old mouth.

Free Audio Story

My short story - Thyme For Love was broadcasted on Sheffield Radio on Friday.
I have obtained a copy of the sound file.

It can be downloaded free at :-

http://www.filefactory.com/file/bz5tiaracp9/AUD-20180119-WA0000.mp3

(Simply paste into your browser)

This story is available in my latest book :-


Tales of The Unaccepted

YOU CAN GET THIS BOOK ON AMAZON, KOBO OR BARNES NOBLE.

HERE IS THE LINK TO AMAZON

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Tales-Unaccepted-Mr-Neville-Raper/dp/1548896446/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1501014922&sr=8-1&keywords=neville+raper

FINISH WITH A SONG

This is 

Loretta Lynn - Coal Miner's Daughter