The smoke that swirled up from her pipe
hung there in the air, partly obscuring her face

With cupped hands she began
    to gather the smoke
  as if it were sand on the beach

Very carefully she began stroking
and teasing it until it appeared
to be taking on the properties of a solid

What had been the contents of her lungs
moments before, were now compressed
to the size of a tennis-ball

This blue-grey sphere hung there between
us like some strange smoke-filled soap-bubble

As I began to open my mouth to say something
a sword the size of a pin flew from my lips, and
burst the bubble whereupon the smoke fell
to the floor like fine white snow…….

          “…don’t you know?” she said, with a grin,
         “…that’s just the way that wars begin!”

As she refilled the pipe with twigs and weeds
she raised one eye-brow and a voice somewhere
between us said…..
”so you want to find yourself,do you?……..
don’t you know that talking to yourself
is the first sign of ’SANITY?”….

“And with that my mouth
involuntarily said “FORKS”
but the sound didn’t come
instead
    from the side of her bed
came the unmistakable sound of forks falling on a
wooden floor…….and everything began to rhyme
   then I heard the chime of her quartz clock
a rooster appeared, with an immense ****
                               ……..attached to it’s head
                                    by the wind it is lead
                   but East is opposite North instead

  then she scooped it up
    and it turned to twigs..
before my eyes could adjust….
…….the phosphorous flash of IGNITION
                     the firey INQUISITION
As she relit the pipe, with what seemed to be
             my thoughts and dreams made real
                                        in solid words
                                            in solid air
                             I cried in deep despair
                   for the weight of untold shame
                             that showered like rain
                   on those who could not explain
                                         their own pain
                           on those trapped in shame
                               those crucified for vain
                           making everyone to blame
                                             for MY pain
                                    which falls like rain
                                into her upturned hand
                                   where it forms a lake
                                     called “my mistake”

Based on a lack or something missing
                     I can hear the hissing
                          of the black snake
                  the guardian of the gate
                 my birthright to legislate
                catch fire before my eyes
                 as  another dreamy spire
                 of grey-blue smoke…….
                     …….rises into the void
for a brief moment the only rhyme is
            PARANOID

             but just as quickly it is gone

As the pipe glows then rises musical notes pour
from its bowl as if the Mistral wind itself were
blowing through the embers.
Upon inhaling I am surprised to find that my
companion has been joined by Oscar Wilde…
heavily, theatricaly disguised as an empty chair
    with accompanying wall-paper

This observation becomes solid in the air
and suddenly there are chairs everywhere
in my pockets, in my pipe, in my hair…..
chairs of every size and type and colour everywhere
no standing room, just chair upon chair upon chair

“Collect your thoughts” said Oscar Wilde
to me, as if I was a naughty child
So, slowly, I gather the chairs together
with cupped hands, like sand, into one single chair
then lay my pipe upon it to make it real
from behind the canvas I step….my hands reveal
PAINT AND BRUSH
IN SUCH A RUSH
                       GRIND AND CRUSH
                                       YELLOW OCHRE
                                                    CHROME YELLOW
                                                              yell “HELLO!”
                                        ’”HELLO!”
                          “HELLO!”

“    “….have you fallen in love with that pipe?” asks the chair
       As I stare…
            yellow sunflowers everywhere
festoon the walls, the floor, the chair…..
                 elsewhere…
there's rubber clothes and x-ray hair
           starry nights and daymares
         loveless thighs and derrieres
          cut price love unguaranteed
    sure-fire ways to dispose of seed
right now…… with GREED-SPEED
            rivers of come, knee-deep
            bed’s on fire…..can’t sleep
cut off my ears but they won’t bleed
               instead they turn to ****
which I place on the chair with the pipe
and invite my companion to take her feed
      
   “…don’t mind if I do” she replies
  “…but must we forever sit inside?”
“..not far from here I think I spied”
“… a cornfield……some countryside..”
“we could walk far, and near, and wide
then round and left and right outside
till darkness falls upon our heads…..
  and sends us scurrying for our beds”

But sleep won’t come
because some elektronik hum
is buzzing in the walls
makes me shiver in my *****
till my spirit-level falls
and my skin begins to crawl
off my body,….up the walls
         reality DISSOLVES
………skinned alive on a granite rock
……beneath the stars of future-shock

                 alone…….
with billions of others
           with no cover
other …than the cold blankets of mist
        that hiss
           from the wounds in my wrist
         reality persists

              CAN MY SOUL RESIST?

          WILL MY HEART DESIST?

FROM BEATING IN MY BREAST

WILL MY BONES STAND THE TEST?

…….or will they crumble like the rest?

                             and be blessed

                                        by her

          as she smokes me in her pipe ….

               I am scorched by her love

         that comes raining from above

                   into my upturned hand

        and when I can no longer stand

               another day another night

                  in this lifetime of fright

                 and I want to take flight

               I drink her from my hand

like fresh spring water on a summer’s day

                      she makes my head sway

              to the natural rhythm

               of her breath……..

                 of her smoke…..

                   of her hair……..

                     of her chair….

        of ANYWHERE

      where she is…..



She gives me back my skin

         fills me to her brim

then strikes another match

and draws me deep inside

till I can no longer hide…

      my grin, a mile wide

   I’m safe here inside

          ………outside

         ………inside

     THE VOID….