We all have our own paths in life,
and most of us think we should be on other ones,
better ones that are bathed in sunlight.
But, just like people, the most beautiful landscapes
are composed of mountains and valleys,
and our paths will lead us by both.
These are our paths, the ones we need to travel,
because they will always lead to greater things.
Sometimes, you will find yourself on the mountain peak,
looking down at the world feeling elated.
Other times, the path will lead you into the valley,
and although it might seem to stretch on forever,
the path never-ending winding through the shadows,
it will always pass the mountains and can walk
in that beautiful sunlight you crave so much.

The streets are cold, filled with icy caricatures
of empty bodies longing for soullight.
They walk hard, as if they just learned yesterday,
their heavy gaits trespassing on the freezing stones,
leaving shallow footprints embedded in the frost.

An orb of bright light appears and moves through the crowd,
darting here and there, and I can hear it call my name.
The orb hurries past me and I turn to chase after it,
but my feet are frozen to the pavement and I cannot move,
the orb zipping away as I my name disappears on the air.
And there, as I stand in the biting wind clawing at my bones,
the heaviness I feel of a life I could have lived,
I realise with growing horror that that was it,
that was my one chance of having my own soullight
and it passed me by and it was tantalisingly close,
and they say that your soullight only ever visits you once
and it sticks inside you and lights your path forever.
Forever yours, it would say to me in the dreams I had,
can’t wait for us to be together it would say to me.

I guess I’m going to be an icy caricature forever,
walking hard like I just learned yesterday,
no longer longing for my soullight to find me.
Heavy steps in the frost of a cold and lonely world.

The night is immense tonight,
the dark stretching further than I’ve ever seen it stretch.
The gaps between the stars I named for you
are bigger than I ever realised.
And I know all those stars are slowly drifting away,
all those beautiful little points of light will soon be gone,
and one of those stars has gone tonight,
evaporated away because I longed for it too much.
That was the most beautiful star I had ever lain my eyes upon,
but it was always out of reach, no matter how hard I tried
to reach up and pluck her from the night sky
so I could hold her close to my heart and say I love you,
the universe will never let you disappear from my view,
I will protect you and keep you safe in this dangerous place.
But I couldn’t, I left it too late,
and now all the other stars are following suit.
I try with all my strength just to grab one,
but they twinkle and flicker and vanish too quickly.
Soon, the sky will be fat with darkness,
and even the moon will leave,
trailing off into the void of a universe
that never cared for its inhabitants.

There was an idiot a long time ago who said
it’s better to have loved and lost
than never to have loved at all.
These are the words of a man who didn’t love fully,
who didn’t wake up in the morning
and spend the next eighteen hours
in a kind of stupor as thought after thought
of a woman he loved soul-deep
kept running through his head like a slideshow.
These are the ramblings of a man who had
never lost that kind of love,
never had that slideshow on repeat every waking moment,
never saw himself in all the love songs
that suddenly were all about him.

That quote has done a great disservice to those of us
who have loved so deeply and lost that love even deeper,
the soul turned into a bottomless well of limitless proportions.
Light never travels very far down there,
the thick tarry blackness snuffs out all illuminations.
And the echoes of the memories you created
rebound and recoil in the dark, the great voice
of a forgotten earth god trembling all who fall too close,
a hungry, vindictive, spiteful creature
who devours the souls of the dead-but-still-just-barely-alive.
If that’s worse than having never been loved at all,
I’m sorry, but that is a crock of ****.

I’m still in love with that first chance encounter,
the sweet serenade of the forthcoming happily-ever-after,
the diamond twinkle in those emerald eyes,
the morning greetings and the endless chatter of the nights.
I thought it was a dream, but this was never such a thing,
the way my dark soul danced with yours and how our hearts would sing,
a melody that had no words but full of feeling,
the miracle of hope and the effervescence of believing.
I fell in love with your boundless grace and unfettered desire,
the way your burning soul gave way to an even greater fire,
and we burned our bodies and melded our minds together,
and we lived in castles constructed of mist in moors of heather.
My heart is right where it was when we first fell in love,
anchored to your distance and a full moon high above,
and I know you still feel the same from that day long ago,
your voice still sings sweetly of all we have yet to know.

These dark woods are mine alone.
The trails that snake between the trunks
travel in circles and meet up with themselves again.
There’s no way out of these woods of mine,
no friend nor foe to aide my quest,
no fair maiden in a castle keep,
just my lonely old heart begging to die.

These deep woods are mine alone.
The night air is cold and full of water,
its thick blanket allowing me no sleep any more.
There’s no rest in these woods of mine,
no bed nor couch to lay upon,
no young belle to kiss goodnight,
just my tired old head begging to die.

Lord help me, I fell in love,
now I own these deep dark woods.
Lord above, I fell in love,
all alone in these deep dark woods.

You are the Chinese dog howling at night,
you are the Greek bat killer praying for light.
You are the Italian bird flying through the open window,
you are the Thai ghost stealing rice after a bad joke.
You are the Romanian dreaming of dark water,
you are the Lithuanian whistling indoors.
You are the German saying cheers with a glass of water,
you are the Brit leaving your new shoes on the table.
You are the Egyptian hearing the low hoot of a distant owl,
you are the Italian with the owl inside your house.
You are the Icelander knitting on your doorstep,
you are the Syrian playing with a yo-yo in the desert.
You are the Russian gifting yellow flowers,
You are the Portuguese walking backwards.
You are the Hungarian at the corner of the dinner table,
you are the Spaniard walking into a room left foot first.
You are the Brazilian putting your purse on the floor,
you are the Cuban drinking el ultimo.

cut out my heart and feed it
to the wolves howling
for the blood of the
lost boys. sweat out death
and glazed eyes feed
families for eternity.

tick…tock…goes the clock

i am the conjurer of
my own magick, the
spoils of my own war,
the monster
of my own nightmare,
the penitence of my own
sins.

tick…tock…goes the clock

devils in my head and death
chokes my heart, ain’t beating
for you no more.
killed it with silence,
neglect took the soul
from my bones.
c’est la vie, i suppose.

tick…tock…goes the clock

this is my doomsday,
how the sky caves in
more and more, the clouds
look orange like ***** fire.
this is the end
of all ends,
this is my darkness,
******* all.

tick…tock…goes the clock

These are my heavens, this is my burden,
to hold the world within its bounds,
chained to the void stretching infinity.
I watch time pass and witness the birth of mountains,
observe your nations and empires come and go
like the polluted waves on a nuclear beach.
I watch as you divide your home,
borders separating each other for no reason,
the folly of men with power in their minds
and a darkness so corrupting in their hearts.
I see no artificial borders from my vantage point,
just the blending of ecological systems
in satisfying rings around this beautiful world.

I wasn’t in chains at the beginning,
you portrayed me as such and then it was so,
chains suddenly around my ankles and wrists,
disappearing into the dark maw of the universe,
and you all have the key to set me free.
These are my chains, this is your burden,
to hold my boundless soul in a confined space.
I cry out sometimes and crack the earth open,
blow tempests into your atmosphere
and watch as they spin with the Earth,
and you give them names, how cute.
You just sit there until they pass.

I suppose you’ve all forgotten about me,
too busy with big dreams at small prices
to remind yourself of the burden of being.
I am here, in my little corner of the universe,
holding you up and steady in the cold gloom,
thankless and forgotten and so ******* old now.
My shoulders have been sore for a long time now,
one ***** thought I shrugged, I just shifted my weight,
and all of a sudden, capitalism bounded to the forefront.
I must be more careful, I told myself at the time.
But at least you discovered heavy industry,
your blanket of smog keeps me warm at night.

Think of me sometimes, holding you all up,
whatever struggles you have in your lives
pale in comparison to my duty of care.
One slip of my shoulder and your world,
quite literally, comes crashing down.
Play your music, create your art, write your stories,
they are what you are here for after all,
to share your creativity with everyone else.
If you are overly concerned about being happy,
struggling to sleep as you try and figure it all out,
there’s your answer, don’t say I’m not good to you.
Goodnight, may you live better lives than me.

My soul has a spark that ignites a flame inside,
the engine room of my mind machinates a response,
and all the world’s a stage, they say, on a trembling tide,
ebbing and flowing like the metaphors of a beautifully-constructed sentence.

I act out a scene no one cared enough to write,
the other players reacting to the shadows of silent words.
Still life painted in gold, no movement in the moonlight,
dreaming of evolution and the voices of other worlds.

Was it love of life that shimmered in that ethereal glow,
or the faces of angels in the gloom that made me heart beat fast?
Never mind the silly stories I was always told,
those who live with their heads in the clouds don’t always finish last.

It’s a cold comfort knowing I’m not the only one there,
feeling the breath of a gentle wind against my reddening cheek.
The voice of a love carried from beyond the sea somewhere,
colours the dark with a splash of light and the night seems so less bleak.

The tide rushes out and the moon rides high in the dark underbelly of the sky,
and the audience has dispersed into the cold still of the night.
You and I are the only two remaining, singing songs that get us high,
hand in hand, shoulder to shoulder, waiting for the first crack of morning light.

Once more, the world spins again in this dark night,
my eyes battling to find some spark of light,
but dreams of you slowly coalesce in my tired head
and suddenly this night doesn’t make me feel quite so dead.

The smell of the lavender guides me along this path
and though they and I both know little of any possible aftermath,
I will travel across the globe to see your face finally,
to watch your smile curve up your cheeks beautifully.

Until that day comes, I stare up at my dark little sky,
the weight bearing down as I now ask how instead of why.
Is this the night I finally bow down to the stars,
pray in the light that has travelled through so much dark?

Let’s create our own paths,
go where neither of us has gone before,
find love on the rocks of a foreign shore,
find life in the places struck off the maps,
plan major plot points and fill in the gaps.
Let’s walk hand in hand through a forest of pines,
travel the world in parallel lines,
gaze at the moon on a midwinter night,
make love in the grass in her pale light.

Our eyes no longer see black,
colours abound in our wanderlust.
Exploring our love with the stars on our back,
forever moving in our own little universe.

The birds stopped singing a long time ago,
long before I ended up at the shore of the lake.
The water is a single shade of blue from black,
trees hanging limp and mournful around it,
drooping branches of dead bark and dying leaves
skimming the surface, debating whether or not to fall in.

I swear the silence is so loud, the voice of the universe
reverberating through the molecules of the atmosphere.
I can feel the vibrations through my feet,
rising like the creeping ivy on a dead house,
long ago forgotten by the hands of its creator.

I’ve heard tell that the lake goes down forever,
that it fills a void of limitless proportions.
If I threw myself like a stone into that wet darkness,
where would I sink if the lake has no bottom?
Maybe it flows down into the sky of another world,
my darkness their vacuum of space and light.
Further I sink, the blue begins to brighten
and I fall into another world where I am important.

I take a step into the cold dark water of the lake.
It wraps around my foot like the gripping hug of death,
that feeling you get when you close your eyes at night
and focus on your heartbeat slowing down as you rest,
and the panic you feel when you think it will keep slowing down,
sinking into your mattress and saying goodbye to nothing at all.

I’ll find out where I will sink to,
there is so little left to explore in this vast world
but I have found one more place to go.
The water envelops me and down I swim,
and the current moves around me in a circle.
I take a deep breath and my heart fills with heaviness.
So this is how it feels to finally let go.

Lost in a forest of dead and dying trees,
listening to words of death carried by the breeze.
When I will be home I cannot say for certain,
but I will not yet allow life to close the curtain.
Separated by the distance of half a broken world,
but I will never give up on the love of my Idaho girl.

The grass used to be green but now is yellow and sick,
the magic in the universe is running out of tricks.
But one more came my way and my heart wanted more,
and you responded by knocking gently on my door.
It doesn’t feel so far now as half a broken world,
I’ve seen the mind and beauty of my Idaho girl.

Here I stand, a monument to my own destruction,
carrying on the work of an ancient construction.
Hands made of callouses designed for moving rocks,
seconds pass to minutes to hours on the clocks,
and life flows downhill through the roots of a Viking tree,
to the garden, to the sea.

Yggdrasil weaves its trunk through my history,
how it knows my life is its greatest mystery.
Its leaves reach to the heavens and caress the clouds,
through its xylems and phloems travels the worlds crowds,
and life flows downhill between the roots of this Viking tree,
to the garden, to the sea.

The gods of dark places fight their battles in the light,
and all the eyes of all the folks turn from the murky night.
Yggdrasil stands tall like a black tower ‘tween land and sky,
where the hearts of the bravest men climb towards a lie,
and life flows downhill by the roots of the Viking tree,
to the garden, to the sea.

Bartz Field in the July heat,
pretty girls in their summer dresses
singing songs of Woodstock and American dreams.
My dream lay beneath a sycamore,
motionless in her island of shadow.
I left her there to dream of cold beer
and headed up to Red Hill.
The sun shone with less ferocity up there,
a slight breeze cooling the air,
and from my vantage point,
I could make her out, sleeping gently,
the calm point in the hustle-bustle
of the students playing games
and chatting over cold drinks.

On the horizon, a thunderstorm was brewing,
promising the relief of cool rain
to wash the heat from the city,
for at least an hour or so.
I scanned the city, the McDonald’s
directly across the road from
the Museum of Natural History.
I wonder if there was some irony in that placement,
or sheer luck that made me smile to myself.
The distant brontide of thunder applauded
and I looked back to the sycamore tree.
She was sitting up, looking around,
and when her head turned towards me,
I waved my arms above my head
like I was signalling a helicopter for my rescue.
She didn’t see me and she stood up,
confusion written in her body language.

I stumbled down the trail and when I reached the park,
she was back under the tree,
fingers of one hand wrestling with those on the other.
I called her name and she spun her head around
and leaped off the ground and embraced me,
then chastised me for leaving her
without telling her where I had gone.
I laughed and she laughed
and I kissed her and she kissed me back.
We sat down on the burned-out grass,
her head on my shoulder
and my arm around her waist,
as we watched and waited
for the thunderstorm to wash away
the heat of a glorious day.

The bikers
rolled in through
the fog
and smoke
of the cold midwinter
morning,
the revving of
the engines roared
like monsters hiding
in the darkness
of a momentary
nightmare.

One biker flicked
his *** into a
puddle licked by
frost, a quick death
to the fire
that once burned
so **** bright.
A metaphorical
device for life,
perhaps?
I think I’m too
drunk right now
to bother
with words.

One looked at
me with a sneer as
he rode past,
and I stuck my middle
finger up through
my beard and
licked the tip,
and I winked at him.
He growled a *******
as on he rode
and I laughed at my
joke, but no one laughed
with me.

They passed and all
that remained was
the silence and the smell
of burned metal
and the sweet
odour of petrichor
as the rain died a little,
but I was soaked
and alone, wondering
where the **** my
life went, where
all the friends I had
had gone to.

But I suppose
that’s just the way
it goes sometimes,
once you were on
top of the world,
king of the kings of
Kintore, and the next,
you’re lying in the gutter
staring up at the
stars with the back
of your head in
a puddle as a
*** end floats past.

“Gonna tell me where we’re headed?”
“You’ll know when we get there.”
“Come on, man. You haven’t said a word since we left. You turned up unannounced, told me to follow you, and here I am, following you, once again, and again you won’t tell me ****.”
“You’ll know when we get there.”
“No, I’m not playing your games any more. This is it. Tell me where you’re taking me. Too many times I’ve had to do this, This isn’t your time, just a warning. You know how many times you’ve said that now? Eighteen. I’ve been keeping tally. Honestly, I’ve had enough.”
“This is your time.”
“Finally, a ******* answer. So, what, I’m supposed to be all depressed now? Too late, you’ve been winding me up for months now, teasing me with this ****. Finally I get to spend the rest of eternity not having to look over my shoulder every five minutes waiting for you to turn up and ruin my day. You know, I hope you enjoy yourself, I really do. You need to be a complete ******* to do what you do. Did you ever have a life, or have you done this for all time? I bet you have no idea what it’s like for us, constantly in fear for when you knock on the door. You just saunter about in your flowy robe looking all menacing, but you have no heart or soul, you’re just a puppet the universe had to create to chaperone the creatures that actually have hearts and souls to some afterlife where we do what we already did when we were alive. Honestly, what is the point of you? Why have life then death then life again? What’s the point in that? It’s just job creation with you, isn’t it? Middle management, pointless to a fine point. Ha ha. Death is a job, nothing more.”
“I have no heart, that is true. You have no idea what that feels like. You get to feel, you get to see, you get to experience love and hope and fear and loss. I have none of that, just the words used to describe them. They mean nothing to me. You can make jokes about me, about how unfeeling I am, but you don’t want this, no one does. You’re right, I never had a life. That is my curse, not yours. You get experience. Death keeps you in check, gives you purpose, a finite time to try to force you all to do good in the world. Without me, without even the concept of me, living forever, you would have no deadline in which to do anything. You people think that if you had eternity, you’d learn every musical instrument, teach yourself every language, travel to every country, love countless men and women, but none of you would do that. You would start tomorrow, and when tomorrow comes, you’d start it tomorrow, ad infinitum. An infinity of tomorrows. Nothing would get done, you would sit all day and stare at your TVs and computers, idling away eternity. We are here.”
“A grave. You brought me to a grave? My grave, I suppose?”
“Yes.”
“So what now? You want me to lie in it, stare out of that rectangle at my little patch of sky? Wallow in self-pity, start regretting every little ******* detail of my life? I’m not interested in that. Just tell me what I have to do or where to go and I’ll be on my way.”
“You have already been judged, I have been told the outcome.”
“Surprise me.”
“You failed. You spent your life caring only for yourself, without any shred of humanity for your fellow people. At the moment you died, there were seven billion, five hundred and twelve million, seven hundred and twenty three thousand, two hundred and ninety nine other people alive. How many of them did you care about, how many did you think of when you threw away your leftovers, how many of them did you fall in love with, how many did you help?”
“Look, if I’m not happy, how the hell can I make others happy?”
“By being there. You don’t have to be happy to make others happy. Making others smile and laugh will cause you to smile and laugh. It is infectious. To help yourself, you must help others in the process, it just doesn’t work one way. I have been around since the beginning of time and it has happened far too much. You have failed, as so many before you have. This is your punishment. You will stand here forever, unable to move, staring down into your own grave. This is your reminder, this hole in the dirt. This is the culmination of everything you have ever done, every thought you have ever had. This is your life, confined to the darkness of a grave.”
“Wait, this is ****. I don’t want this. No book ever told me it would be like this. Where’s the fire, the torture, the pain? At least I’d be kept busy. There’s nothing here, no feeling, no company. Why must I be alone? Because I was alone in my life? That wasn’t my ******* choice, it was the choice of everyone else. No one took any time to ask me how I was doing. What happens to them, will end up like this?”
“Perhaps, but that is not for me to decide. There is more than one punishment, those who decide on such things have decided this is befitting of the way you lived your life. I must go now. There are many more souls in need of me.”
“Wait! Is there anything I can do? This can’t be it, I have time left, I can do good.”
“That time has passed. There is no time here. I must go now. This is your punishment; your trial has already finished.”
“So I stand here forever?”
“Yes. Goodbye.”
“****. I don’t want this. I’m sorry! Can you hear me? I’m ******* sorry! Give me another chance, please. Just one more chance.”

I went out in search of myself,
and on the road I found you,
your heart slowly fading in the gravel,
your soul disappearing in the night air.
I will rescue you from your darkness.
By dawn I will be home,
rapping gently on your door.

Many miles I’ve trekked alone,
walking weary beneath the stars,
and full moons passed without a smile,
frowning at my furrowed path.
Will you rescue me from my darkness?
By dawn I will be home,
lying softly in the grass.

The road was long and arduous,
but in the pines I found your tracks,
leading me from my borrowed grave,
guiding me to a brand new life.
You will rescue me from my darkness.
By dawn I will be home,
calling out your name again.

The nights were long and cold,
my breath clinging to the frosty air,
frost crunching beneath my feet,
the moon above haloed in ice.
She will guide me from my darkness.
By dawn I will be home,
sleeping soundly in the grass.

So many years have passed so slow,
my legs are lean and my body broken,
but my mind has never lagged,
thinking of you kept me strong.
You have rescued me from my darkness.
By dawn I will be home,
kissing your cheek once more.

I hope you dreamt of me each night,
running scared from what I was,
but you were always in my dreams,
piecing you back together again.
I have rescued you from your darkness.
By dawn I will be home,
running my fingers through your hair.

Almost home I see the lights,
the smoke rising out of the chimney,
you by the window awaiting my return,
heart skipping as I emerge from the forest.
We have rescued each other from our darkness.
By dawn I will be home,
in each other’s arms again.

Her face I see in darkest night,
rising slowly in evening’s silky twilight.
Shining low through high-flying clouds,
burning away love’s labour’s doubts,
and I see you somewhere far away,
this night is mine, yours is day.
This is the same moon lighting my way,
the same breeze caressing my face,
my cheeks red with the chilly night air,
the remnants of a broken nightmare
crunch underfoot and return to the earth.
Tonight’s value is less than its worth.

There is nothing here
but the haunting silence
your absence provides,
the indeterminably
long days the memory
of you offers me.

Shadows of yesterdays
cling to every surface
like the tar of black rain.
Every doubt I ever had
flows down the drains
and blocks every sink.

You are still around,
caught in the folds of
this origami universe.
Sometimes I see you,
peering out of the dark,
looking for a way home.

The wild cats
howl
and mew in
the forest,
and you’re in the
trees dreaming
you’re the tallest.
This is the
sound of your
heart’s love
and affection.
This is the
view from your
soul’s deepest
connection.

I saw you from across the room,
perfect strangers, eye-contact,
palpitations and trembling knees.
You saw me shake and smiled,
a reassuring one, not judging,
not mocking my silly reaction.

Your eyes glow with new universes.
Your hair burns with a million candles.
Your skin shines like full moons.
Your heart beats to a lost symphony.
Your soul radiates tranquillity.

You became my sweetheart, my darling,
my soulmate, meine liebchen.
Your eyes close with the coming night
and I lay you gently on the bed.
I sing a lullaby as you begin to dream,
nos da cariad, sleep tight.

I want to run my fingers through your hair,
breathe in your thick mountain air,
and love is love, I do declare,
my heart lives in your doleful stare.

Your sweet voice I have yet to hear,
imagining it’s tinged with hope and fear,
but I will hear it by the end of the year,
sweet and sultry distant and near.

It’s your face I dream in darkest night,
when all is lost, this blinded sight,
but soon will come the dawn’s fire light
and illuminate again my world so bright.

I have never felt this content before,
even reading those mythologies and lore,
for no longer am I begging for more,
I hear you knocking at my door.

Sunrise here,
sunset there,
and the distance
seems to shrink
each day.

Here comes the
morning light,
breaking through
my curtains,
waking me up
with colour.

The birds sing
your name to
the dawn, each
more beautiful
than the last.

The cigarette smoke burns my lungs,
but the glow is my only light
for the coming dark.
I have the cough and the slack
in my chest tortures my breaths,
but I persevere,
the relics of a healthy body turning black
until all that is left is the wheezy
breathlessness of detachment.

I am performing the slowest suicide possible,
cancer not far away now,
soon to have my heart in its grip,
holding tighter and tighter
until it squeezes all life from it,
and I am left cold and broken
in a grave of my own digging.
My singing voice is raspy
and my voice breaks at the high notes,
so now I sing sad folk songs
and breathe out broken veils
of mist into the cold air.

My throat is dry, coughing up consonants
and vowels growl with the voices
of smoke monsters.
I have just had a smoke
and now I think I may have another,
fed up of breathing easy tonight.
Create gothic cathedrals of fog
and let them hang foreboding
in the cold night air.

That was the wind knocking on my door,
passing on the message you won’t be round no more.
The whirlwind lifted me up off my feet
and landed me in the middle of the rain and the sleet.
You said you ain’t gonna be my girl no more,
but that wind just keeps on knocking on my door.

That was a cloud passing by over my head,
sending me a message that to you I’m as good as dead.
It took my light and left me with this shadow
clinging onto my soul and blocking my view of the show.
You told me I was to you as good as dead,
but that cloud just keeps on passing by over my head.

That was a bird whispering in my ear,
that everything will be okay if I cast off the fear.
She sings in my dreams and gives me solace
and sits in my caged heart behind my gladiolus.
You said I will be okay if I cast off the fear,
but that bird just keeps on whispering in my ear.

I’m running with the wolves
tonight.
Standing on the rock and howling at the
moonlight.
Wish I had more than
hindsight.
It’s cold and my claws have
frostbite.

I’m chasing after a dream
today.
Might not meet you there but we can meet
halfway.
I saw your silhouette in the
archway.
Smoke still rising from the
ashtray.

I might find time for you
tomorrow.
Today I’m busy chasing after a colourless
rainbow.
A dream offered itself but it was a
no-show.
Finding solace in the sadness of a
willow.

Tell a soul how
beautiful you are; go on,
do it, say those words
that open your
heavens wide and
shower your world
with the
love you deserve.
This is your
moment,
your turn to stand
in the spotlight
and
feel
love
like you have never
felt
before.

This
is my
bane, my
dear, lover.
Restless night
syndrome, dark
and pitiless sleep
as the blood rushes
through my ears like
cascades, torrents of
floodwater crushing my
eardrums and deafening
me as I try to dream a
little dream to find
some solace and
comfort in an
old world I
used to
know.

Fall
into a
void of
my own
making, I
clamber up
the stairs to
my dreamland
and dance with
your heart among
stars that refuse to
let their shine diminish,
and I will see you in
that void, the dark
and lonely rooms
that sit between
my happiness
and the love
that you
provide.

I am
yours
and you
are mine and
mine alone and
together we will
conquer all that we
see, every speck of land
in every single dream we
dream, universes dancing
together, minds melded
as one, and even they
who cannot be but
jealous may look
on with those
green eyes,
we will be
strong.

But the
alcohol dims
the effect and I
find myself talking
to the walls as if they
really did have ears, but
we all know they are dead
things, dead as you are in my
head. Someday I might find
the talent to create some
creature as beautiful
as you look in my
dreams, but I am
unable to find
appropriate
words to
describe
you.

I take a draw
of my cigarette
and the
way the smoke dances
reminds me of
how you used to dance,
slow and ****,
a striptease of sorts,
sliding that body
out of
the
black dress
like a
snake
shedding her skin.

The glow of
the cigarette end
is beginning
to fade,
and the last ashes
of you fall
broken to
the ground. I
can’t repair you
anymore, I have
neither the tools
nor the patience.
I have to leave you
as I
find you,
and you must leave
me the way
you found me,
looking for you with
another cigarette in my pocket
and no
light.

There’s this fly buzzing
around in my
apartment, divebombing
my head and
generally annoying me.
He swoops and flits
and bounces off
my cheek but
he never flies into
my rolled-up
newspaper.

He seems to be
enjoying himself,
the cheeky little
******
making faces at me.
What do you have
to smile about?
A hundred eyes
and **** on grass
still looks sweet
to you.

What is his purpose?
To annoy everything
else on this
planet?
If so, he’s doing
a **** fine job
of it, better
than anything else
wallowing around
in this hell.
Better than me,
that’s for sure,
shown up by
a ******* fly!

Later on, I find
him dead on the
windowsill, his little
legs sticking up
in the air,
his wings spread out,
ready to fly off
into the afterlife,
heaven-bound, if such
a heaven exists.
I hope not,
I don’t want an afterlife
that I have to
share with
him.

I flick him out
the window
and wonder if there’s
someone up there
with his thumb
and *******
in a circle
ready to give me
the same treatment.

Bring
it
on,
old
man,
bring
it
on.

Every evening offers
me three
choices; get drunk,
watch old westerns,
or get drunk
and watch
old westerns.

I always
choose the
best
of
both worlds.

Eastwood narrating
my world,
Morricone
supplying my
soundtrack
as I travel
from Nowhere A
to Nowhere B
on a palomino
that just
runs
runs
runs
through desert
heat and raging
rapids, imagining
the Indians behind us
and having to duck
their arrows as we
try to reach
the hills and
safety.

All from
the comfort
of
my
sofa.

It’s snowing
outside, but
not
in my
world.
In my world,
there is sunlight
and kisses
and beautiful women
who just so happen
not to be
******* gals
spreading their legs
for a coupla bucks.
These are refined
ladies, champagne
drinkers in cocktail
dresses that hug their
***** and hips.
They wear high heels,
elegant ones,
all black, none
of that garish red.

All from
the comfort
of
my
sofa.

I fall asleep,
drunk,
dreaming of revolving
circles where
parallel universes
collide and mix
together to form
a brand new
state of
consciousness.

It’s hard to let
go when you
forget what
it was you
were holding
on to.
Was it a dream
that captivated
my heart or
was there something
greater at
play?

I’ve forgotten
all the names
of the characters
that have graced
my stage over
the years but
I never forget
how each one
made me feel.

Forgetting is
the
only
journey worth
taking
now.

I’m old,
stuck in my
ways and I
won’t be
making
friends
anymore,
too long in
the tooth
to let new
eyes see the
fire still
burning in my soul.
That is
for me alone,
it might come
out to
play sometimes,
when it’s dark
and no other
fires are visible,
I’ll let out a
little spark and smile
in the way only
someone who has
lost everything can.

I hopped into a
boxcar and ended
up somewhere
in Wisconsin,
mid-winter froze
in the air
and my breath
crystallized into
dead angels
that hung like
gargoyle icicles
hanging from the
gutters of cathedrals
of fog.

I found a bar
with bikes outside,
the lights inside
too dim to lighten
the sidewalk.
There was swearing
and the sounds
of poker chips
sliding on wooden tables
full of scratches
and gouges and
knife marks.

It was ***** inside,
dust clung to every
available surface
and none of the clientele
had had a shower
in weeks.
I ordered a whisky
and found myself
a dark corner
to watch the locals.
I was as happy
as a spider
in a cauldron of
dead flies.

There is something
magical about places
like this,
seeing the real
side of humanity,
the dirt and the
grime, the fights
and the blood
and the camaraderie
of like-minded souls
not fit for
public consumption.
These places were
perfect and I never
wanted to leave
any of them,
but tabs build up,
money runs dry,
glasses get smashed
and I get my
*** handed to me
by some ****
barmaid wearing
leathers and chains.

I think I’ll be good
tonight, a long
journey just behind
me and I need
a few drinks
to forget who
I am and where
I live in the universe.
Give myself the
company of a
different mind
for a while.

I think I’ll like it
here, in the snow
and the warming
whisky
that flows through
my veins like
hell’s blood.

I have a
black heart
in a black
cage
in black chains
and I am
the happiest
person you
will ever
meet.

I only
go out
at night
with the
****** and
the drunks
and these
are all
the
friends
I will ever
need.

Summer is
just Winter
letting her hair
down,
prancing around
in a bikini
with those
come to bed
eyes,
but she
will freeze
you solid
and take everything
from you.

At this
juncture,
I hope you
find some kind
of meaning
to allow
the clocks to keep
ticking,
to let the days
keep tumbling
over each
other,
one after
another
after
another,
never ending,
never ending,
never ending.

Let me lie
here on
my bench
while you
all rush to
wherever it
is you need
to be.
I have good
whisky
in my head
and the
stories I
tell are
better than
yours.

I do nothing,
and time is
much
slower for me
than it is
for you.
That annoys
me sometimes,
when you
are old you
wonder where
all the time
went.
I know
exactly where
all mine went,

every
dragging
second
of it.

I watch
you people
but I
am not
jealous.
What horrors
sit ashamed
in the hallways
of your
mind,
begging to
be released,
growing
bigger each day.
One day
you will
unleash
all of it
in one
****** go.
Here’s the
trick I
learned.

You gotta
release
it a little
bit at
a
time
so no
one gets
hurt and
you get
to
relax
afterwards.

This is
how I see
the world,
full of
powder kegs
waiting
for a
light.
Let me
lie here on
my bench,
I have no
fight in
me
today.

This is my room, these are my four barren walls.
This is where anxiety keeps me in chains,
this is where I shield myself from the hurt.
Here I’m alone, nothing will rip my soul in twain.
This is where I wear my heart on my sleeve,
this is where darkness will find no home.
Here is my life, like superfluidity,
flowing free as a waterfall with an infinite drop.
This is my room, these shadows are mine alone.

There is heartbreak on every corner,
a worn-out poet in every home,
a fairytale seamstress in every room
and they are all decidedly human.

Every busker sings songs for glass hearts,
every street magician infuses some magic
through the pain and hardship of another day
and we all appreciate the little things.

What meaning is there to life
other than the meaning you give it?
Show me the proof of a master plan
and I will show you how wrong it is.

Rise up to each day’s new challenges
and laugh when everything wants you to cry.
Live the life you want the world to know,
not the life the world expects you to live.

i summon and conquer your dreammind
with ghosts of aborted foetuses
and we rampage through the corridors
of your indoctrinations.
knock on the doors and you answer
with your deadmind ex nihilo,
manifestations of deeper fetishes,
like the one where you
want to fuckkids and have that power
because you have nothing.
your life is nothing but a bookend
waiting to fall off the shelf.


*n u drag ur naked body thru the blood n the glory of a fight that still has some losing left in it. u lick away ur bruzes n sleep in catatonia coz ur mind fuckedya. had enough but it was pillory n stocks n u swim on the back of a nightterror. still u drag that useless body thru gravel n rocks n icecold water, washing off the dust n the silt n the beggared belief of the siren call of a dream u had when u was young but now its gone n ur left grasping at the pebble of a memory that was once a mighty boulder but time has weathered m worn its face n peeled away all the best parts until now it is smooth n useless n small, an insignificant little morselpiece of what it once was, and u turn it round in ur hand n bury it in the silt.

The bass fades in, nice and slow,
fading out again for a moment of silence.
The flash of a flute in the distance,
a slow cymbal shaking into existence,
cellos driving out a deep and quiet rhythm.
The tin whistles of frightened seabirds
fly for shelter from the rising and falling
of bassoons floating in the dark sky.
The conductor unleashes a mighty roar
from his orchestra and gone again,
the violins with their staccato
carrying on for a bit longer
before the orchestra erupts again,
playing a few more notes than before,
the oboes constantly playing.
Drumsticks beat down steadily
on a cymbal held in a gloved hand,
rising up in crescendo and accelerando,
harder and faster they fall,
harder and faster they strike,
the orchestra blares again
as we in the wings start to get unnerved
but the storm has used all its power,
the players are tired tonight
and all that is left
is the tambourine man
shaking his hand as he walks off stage.

I’ve fallen for a black magic woman
and her spell intoxicates me,
tints my world with magic
and I am infatuated with her.
We make love beneath African skies
and she conjures storms
to wreak havoc on my dull days.
Her eyes the shade of mulled wine,
her lips sanguine like fresh wounds,
her soul the steel-blue of juniper berries
and I am drunk on the gin of her tears.
What fool I was to fall in love
with the dark heart of a loveless woman,
to exchange my happiness for her satisfaction.

The neighbour’s a borderline neurotic
and he waves a gun out his window
claiming it’s the end of days,
but no one pays attention to these people anymore.
There’s a very famous book
full of people like my neighbour
and they were all taken seriously.
I don’t know what’s happened in the intervening years
but there’s no crowd in the street
writing down everything this crackpot says,
no **** of mystics and doomsayers
claiming the judgment is at hand.
No, there’s just an empty street
because it’s 2am and he’s drunk
and I’m trying to get to sleep.

By the light of glowing stars
I will traverse this path I’ve taken.
Though wicked brambles may snag my sleeves
and felled trunks may block my course,
even as twigs and sticks trip my ankles,
I will traverse this path I’ve taken.

As the path rises, it shall surely fall,
you can only travel uphill so far
before the landscape takes pity
and guides you down into a valley.
Even as the sun ends another day,
I will traverse this path I’ve taken.

The beautiful night hides nothing from me,
I will traverse this path I’ve taken.
Midnight dark, the sky full of stars,
they offer me luminance and courage
when others see dots in the darkness.
By the light of glowing stars
I will traverse this path I’ve taken.

Who the ****
was me in a
past life?
Who deserved
this on
their record?

I can tell how you will live your life
by the way the wind scatters the leaves.
If the wind scatters the leaves in disarray,
your life will be as tumultuous
as the way the wind scatters the leaves.
If the wind scatters the leaves in pretty patterns,
your life will be as beautiful and elegant
as the way the wind scatters the leaves.
Here are the leaves that will show you your life,
a pile soaked with rain and clumped together.
The wind comes in and those leaves do not move,
stuck to the ground and matted with rainwater.
This is how I know you will never change
by the way the wind doesn’t scatter the leaves.

In a castle constructed of bones on a mountain high,
our hero sits alone on an ivory throne,
waiting for his current state of jejune to pass.
Whisperings of a voice, mellifluous air,
a singing so beautiful his heart skips a beat
at the gentle murmurings of such an ethereal voice.

And so he vacates his ivory throne
in search of this songbird that has invaded his walls,
the voice instils a certain hiraeth in his mind,
that village once so dear to him that now lies in ruins
due to his incandescent bursts of magical madness.

The owner of this voice, the eloquence, the elegance,
the image in his head that of a maiden on a rock,
as naked as the day she was born
and bathed in an iridescent sunrise.
A scintilla of a break in her voice
and she begins to sob at the meaning of her words.

He finds the source of this angelic sound,
a woebegone but comely creature supine on a table,
her eyes staring into heavenly mountains of madness.
She does not look to meet his wild-eyed gaze,
instead melting away until she is nothing at all,
leaving only dancing embers and phosphenes where she had lain.

He hears this burst of angelic quavers every day
but his madness permits no memory of each
to reside in his brain, comfortable and snug.
Instead, he suffers this delusion every morning,
when his head his quiet and thoughts are oblivion.

This siren swansong has no source in reality,
it is the last vestige of a mind damaged by time and solitude,
where the dawn chorus each morn’s twilight goes unheard,
but the ghostly choral vocalisations of a bitter memory
break his trance and he searches for the only sound not real.

they came from the woods equipped with vindictive teeth
and they ripped my skin off and my internal organs
they scattered ubiquitously and left me for dead
but i am no mortal, i am a god of my own design,
and i will take my retribution on them from the woods.
i drag my body through the thorny bushes and sticks
and up the hills and down the valleys as mountains tremble
to the ground and fall as pebbles from the stormy sky
and my claws dig deeper into the soft belly of the earth
and she screams in agony at this **** of her soil.
i drink from the river and find shelter in a dead horse
and lay its still warm organs where my organs were before
and there i sleep until the sun appears and again i drag
this useless body as forenoon becomes afternoon becomes e’en.
a starry sky offers itself to me but i cannot navigate
with this pallid tepid light illuminating nothing of this environ,
so morning again i drag and i drag this sack of skin and bones
and my teeth chatter in the cold and my breath becomes angels
and they dance for my amusement as i continue up broken hills
and there before me is the city of a thousand lights
siren calling me towards her open arms and seedy *****
and i roll down this steep escarpment and paralyse my hands
as i grab these rocks so jagged like mica or quartz or flint
and now my hands are gashed wide open and blood
smears the path i took but that does not matter because
my enemy lies before me in this city of a thousand lights,
a city that refuses to sleep to man or beast or godlike dead.
i slide unseen into a school and wait in a closet until the morn
when all the children fresh from adventures as robin hood
and his merry men running wild and rampant in the woods,
who found me sleeping and with their army of vicious teeth,
they ripped my skin off and threw my internal organs away
and now i lie in wait for them so i can cut off their skins
and i can disperse their internal organs everywhere
because you don’t disturb the gentle slumber of a tired godman
and don’t expect the godthing not to succumb to blind rage,
so as i lie here and imagine all the horrible things i will do,
i cannot help but laugh a laugh of a beast on the cliffedge of death
but i will always get my requital and **** what needs to be killed.