Tuesday, March 28, 2006

Gloves?

Left lying empty in the streets, these gloves –
Limp as weak ladies wobbly legs, limper.

Some abandoned by babies, hurled from the
Pram in gurgling play, mum doesn’t notice
And they roll on, leaving the shed skin of
A tiny hand, lying limp and alone.

But longer, more sinuous quintets do
Leave their digital coats behind too
Suffering, no doubt, from cold and wet hands
In the winter months – but here’s the gist:
Gloves left behind in the gutter, everywhere
This time of year.

Quite a few gloves,
In one day, in one short walk I spotted more
Than three gloves left behind…

I saw a handful of gloves upon the road
And a glove full of hand at end of my arm.
On Nothing

It was nowhere to be found.
Instead, it lurked everywhere,
Somewhere, anywhere, kitchenware
Abiding in the hem of your shirt like a flea,
Too small to locate, springy and elusive,
Biting you on the wrist just under your watch,
How did it get under there? And while I was asleep!

You can learn to ignore it if you wish
You can go to evening classes – you’re
Taught exercises – yoga of the mind:
Bend all your thoughts the other way, they say,
And drink some of this special yoghurt milk.
It’s darned like a legging – of mock-sock-silk
And weaved in the Alps, by mountain ilk.
“Twaddle, drivel!” I say, “They’ll only bilk
You out of tonnes of dosh and fly-by-night
Before you realise you’re wrong and I’m right”

The lark in the tree is nowhere near me,
If it was I wouldn’t know, I’m no bird
Watcher – nor have I any avian
Erudition – I’m more of a fish’man,
Sifting the waves for my dutiful prey
Parking my boat in the beautiful bay,
Stinking of fish at the end of the day,
Dancing the deck like a goat astray.
My ignorance of rural life could fill
A warehouse, a whorehouse, a mouse house a…
House. I can go on and on and on, I
Can pick my nose like a pro, yes I can

And from my nose did all this spew
Yes that above, the nonsense too.
It must have, I didn’t write it
I found it in my nasal cavities.
Right! Enough of this. I’m off to play the piano.

Saturday, March 18, 2006

Singing in Public

It should be smiled upon – but instead -
If you see anyone singing in the street
“They’re probably mad,” we say – probably?
Certainly mad - bonkers! Ring the council
And complain, I can’t exist in this racket.
But do we need the council? Maybe we

Just need to throw a soft spanner into the
London Underground – the very place
Where the devil of solipsism was born:
“No one else exists, especially not you! Yes
You, the one letting your leg touch mine!
I won’t stand for it!” The standard reaction.

We don’t chat on the tube, let alone sing,
Unless you’re begging. But then you’re
Despised – But I suppose you’re despised
Just as much for begging as for any other
Transgression of the absurdly stringent
Tube etiquette rules and regulations:

Smile at anyone or thing (– or even at nothing)
And you’re a complete nut
Hum along with your personal stereo and of course
You’re a fucking shit face
There’s no question – You’re an utter cunt if you
Make any form of conversation.

Now I’m not denying us our rights.
My personal space? You keep away!
I want that to myself – and I want
To hold firmly on to my right to
Sit in quiet desperation – pretending to read,
Eyes darting about trying to avoid cleavages.

Oh yes – never you mind sonny – no.
I’m no grubby swinger, no hippy, trying to
Force you into bed with my wife – I don’t
Hand out flowers to soldiers in
The hope that one day I’ll have a job
And a car – or a haircut – no!

I’m interested in your safety; I’m as
Concerned for myself as you are yourself
That’s how my empathy works, we’re
Just the same – I’ll say – don’t doubt it.
Your rights are my rights – But you
Get to keep your own, don’t worry.

But – aforementioned rights remaining
Firmly intact – don’t you think we
Might be a little less sulky about the
Whole affair? – What “whole affair”?
Life I tell you! Life! The tube is noisy –
I know you may want to be at home

Sitting in front of Baywatch with hot cup of soup…
…So does everyone else! We’re all Homo sapiens
Here buddy. We all have our needs: food, water,
Baywatch, soup, ringtones, colonic irrigation,
And all the rest of it – Just think of yourself
As a naked – yet civilised – savage, in

A cave (or up a tree, its not important where)
Surrounded by other equally civilised savages,
What would you want the most? – Now don’t
Tell me Heat Magazine, Rollerblades, Brie,
Reebocks, Budweiser, Fatboy Slim, or any of
Those commodities y’know? – More than anything

You’d want to sing out loud - like a bird,
You’d want everyone to hear it too. By
Jove that’s it – that’s what we want – when
A mother sings (or talks with a sing-song
Voice) to her baby – when the football crowds
Chant in (albeit raucous) tones – when a

Drunkard in the street peals out a distorted
Rendition of some pop classic – when you
Sing in the shower – when children on the
Tube shatter all the conventions, singing,
Running about, talking loudly and even –
God forbid – communicating with suited dullards.
In Vainly Striving for an Epigrammatic Conciseness

I am the wearer of a ridiculous hat.
It is old and green – with dirt? who knows?
Its been years since I bought
It – five maybe. And I wear it everyday,
Putting it on as soon as I wake up.

I’m not wearing it now though
The stereo is loud and my head is unadorned
I'm happening at the computer – going with a poem.
It’s in the present – presently – and the poem is
Loosing its grip by referring to itself – grip on what?

The hat! Yes, indeed, that was the topic
And a fine topic – a conversation point
I like those dashes; I use them because I like them
Especially when Emily Dickinson uses them,
Sometimes at the end of the line like this –
But I’ll bet she never used two – – in a row
You can see why.

Can you blame me for losing track?
It’s just an old hat – the filthy thing
Doesn’t hold my attention for one moment
And I’m just speeding along with this now
I don’t suppose the beers I had earlier are
Helping – “# Skeletons? Yes, but with their
Flesh still around them, and alive #” sings the radio.

But I haven’t got a radio – how on earth?
Oh come on you! Its fictional creativity
You buffoon – Now now… don’t argue with yourself
And on paper too – which might outlive your
Organic existence by a good few years
If you’re lucky

But wait! Hold the press – this isn’t
Even paper.

Friday, March 17, 2006

New Years Eve 2003

“- and the squashed couchette that dribbles from your throat…attracts a dirty old goat…” he rhymed.
“Don’t forget the rancid stoat…” I added, leaning towards the Dictaphone in his hand, “yeah! The stoat, that sails in a boat… round the fairytale moat…” I said, before hesitating.
“If you’re not careful you’ll be demoted”, Adrian continued, holding the Dictaphone right up close to his mouth, “we’ll rip those stripes right off your coat, from your current position down to a private, and you couldn’t ever skive it, you signed the five year contract maaan!” he sneered to a stop.
The Dictaphone clicked as Adrian turned it off. Our throats were sore as we’d been freestyling into Adrian’s Dictaphone for at least twenty minutes without a break. It was New Years Eve and we had decided to spend it in The Hobgoblin, which is the nearest pub to my house. In the summer its vast garden served us well but we soon realised that in the cold of winter, we would have to escape the elements inside. This is just what we were doing, much to our distaste. For the new years celebrations the pub had a DJ and those irritating coloured disco lights flashing about the empty dance floor. The music was excruciatingly loud. So loud, I thought, that the DJ must have given up trying to attract people to the dance floor. He was now just punishing us because we had failed to do so.
“We probably won’t be able to hear a thing of that,” I shouted into Adrian’s ear over the colossal din and pointing at the Dictaphone, “the music is way too loud”.
He shrugged and then raised an eyebrow ironically. He was just about to shout something into my ear when Dave and Rachel arrived back from the bar with four shots of whiskey.
“Here we go lads,” screamed Dave in an exaggerated cockney accent “all together now.” The four of us (Adrian, Dave, Rachel, and me) each imbibed a small quantity of poison, and each spluttered or hissed according to the ferocity with which we felt our insides were being destroyed and our brains melted.
“Right – what now then?!” Dave shouted at the other three of us, just about reaching the necessary high decibel scream that was required to supersede the musical racket and reach our ears, “This is horrid! Do you reckon we could brave the cold and sit outside?!”
There seemed to be some drunken consensus: a bit of nodding, Adrian put his hat on, Rachel picked up her hand bag, so Dave led the way and we strode out into the harsh, cold, on-the-cusp-of-January air. The sudden stillness, emptiness and relative quiet of the deserted pub garden allowed me to realise how drunk I was. Our ears hissed.

We had been suffering the loud, smoky interior for a number of hours now. Our desperate attempts to enliven this notoriously anti-climatic pseudo-event came in two categories: alcohol and nonsense. Shouting improvised nonsense-rhymes into Adrian’s Dictaphone had been punctuated only by throat-searing shots of refined hedonism. It was now at least ten o’clock, not very long before we were to be blessed with a new year.
“Shall we get a kebab?” suggested Dave.
“Uuuh… I dunno,” I mumbled, shrugging and the beginning to shiver.
We all looked around at each other searchingly and the dull glisten of apathetic intoxication was consistently reflected back by each pair of eyes.
“Well I wouldn’t mind some chips,” said Rachel smiling sardonically, “I suppose its something to do”
“Ok then – shall we all go?” inquired Dave.
I shook my head and looked at Adrian to see what he thought.
“William and I will stay here!” he said in his mock-heroic voice that he sometime puts on when there is little else happening.
“Yeah, we’ll wait here” I nodded.
The couple jumped up rubbing their hands together and hunching their shoulders inwards as people do in the cold, and shuffled off to the kebab house down the road.

“Soooo… William” said Adrian, as soon as we were alone, pronouncing my name rhythmically in his unusual American accent, “what shall we do before this year is in the past?”
“We could go on an adventure,” I said pathetically, shaking my head at the emptiness of my own words.
“We could just go for a walk down some of these streets,” Adrian suggested, waving his hand in the direction of Brockwell Court.
“I suppose so” I said, tracing a route in my mind through the local streets. “But wouldn’t that be boring?” I asked.
Adrian lifted his hands mock-despairingly, “you never know” he shrugged “it could be better than just sitting here”.
“What about the other two?”
“Let’s just run round the block… we’ll be back before they are.”

We ran across the road and I began to feel more excited. Running when I’m drunk is always quite exciting; the edge of my vision blurs and it seems as it gives the impression that I am running extremely fast. We slowed to a brisk walk and entered the Brockwell Court estate. Adrian started singing. Well it was really half singing, half humming. In time with our steps he was repeating a jazz-like phrase, slightly different every time. Around the side of the flats we were skirting, adjacent the large cylindrical bins, there was an old sofa left there to rot. On a whim I jumped on it and climbed up and over the wall it was resting against. The wall was about six foot high. Without a word from either of us Adrian followed suit. We were now in the next estate, I forget its name. We were walking along a grassy alley passing windows in which we could see people celebrating New Years Eve in their living rooms. Adrian was still trumpeting along and I joined in with a simple bass riff. Our alcoholic confidence increased and we began to sing louder. People noticed us and looked up as we passed their windows. First, an old couple that looked like they were just sitting in silence, waiting for something to happen. We obviously weren’t what they were waiting for – they scowled vehemently at us. Then, a Hispanic looking couple that were cooking a meal together looked up as we sang passed their window. The woman, at first, looked shocked but I detected a favourable hue in her surprise and I stopped singing for a moment to shout “Happy New Year” through the window at her. As we walked on swiftly both moved towards the window and called “Happy New Year!” after us.

A minute later, still walking down the alley, we came upon a metal frame fire escape and, again without a word, Adrian began to ascend the steps. Six floors up we reached the top and beheld a beautiful view. The sky of London was alight with fireworks. We stood and watched the sky for a minute before Adrian began rummaging in his pockets. “Here it is,” he mumbled, producing the Dictaphone. Affecting a ridiculous air of importance he held the machine up to his mouth and started singing.

“Ahh den der-tis sen der dih hoss….
Ahh den der-tis sen der dih haaa ho hosen…
Ooh hoo er haa… en-der-dih hoss
Ahh den der-tis sen der dih hoss….”

I knew the song and joined in at the chorus:

“Otis – air-dees – er-ti-hos…
Otis – air-dees – er-ti-hos…
Otis – air-dih hees – er-ti-hos…
Arken Der-ti-hos!”

The song we were singing was by an insane French progressive jazz-rock band called Magma. They had invented their own language called Kobaia and we were, apparently, singing in it. We hadn’t the fogiest what we were singing – all we knew was that it was a tribute to Otis Reading. We both loved the song and became lost in our roof top rendition of it. The fireworks went on beautifully in the distance. At a certain point when it seemed to feel right, we slowed to a stop, ending the song with a duet of high pitched wailing (a faithful imitation, I might add). Turning off the machine and putting it away, Adrian turned to me with a genuine smile, “well what shall we do now?”
“More things!” I said with excitement, setting off back down the fire escape.

Over a couple more walls and across a road and we entered a very different state. It looked a lot more private and perhaps even a little posh. A driveway led us round the large red brick building into a sort of large quad containing a small ornamental garden. It was completely silent and we could go no further. We stood for a moment and looked about at the little garden.
“Look at this” I hissed, walking over to a bicycle that hadn’t been chained up, “its just leaning here!”
“Shall we have a ride round on it?” asked Adrian.
My future conscience kicked in. We’ll never return this if we go for a ride on it, I thought, we’ll end up throwing it in a bush half a mile away most likely.
“No… I – I don’t think we’ll ever return it will we?” I looked Adrian in the eye, “in the state we’re in…”
“No, I guess you’re right” he nodded, sighing.
“Well lets move on,” I proposed, as if we now had some concrete agenda.
“Indeed” he muttered, with his usual whimsical drawl.

We walked back in the direction of the pub, back in the direction of my house. Neither of us had a mobile phone nor any timekeeping equipment.
“I suppose its now 2004” I announced.
“Yes well happy new year… I suppose” he replied, not forgetting to raise his customary ironic eyebrow.
We arrived at the pub but the garden was empty and people were being told to leave.
“I wonder what happened to Dave and Rachel?” I thought aloud.
“I’m sure they’re doing fine someplace,” he squawked, accentuating his accent deliberately (but purposelessly).
“Yeah…” I looked around at the drunken stragglers in the street and realised we had probably been away from the pub for hours. It was the singing on the fire escape that did it. We were too drunk to notice time slipping away. What had begun, as ‘a run round the block’ had actually become, in some oblique manner, an adventure. But it was not to end here. There was to be a final flourish.

Without discussing it, Adrian and I had begun to wander in the direction of my house. It was not more than a hundred metres from the pub. I could tell we were both walking slowly on purpose, prolonging the adventure, unwilling to have it end – as it certainly would on entering my house. Within about 20 metres of my house I became desperate for some one last taste of drunken revelry and jumped out of my slovenly stupor: I leap into the middle of the road. It was currently empty and I could hear no cars approaching so I lay down right in the centre of the road. As soon as I found myself resting comfortably, I wondered what foolish purpose this was supposed to serve. I was just about to get up and give in – ending the adventure – when I heard a chorus of cries. A looked up from my supine position to see a group of six young girls, no older than seventeen, running towards me. They were all heavily made up and dressed in short skirts and tiny low cut tops. Running was clearly difficult for them as they were all wearing stupendously high heels, and they were all, of course, ludicrously juiced. Their collective scent preceded them, carried by the gentle breeze, and I inhaled a mixture of gut wrenchingly strong perfume and the somewhat preferable reek of neat vodka. They were now in a single file line and the leading girl was within feet of me. Suddenly frightened I tensed up a little and held my head with my hands. The girls proceeded to jump over me. Some cleared me completely and some placed a cursory foot on my abdomen during their flight, without any weight. Skilfully done, I thought, for someone so drunk. Relaxing a little, I realised that I was in little danger. The last girl was lagging a little behind and I remained lying in the road, giving her time to have her go. She was running on socks, carrying her high heels in her hands. I caught a glimpse of her face and was immediately aware the degree to which she had indulged this evening. Before I had time to think any further, she leapt into the air landing on one foot with her full weight on my abdomen, then leaping off and staggering away to join her screaming sisters. This girl had just compressed my stomach with such violent suddenness, such frightening unexpectedness, that I was left coughing and spluttering in the road. I managed to get up and join Adrian back on the pavement and exchange a brief glance with him. We were both shaking our heads in cheerful bemusement.

Thursday, March 16, 2006

Unravel

Maurice Ravel; piano master whose early works seem scarcely less mature than those of his maturity; shavings of Parmigiano-reggiano were caught in his beard; It is the “tree moss” of the poets and Shakespeare's “idle moss,” and in the past it was used as a remedy for whooping cough, catarrh, epilepsy, and dropsy, also as an astringent, a tonic, and a diuretic, it was first described in 300 BC as a hair-growth stimulant; Greek voyager Pytheus sailed around Britain and discovered a place he named Thule (possibly the Shetland Islands, Iceland, or Norway), which for centuries was considered the end of the earth; I remember digging a whole in the garden and seriously believing that if I put the elbow grease in I would reach Australia; I could never quite pronounce the word ‘Vaseline’; chapped lips in the winter are a pleasure to crack, I smile as hard as I can in the mornings to crack the sides, and then immediately regret it; while earthquakes have inspired dread and superstitious awe since ancient times, little was understood about them until the emergence of seismology at the beginning of the 20th century; Steveland Judkins, a blind child prodigy produced a steady stream of classic hit songs, but Stevie Wonder (as he became) was much more than a freakish prepubescent imitation of Ray Charles, as audiences discovered when he demonstrated his prowess with piano, organ, harmonica, and drums; I had been writing under a pseudonym for years, until one day my house was burgled and it was stolen, now I have to be content with writing under a desk lamp; witticisms may not be my strong point; for many prehistoric tribes, the traditional test of manhood was the lifting of a special rock... such manhood stones, some with the name of the first lifter incised, exist in Greece and in Scottish castles; among the simplest instruments are those that European folk cultures share with many tribal cultures throughout the world: rattles, flutes, the bull-roarer, bone whistles, and long wooden trumpets, such as the Swiss alpenhorn; as “they” say ‘every singer starts out singing other peoples songs’ and I suppose eventually you come into your own, having understood the ineffable essence of composition, and weren’t the earliest writers writing what we sometimes refer to as ‘songs’?; Gilgamesh, who had returned to Uruk, rejected the marriage proposal of Ishtar, the goddess of love, and then, with Enkidu's aid, killed the divine bull that she had sent to destroy him; I want to convince myself that I’m not too much of a plagiarist – not too much of an idea-stealer; the fish monger had a hard time convincing Mrs Millenthrop to take home a Haddock as she was there was “something fishy about those spots on its shoulder”; before I go any further I should wash my hands repeatedly and say a thousand Hail Mary’s; despite his name, Pope Urban IV (who reigned 1261–64), wasn’t a proto-gangster-pimp, exhibiting the finest in Medieval bling, and pimping his nuns like a forward thinking antediluvian thug, instead he freed the Kingdom of Sicily, a papal fief, from Hohenstaufen domination and restored papal influence in Italy; an exercise in unfree-association.

Friday, March 10, 2006

‘As Mag sat with the kid in her lap and began to read from a book, life in the forest...
"The weasel and his cousins, the mink, the fisher, and the marten, are lithe, fast, savage creatures. They are meat eaters, and are in continuous, bloodthirsty competition for the..."
then the beautiful child was asleep and the moon was full.’
From Tales of Ordinary Madness by Charles Bukowski.
Lipogram
I know a man who said “Drop your slacks and fling your bits about all you want, you’ll only ruin your days. Publicans and drunkards will similarly gawk, watching your phallus (and you with it) drop down into ignominy… humiliation, infamy. Corruption of your status will follow; disdain from all around you.” A judicious oration without doubt. But a thing was missing. But which thing do I talk of? Do you know? It is a common part of communication. All habitually apply it to manuscript. Without it I could avoid this uncanny quality of contact. Do you know now?
The party was thronging and I was drunk. I was wandering about in a sea of familiar faces. Squeezing past people, under peoples arms, over their feet, round chairs and so on. The house was packed. Even the stairs, there was a person sitting on nearly every step. Everyone was talking and laughing and the music was pumping away not so quietly as to allow easy thought when you weren’t talking. It was my house and I knew most of the guests. Some better than others, but in my drunken state (which most of them probably shared) I said hello warmly to everyone. It wasn’t false warmth. It was my real burning cheeks, my hot stinging throat (fresh from the vodka), and my happy wobbling gait. I was warm inside. I shook everyone’s hands as I stumbled through. As I passed some people I engaged in fleeting conversations or joined in on ones that were already going. Sometimes I think I would just amble off in the middle of a sentence (theirs or mine) or answer the question a previous person had asked me in the face of the next person. If there was confusion it was laughed off or out. I was drunk and so was everyone else for all I knew.
I was making my way through the party to get to my room. It was on the top floor. There was no one in it. I had locked it. The party was only to be downstairs. As I finally reached the top of the stairs I heard someone calling my name. I could hear them downstairs, laughing and spluttering and calling my name. It didn’t sound like an emergency. It sounded like someone had said something funny, or someone had donned a silly hat, or perhaps there were a couple of girls snogging – and whoever was shouting wanted me to come and see, I don’t know. But I was in need of some quiet. It wasn’t that I was feeling ill or exhausted, or even slightly nervous as I sometimes get when surrounded by so much stimuli – no – I had had a thought and I wanted to solidify it. That needed quiet.
As I approached my door, leaving the stairs behind, I no longer heard my name being called. The bubbling noises downstairs rumbled under my feet as I unlocked my room and stole in. Shutting the door behind me I was plunged into a murky hush. The party was a background hum and my thoughts could be heard again. I turned the desk lamp on and fell into the chair. Pushing aside some university work I located a pen and grabbed an old envelope from the wastepaper bin. It would do, I thought, a drunkard can write on a surface befitting his bedraggled comportment. My tongue out to the side, with a shiny red nose (probably), and my cheap biro scratching at the old scrap of brown paper, in between the shrivelled stamp and the address, I wrote:

This house party is like an amorphous anemone. Tangled bright and varied colours, interconnected tentacles that sway in the moonstruck ebb of drunkenness. You can traverse the multitudes like a worm or a snake, or a wriggling child in a sleeping bag. You can zigzag through the lines of vision, the airwaves of communication; you can even burst through the sensuous touches of a couple in half-embrace, tracing your path in advance with your wielded sword fist so they know that’s the way you’re going and there’s nothing that will stop you. Except perhaps a punch in the face –
There are quiet ones on the periphery, sitting watching the surging swarm of the party nucleus. Some of these quiet ones are heavy drinkers, quietly concentrating on their large glass of gin (the bottle half hidden behind one of their legs), only speaking when spoken to – and monosyllabically. Some of the peripherals are nervous teetotal onlookers, eager to dive into the swarm, but hesitant and afraid. Wide eyes like a lonely child. I’m always glad when they find each other to talk to or pluck up the courage and swathe themselves in drunkards. Lonely eyes have no place in the lap of hedonism; an environment of great ease, comfort and blur. Still others seated round the edge of the party are just too drunk, they’ve had their fill of luxury. Perhaps their stomachs are cloying, or their heads are spinning like whirligigs of despair, like interminable eye-fatiguing Catherine wheels…
The nucleus is bursting and erupting like Jupiter. Splashes of Sangria, a spray of scrumpy from a mouth, brandished brandy, launched liquor, flung framboise, chucked chartreuse… Oh the trickles of tequila, the oozing ouzo… y’know?

But who am I to glamorise alcohol? It is a complex cycle, fast-paced and difficult to break out of. But before I want to leave, the cycle is thrilling. Like the child learning to ride a bike I stay on, not knowing how difficult it is to stop, not realising that I don’t know how – and then blamo! we ride into a wall…the childhood memory of a bike, the alcohol, and I. Now someone is carrying me up the stairs but it seems like it is happening to someone else. It is experienced from a distance, someone far away is shouting my words for me and I can’t quite hear them. I am shouting inanities, blasphemies, nonsense, proposals of love, I’m singing, I’m dancing and writhing inside but really – in truth – I’m vomiting in a toilet. On my knees on the urine-damp bathroom linoleum, hands clasped unknowingly (but out of necessity) on the equally piss splattered seat. My eyes have stopped sending signals to my brain. My only thought is a sore throat, I can’t yet comprehend regret or anything so advanced. I have regressed.