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Wandisa Zwane Oct 2015
Written by

Wandisa Zwane  


April 16, 2015



INT.  APT 3101 - THE BEDROOM  

It's 02:31 am and I find myself laying silently on my bed scrolling through Instagram...Twitter...Tumblr....and Snapchat. I find myself struggling to go to sleep.  I wasn't even able to sleep for an hour or two. It's not normal as its way past my curfew. I receive a text message. I'm confused because it's
still too early for anyone to be texting me, and I know everyone nearby is fast asleep because we have school. So who could be texting me?

CUT TO: PHONE SCREEN

HER ( via text )

I'm struggling with the math homework, help ? Are you up ?

ME ( via text )

I am actually. FaceTime, call or text?

20 minutes later my phone starts ringing. She was FaceTiming me. I stare at her name for about 5 seconds trying to put myself together.

ME

Hello, Ellie

I wasn't focused on the math. I was hoping that we could forget about the math and just talk about us and the futility of life. For some stupid reason I really thought you were gonna say something cheesy like I can't get you out of my head but can we just talk until we fall in love? But no it never happened as we had an hour long conversation about math.

CUE " MATH CONVERSATION"

The futility in that conversation was cosmic to the point where I began questioning existence. But when the call finally ended I was disappointed.

CUT TO: VARSITY

It's 8am and I'm at sitting in English tired and drained. Still contemplating about the futility of life.

HER

Hey, Tyler thanks for helping me with the math homework.

ME

Uhm Ellie do you want to come over too my apartment over the weekend and chill ?

CUT TO: APARTMENT 3101

It's 12am and the apartment is really untidy. I jump out of bed and clean the entire apartment in a record time of 12 minutes and 44 seconds. I'm going crazy over here as I'm trying to remember if I gave her the correct directions. Thank god I gave her the correct directions as I see the uber pulling up in front of the apartment complex. I start sweating and shaking and I'm fearful that I'm going to have a nervous breakdown. I start cringing.
I open the door the door and it's her standing directly in front of me. I can't breathe. I'm overwhelmed by an awe of emotions. Literally - she's beautiful

ME

I mumbled - Hey Ellie it's so good to see you ( the hug was very awkward because I was nervous - it was one of those hugs where both people don't know how to hug each which makes things really awkward)

HER

Hi


ME

So glad you could make it. How was the drive ( note to self: I should stop making things awkward ) I'm so irritated at myself.

CUT TO:  APARTMENT 3101 - LIVING ROOM

She's sitting on the couch. And I'm sitting right next to her. Okay let's just say there was a 30cm gap between the both of us. I was really nervous. I found myself drinking gallons of water. I forgot to offer her anything. I was nervous to the point where I couldn't even make eye contact. I just stared at her forehead and her lips.

ME

Aren't you exhausted I mean that drive was really long ( she lived like 3 blocks away from me )

HER

Not really , I'm just really stressed about varsity and stuff I guess.

We actually start conversing with one another for 5 hours straight.We smoke about 3 cigarettes and have the most fruitful conversation ever about female energy and the power of the the heart. She's really enlightened - I thought she was really basic. We both can't go to sleep because we're actually  enjoying the presence of one another. It was cathartic and refreshing actually.

ME

Want go up to the roof and look at the universe?

HER

I'd love too.

CUT TO : COMPLEX ROOF

I brought a blanket up to the roof cause I thought it was cold. It wasn't but we just layed down underneath the open night sky and gazed into the stars. We connected with the universe/ourselves/each other. It was bliss. We ended up falling asleep on top of the roof. To my amazement we were silently wrapped around each other.

CUT TO: APARTMENT 3101 - THE KITCHEN

HER

( chuckling )
How'd you sleep

ME

( Smiling )
I slept pretty well.

ME

Do you have any plans for today?

HER

YES actually...

SEVERAL HOURS LATER: APARTMENT 3101 - KITCHEN/BEDROOM AND LIVING ROOM

The sun is setting and she still hasn't packed her bags.

ME

When are you leaving?

She said she was leaving on Sunday

HER

In 30.

ME

(I tried to not crack in front of her)
Cool.


APARTMENT 3101

About 2 weeks later she surprisingly pitches at my door with her luggage.

HER
I'm moving in with you!

I was excited at the fact that she was moving in with me but I obviously tried acting cool and composed.

CUT TO: WOLVES CAFE

As they're sitting there talking to each other about their families, Osho and meditation over a cup of tea.

ME

I was adopted.

HER

WOW - That's a huge plot twist.

She sat there speechless for about 2 minutes trying to fathom the knowledge I just presented to her.

HER

So do you ever think about your real parents?

ME

All the time - they both died in a car accident when I was 3.

HER

I'm so sorry.

ME

It's okay - I mean I know they're somewhere out there in the universe checking up on me. I speak to them when I feel lonely.

Enough about my tragic past..How are your parents?

I've never told any other soul about my parents before. She was the first person I ever told .

HER

I never knew my dad but my mom has been living with a brain tumour for like 2 years now.

ME

Wow. That's must've been so tough for you when you found out about it.

HER

It was. I went through the most vicious cycle of depression for an entire year. But I'm trying to make most of the time I have left with her.

ME

How much time do you have left to see her her and stuff ?

HER

(She starts tearing up)
3 months

CUT TO: APARTMENT 3101 - LIVING ROOM

I'm still fascinated by the fact that she's into Osho, existentialism, metaphysics and epistemology. But I also felt like our relationship had escalated so quickly. We're we rushing things? The relationship felt like it was moving at the speed of light.

ME

Do you feel like we're moving too fast ?

HER

There's no such thing, if it's meant to be it will be, whether fast or slow as long as it's true, it will last as long as you want it to.

I was momentarily tongue-tied as I was trying to digest the words she just said.

ME

......

(Still voiceless)

She still had a lot more to say after that

CUES : "rants"

But in that entire rant she said something that echoed within me.

HER

YOU KNOW I MAKE YOU HAPPY

After she said this I felt like fainting. So not only did she make me voiceless I was overwhelmed by an ocean of indescribable emotions- wow

DAYS LATER: APARTMENT 3101 - KITCHEN

I'd finally recovered from those powerful words she preached to me. So I found myself sitting in the kitchen trying to write a letter to her about how I really felt. I wasn't the best at expressing my emotions through writing but I gave it a shot.

ME

Love is the unforetold explanation for creation. Love is life. It's the merger of minds. The marriage of minds. It transcends through time, it's timeless. It takes you into a dimension filled with possibilities and opportunities. It helps you understand you are that you are not worthless. Every time I am with you I understand we are here for a reason. And every time I stare into your eyes. I realise that you are mine.  

I sealed it an envelope and put it on the kitchen counter.

LATER ON THAT DAY:

She opens the letter and starts crying.

CUT TO: THE TREEHOUSE

I introduce her to some of the guys in the treehouse. They welcomed her to the treehouse with open arms.

HER

So what do you guys do in the treehouse?

PAUL : (one of the guys part of the treehouse)

Well in the treehouse we just try to expand. We write, make music, poetry, nothing much really.

MCDONALDS DRIVE- THRU

She was to lazy to go home and cook supper she was s bit hypocritical cause she said we should stop buying junk food. So we decided to go to McDonald's. We were down to our last packet of 2 minute noodles anyway.


CUT TO: HOSPITAL

We went to visit her mother. She introduced me but there was no warmth in the hug we shared. I could feel her shrill body disintegrating. She was really cold. You could see she was dying.

HER

How've you been mom ?

MOM

She couldn't even speak properly. It was sad but when she eventually managed to responded to Ellie's question.

MOM

I'm still fighting but I don't know if I can do this for much longer.

HER

No mum you can't leave me.

MOM

I don't want to make you empty promises my child.

Who's this handsome young man Ellie?

HER

(Smiling heavily)
It's Tyler, my boyfriend

She just called me her boyfriend in front of her mom. She just put a label on our relationship. I thought it was completely platonic.

ME

Afternoon Mam. It's a pleasure to finally meet you.

I knew her name ( Stacy )  but in that moment I felt like a child in primary school - so I decided to be respectful and call her mam. I wasn't sure whether or not I should call her "Ellie's mom" or Stacy. It was just a tricky situation. So I opted for mam.

MOM

( smiling )
The pleasure is all mine Tyler.

She told me to come closer to her cause she wanted to whisper something into my ear.

MOM

Tyler I'm clearly dying as you can see. So I'm leaving with you an important task of ensuring that's my daughter remains happy at all times.Take care of her for me - please

ME

I'll take care of her - she's in safe hands.

MOM

That's the spirit Tyler. Can you give us a moment please Tyler.

HER

Just go down to the kiosk and get me a bottle of distilled water. Please.

(Tyler leaves the room)

MOM

I remember the first time you wrapped your tiny hand around my index finger , you had my soul laying on 3 cms of palm.

( Ellie interrupts )

HER

Mom don't do this , prolonging life is pure idiocy.

(she smiles as a tear rolls down her cheek )

Die so your soul can have its summer ,don't worry about my pain cause I'm really happy for you, your soul can finally taste true liberation, see my tears as autumn leaves falling from trees , I'm naked and all I can show you is the truest forms of love.

MOM

You're so beautiful because you're so true. Our connection has no equation my daughter, as I leave my body just know that my time with you transcends forever.

HER

Mother it's time for you to leave. Take a piece of my happiness, it's futile anyway and I have it in abundance but I shall be lost without you in body, I shall be found when I'm with you in soul.

MOM

Clarity comes with the last breath, as hatred and love become nothing, you are nothing and everything all at once, I'm happy for you have given it to me, tomorrow and yesterday no longer matter

(her heart stops beating and her souls goes home - heart rate monitor indicates her mom has just flat lined)

Ellie starts screaming. The nurses and doctors come sprinting in.


DOCTOR

NUURSE HAND ME THE DEFIBRILLATOR !!

HER

(in agonising pain and disbelief that her mother is dead she starts screaming)

SAVE MY MUM, PLEASE SHE CANT LEAVE ME !! YOU CANT LET HER DIE.

DOCTOR

Nurse get her out of here.

She's kicking and shoving the other nurses as she is being escorted out the room.

NURSE

Don't worry the doctors are doing all they can to save her.

Tyler comes back from the kiosk with the distilled water to find Ellie on the floor crying.

ME

What's wrong?

HER

( Her face goes pale )
She's gone ....

2 DAYS LATER: BACK AT 3101

Ellie has locked herself in my/our room. We haven't spoken to each other for like 2 weeks.

She finally decides to come out of the room.

HER

(Breaks down, again  )
It's her birthday today.

I've never seen her so broken and disfigured before. She's in pieces - distorted.

NARRATOR

Death is the door between two lives; one is left behind, one is waiting ahead. Death is the ultimate experience of this life - Osho

“Birth leads to death, death precedes birth. So if you want to see life as it really is, it is rounded on both the sides by death. Death is the beginning and death is again the end, and life is just the illusion in between. You feel alive between two deaths; the passage joining one death to another you call life. Buddha says this is not life. This life is dukkha – misery. This life is death"

HER

I WONT CRUMBLE - IM A BIG GIRL NOW. MOMMA RAISED ME TO BE A STRONG WOMAN SO IM GONNA DO THAT.

She put up this facade as if nothing ever happened. She didn't allow herself to mourn the death of her mother. She was apathetic for the next 2 weeks.

This  was a tricky phase because she either woke up angry or sad. She just rampaged through the house, didn't attend lectures - she just left a trail of destruction wherever she went. I even have the scars to prove it.

A FEW WEEKS LATER: THE DEATH ORDEAL IS FINALLY OVER

She gained about 5 kilograms in that entire period. She just kept on stuffing her face with ice cream and chocolates

HER

Tyler thanks for being there in my moment of absolute depression.

ME

I thought you were never going to be able to get yourself out of that dark abyss you were trapped in.

AT THE BEACH

The sun is setting and the couple is walking along the sand enjoying each other's company.

ME

I've got something for you Ellie

( I hope she likes it )

HER

Yes?

ME

Close your eyes

(Takes out a heart shaped pediment from back pocket  and places it around her neck )

You can open your eyes now.

HER

(Smiling)
It's lovely, thank you

ME

(Smiling back)
I'm giving you my heart but not my soul.

HER

(Blushes)

ME

(In my head)
I'm giving her my heart she better not break it.

Have you ever had that feeling before in a relationship where you think you love the other person more than they love you. To the point where you'd even get their names tattooed onto your chest. Cause that's how I feel right now.

IN THE CAR:


I'm driving Ellie to the airport. OR Tambo in fact. I'm playing some Jamie ** but I quickly change it and play my favourite song Female Energy.

CUE "FEMALE ENERGY"

ME

You excited?

HER

Yes I'm really really excited for this.

ME

I'm really gonna miss you

HER

Me too.

Ellie was completing her mothers bucket list - so she had had to travel all the way to Tibet and learn Buddhism. Nothing much really she was leaving  for 2 months.


But little did Tyler know that this was going to be the last time he sees Ellie because her plane never landed in Tibet - the plane crashed and it sunk with no no one  surviving.

STILL IN THE CAR:

Ellie hands Tyler a letter

HER

Tyler please don't open this until you get home.

ME

(Smiling)
I'll try my best.


Car parks at drop and go zone at the airport. Tyler takes out Ellie's bag from the boot.

They hug and kiss

Ellie cries.

CUT TO : "APT 3101 - LIVING ROOM "

Tyler opens the letter.

CUE "ELLIES VOICE AND ON OUR SWEATERS "


It's funny how for someone who has been so used to being lonely, the second I grip onto something that seems real, my biggest fear is losing that grip - even though for the longest time ever I've become immune to the feeling of loneliness. The same way people become dependent on other beings, people can become dependent on loneliness too - you become immune to self reassurance, your insecurities, your vulnerability and after a while it seems ideal and okay, but only because it's all you've got. You allow yourself to be consumed by this self indulgent energy making you think you don't need anybody because how else do you get by when you know that you have nobody. So when someone comes creeping in through the front door, with nothing but good intentions - you shut them out because you've lost sight of the difference in the realness of someone coming through the front door and the fakeness of someone coming through the backdoor. I struggle to fathom your presence because I didn't see you coming, through any door, you were just always there in plain sight. I don't know how to describe what I feel when I'm around you because I have never felt anything like it. All I know is that it leaves me in a place
An incomplete screenplay.
Caroline Lee  Aug 2016
Purgatory
Caroline Lee Aug 2016
8am solo endless drives in
Purgatory
Will you remember me?
Will you still say say my say my name
Or have I disappeared into all these varying shades of 8am
Have I become the way I looked at him?
Will I fade here? Or will I reignite only to show you up
Turn up and burn up I know you never wanted me
Just wanted the person you imagined me to be
Now all I see is the white lines of this highway
Purgatory
Will you remember me?
Will this be
Forever?
8am fade out good so slow
I'm nobody's baby so nobody needs to know
My glass bloodwork and hazy brain
I know you don't see me the same
Purgatory.
Written in the parking lot of my community college
Also frank ocean's new album is perfect.
Sara Jones  May 2015
Complements
Sara Jones May 2015
Cute
Pretty
Beautiful
****
While most women love hearing these words from the lips of their lovers for the evening,
I don't.
They aren't simple complements, they're ways to make me vulnerable.

Now I just sound like a white girl with issues, yeah I know.
But the truth is that everyone who has told me those words as only wanted what's between my legs.
And half the time, when they got it, they left.

I'm tired of men seeing me at 8am with no makeup or heels
Looking at me as if I had lied to them
Because I'm obviously looking for
love* in the wrong places

One night stands don't make hoes into housewives
But they will certainly turn housewives into hoes.
Stop.. Why are you crying?

Because you told me I couldn't
Therefore I didn't

You taught me to loathe myself.
And now you come back like "hope all is well."

It's taking me time
Only time could tell

Well..

Everyday I'm learning how to keep it moving
Everything you said "no" to, I'm doing

I'm not afraid,
Anything I didn't do yesterday I'm doing today

I swear..

You altered me
But wonder where's my originality

I hate talking to you because you don't listen
You force me to become a beast within

This is why I can't let anybody in
This is why I repent my sins


Getting my daily bread but it feels like I'm giving in

I thought you loved me enough to send me out in this world
I was supposed to be your #1 girl

But you tricked me

Let me down and filled with insecurity
Let me drown and think I wasn't worthy

Stop.. Why am I crying?
*Because if I said I forgive you I'd be lying
bobby burns Feb 2015
in the somatic nervous system,
acetylcholine (ACh) stimulates skeletal muscle, causing contraction

action potentials
in the 8am physio lecture,
the biggest on campus
crammed with nursing majors,
and health science hankerers,
public health preachers,
OT saints and angels

amino acid NTs: glutamate (+) GABA (-) aspartate (+) glycine (-)

the prof wrote on a distant whiteboard
too many complained about being lost
she made a joke about feeding *******
to mice for her neuroscience research

amines: serotonin (-) dopamine (-/+) norepinephrine (+/-) epinephrine (+)

STEM-dominated
when i'm just looking
to drop my roots
and press that
good earth into
the spaces between
my toes and
under my nails

but the grounds are a garden
of biodiversity from clippings
gathered by migrant habit-clad
founders more than a century ago

the soil is fertile            it is temperate
there are water filters in most residences

there is enough here for me
*(+) stimulatory (-) inhibitory (+/-) stimulatory or inhibitory depending on the type of receptor to which it binds.

there are two types of summation: spatial and temporal.

in spatial summation, many presynaptic neurons fire to a singular postsynaptic neuron.
in temporal summation, a single presynaptic neuron fires sequentially to a postsynaptic neuron.
andrea hundt Aug 2013
If 3am could talk it would probably tell me all your secrets.
it would tell me the position you sleep in to feel safe
and the ice cold comment your best friend made.

if 4am could talk it would probably only whisper rumours.
It would assume you can't sleep because he hurt you last year
And it would conclude the fluttering of your eyelids had something to do with what you failed to tell 3am.

If 5am could talk it would be nervous and unsteady.
It would look to your still body and wonder if you were at peace, and if it should wake you.
It might ask 6am to follow up.

If 6am could talk, it would try to be cheery. For the sake of 5am.
It might say you slept just fine, and tomorrow will be the same.
6am might lie and have you shaken and stirred for 7am to handle.

If 7am could talk, it would not know what to say.
It would tell me you were happy being unhappy
7am would giggle mindlessly and hope I went away.

By 8am, no one will be talking but you. And you will tell me a mix of what I already heard through the whispers of the night before.

By 9am the silence of the noise will begin all over again, and you'll wonder why nothing has changed. Why 3am can't be trusted, and 8am hasn't saved you from the incessant humming.

I want to listen to you at 3am, not the silence that tells me what wasn't mine to hear.

I want the truth at 4am, and to hold you when 5am can't.

I want to push away the last of the darkness at 6am, and I want to give 7am something to talk about.

I want to be your saving grace at 8am. I want to be the change you feel at 9am, when you hear the music of the world instead of the noise.
Arby Sep 2018
The misty fog outside,
condenses into a speckled bedroom glass.  

Through which,
nestled deep under the blanket,
I hear the orchestra of a rainy 8am life.  

Bothered by the unconducted iso-rhythms
of dripping water droplets,
dropping onto the metal window sill,
I peak my head out from under the duvet
and yawn out the stale air from my lungs.  

I notice the coffee left for me
on the bedside table before she left.  
I grasp the warm little blue cup.  

I hear the birds in the trees somewhere below
warming up their sleepy little lungs.  

I close my eyes and feel the cold air
through the window.  
Hiding under my duvet,
I drift back to sleep.
Mateuš Conrad Nov 2016
they day finishes with: at last! a schoth reserve
for highlands nomads!
     long gone is the fatamorgana of soberness
coupled with a very softcore soviet sleep
experiment: i chance you to also say:
the soviet sleep experiment is a way to censor
dreams, **** it: another paul mccartney
can write another yesterday into the repertoire,
you can hear of marathon-men who did over
100 hours without sleep, and when it came to
sleeping: hour-long interludes...
as all the p.o.w's realised was the case:
stop this dream-industry of disney! stop it!
nearing 36 hours is nothing,
when i'm going to do a hiatus in Poland visiting
my grandparents i'm planning to top that,
perhaps 48... just to get the glory days of Jews
in ancient Egypt and Joseph the adviser to
the pharaoh: 7 lean years, followed by 7 years
of starvation: what we otherwise carpe diem
over-indulgence - Moses wrote the book
of disgrace... when things turned sour,
obviously he was *******, just a little bit,
from a Jew becoming an adviser to the pharaoh
by interpreting his dreams which were always
in abundance given his lavish lifestyle...
dreams come to people who aspire to lavish
lifestyle, dreams come to people who take no
pleasure from the simplest prospects of a peaceful
hermitic life... they need both the lavish life
and the lavish hope of an afterlife with abundant
dreams... they can't master the opposite:
from simple pleasures that life has to offer:
one forsakes the capacity to the need to dream...
yet those who attain a comfortable Buddhist /
bourgeoisie / middle life: through the ethic of hard
labour find dreams nonsense... only
aristocrats find meaning in dreams, because
they have enough life insurance to guarantee them
the very unentertaining life, hence the Freudian
cinema, and here is their seeking of meaning,
because outside of their sleep nod,
their meaning is already akin to a predatory creature
kept in a zoological confinement, rather than
beckoned to attest the prime element beyond
the classical elements of fire and: where was the
Japanese army bombing the hell out of that
****** tsunami to make the orca-surf shrapnel?
where? nowhere! the reporters were there prior,
i'd swear you could have done the reverse Aleppo
with that tsunami wave by bombing it and
saving lives... but no... atoms bombs were never
intended for warfare as such, they're non-profitable...
all the arms-dealers across the world make more
money from millions of bullets and thousands upon
thousands of guns being sold: atom bombs make
no economic sense... atom bombs make
no economic sense in terms of dealing arms...
the soviet sleep experiment was one of the topics
at the end of today... the other was feline pavarotti
in a cattery: i swear to god that ginger is acting
too much like a bloodhound... moans all the ******
time, i've heard every kind of Tosca, but a cat's Tosca?
never in my life has a cat so many variable versions
of meow... animals really do possess their owners,
but in a way that shows the owners to themselves...
a poem a day: keeps the psychiatrist away.
and back to the soviets, who discovered Yiddish
dream-factory ******* that only applies to
aristocrats akin to Wilhelm Oedipus II,
    i never understood why people desired so much
from dreams, pure unconscious doesn't allow it,
it's shallow dreaming that becomes easily swayed
by a decreasing poignancy of the senses that
creates dreams, and as we've already been told:
they're bound to millisecond intervals -
snoring can be seen as a prompt for dreaming,
but then pure unconscious that's beyond the sensual
realm of pulverising you with everything external
          doesn't allow dreams, because it allows rest...
the subconscious makes more sense in terms of dreams
than what it currently prescribed,
             on the fully-waking hour of what people call
reverse-psychology (popularly), or who people can
influence you and treat you as a pawn...
   in the waking hour the theory of the subconscious
is that it's somehow there, and it's brimming with
theories ranging from the unitary stealth workings
of a superego, to advertisers competing for your
attention, as in: how can this person be manipulated?
that's the strain of thought working from consciousness
where you are said to have: no free will,
no critical approach toward the world with thought,
that you are naive and gullible...
  such people do exist, because they're not working
on the subconscious from the unconscious position,
hence they are most probably highly-developed dream-machines,
they probably even dream in colour and remember
dreams vividly... but take all the things i said
about the subconscious from a conscious pinpoint
and invert the starting point from an unconscious
pinpoint, and all that manipulating dynamic that
the subconscious is supposedly is fed fades
   to simply expose the subconscious as the medium
of dreams, whereby dreams appear from a sensory
hush of all external factors... a few days back i dreamed
i woke in a bed covered in cobwebs and spiders crawling
in them... the last thing i remember looking at?
my pet incy-wincy hanging on a silken web in
the corner of my room... for this to be true,
and for all that pompous subconscious theoretical *******
to go away, to actually work on the subconscious
having a dream reality rather than a reality of
being easily swayed by superego or advertisement
and willingly giving up your will to external factors
that go beyond mere senses... you have to acknowledge
at least 36 hours of the soviet sleep experiment, clock:
no nodding.m i've set the threshold,
the junkies did over 100 hours without sleep,
but they were army material, i'm... dunno.
              a break with an article on melanie martinez,
and then back into today's end...
    it's pouring cats & dogs outside, and will so
throughout tomorrow, one of the street lamps has
turned itself into solitary disco strobe...
   e.e.m. (epileptic eye movement)
           vs. r.e.m. (rapid eye movement) -
the difference? the latter invokes the theatrical curtain
of the eyelids... the former invokes your eyes
having rolled to the back of your head so you only
see the sclera...
but a real life problem too!
in these pseudo-capitalistic societies, companies
have started to do the Pontius Pilate tactic,
they are companies without employees,
what they want are subcontractors, people who
are self-employed, because actually employing
employees is bad business for them: you have to
have a pension fund... and what capitalist wasn't
old people getting money for doing nothing?
most construction companies are following this trend...
but the problem with that is that these companies
are employing useless managers, construction
site managers that should be on a site for at least 2
days a week... even 3... so they can get the knitty-gritty
of organisation done and the project runs smoothly...
but as i've already known for months,
say a roofing company from Gloucester is given
a London-based contract... it has employed a
project manager... who 1st of all doesn't have the right
credentials to be a manager... and this pleb travels
to London from the village of Gloucester
and is on a construction site for about half an hour,
doesn't make any notes,
and spends the rest of the time being a ******* tourist
in and around London, a day like this happens,
an authentic waterproofing problem...
   so you have these flats near the city airport,
and they're connected with walkways and have planters
too... you lay the concrete, then do the waterproofing:
primer, hotmelt, fleece, hotmelt, felt.
                  now the problem, why impose self-employment
and also employ parasitical managers who know
jack **** or are interested in selfies on tower bridge?
only because they can get a cheap train ticket back
to the village of Gloucester before the rush-hour commute?
the problem is simple, or hard, depends whether
there's an actual plan and someone is bothered..
four elements...
       1. drainage matt,
             2. pebbles,              3. filter layer
and 4. ~artificial turf... plastic-like, not asphalt,
     i grant it a status of artificial asphalt,
  or turf coloured copper...
the debate ranged about where the filter layer should go,
but there was no manager with the appropriate
method statement to give... the ******* crane arrives
at 8am, and he texts the day before that he might have
an answer by noon... or that some other manager should
be consulted to the method statement...
i suggested that first: the drainage matt, then the pebbles,
then the filter layer and then the artificial asphalt...
   the other suggestion was: drainage matt,
filter layer, pebbles and then the artificial asphalt
        given that pebbles will never be spread like
a plateau of concrete, meaning there will be pockets
beneath the artificial asphalt to soften the walk
and give more spring to the step...
                  and then i read a newspaper in england
and start to think: are these the only people on an actual
payroll? with safety in retirement schemes?
          i used to think of journalists as daring...
Watergate journalism that did something...
               then you turn on the 24 news channels
and state media is no different to free-enterprise media...
     as people my age say: television is really
a piece of 20th century antiquity... who gives a ****
that millions watched a man walk on a moon
on it... at least a billion people watched the cinnamon
spoon challenge from some ******* on the internet!
     or that guy who gave his cat l.s.d.,
or that guy who jumped off tower bridge and caught
pneumonia and had to be rescued...
still, the rain is ******* down, i've got my headphones
on, and that rebel street-lamp has turned into
a discoteque strobe's of needy rhythmic epileptics -
as every: i count most psychiatric terms in popular
use as undercover poetics, people who don't read
poetry, nonetheless apply psychiatric terms
   an unilateral transcript of denoting them as metaphor(s)
in everyday sprechen; and yes,
our informal vocabulary usually suffers for the fact
that we have chosen a fixed (courteous, hierarchical)
formal vocabulary, that erodes any chanced deviation
akin to a cat-stretching: e.g. (a) so and so died,
(b) oh, i'm sorry,        (c) and you're the one who
brought back the resentful Lazarus?
(d) as if you could have, prevented the inevitable;
a conversation between four strangers.
RH 78 Jul 2015
Covent Garden.
Midnight.
Revellers and tourists combined.
The market is heaving.
Last trains are leaving.
An eclectic mix to broaden the mind.

Covent Garden.
2am.
The place is pretty quiet.
Pubs have closed.
Clubs.... God knows.
The tourists have frozen their riot.

Covent Garden.
4am.
A drunkard stumbles by.
Flood lit shops.
A rickshaw stops.
The backdrop against a reddish
sky.

Covent Garden.
6am.
Blokes lurk down Langley street.
The glint of a blade.
A blur in the shade.
Lava tip of cigarette falls to a strangers feet.

Covent Garden.
8am.
Commuters emerge from underground stations.
Workers prepare.
Visitors beware.
Pick pockets attracted like gravitation.
Spent a night shift at Covent Garden in London people watching.
Andrew Duggan Aug 2018
They were not interested in the forests.
Or how many Asians died?
Nam Viet was a restaurant
Open from 8am-11pm each day.
And summertime in Hue,
means cheap ***** and handmade suits.

All around the girls in golden tight dresses,
who can hardly walk in their six inch heels.
Sell cheap cigarettes from table to table.
Always with a smile and a look at their *******.

On trips to Hanoi and Hoi An,
the code to Vietnam's  literary treasure.
They asked thin questions with no light
“What about the Women Andrew”
“What about the nightlife and the girls”
“Do you think they’re ****?”
"How expensive are they?"

Someone in ** Chi Minh City asked me
"Why do people think like this?"

I guess it is easy, if ugly is all you know
Calling to nothing, and the fall of the future.
A trip to Vietnam
Shelby Hemstock Aug 2013
"Dude, we're going to a burn this weekend and none of us have a car, will you take us?

"Sure, if you pay for my expenses."

And thats how I went to my first burn,
Freezer Burn, in the dead of winter, outside of Austin, Texas
So icy polar bears wear parkas and penguins wear pea coats
In the same essence of Burning Man
Just on a much much smaller scale
Located down a gravel road
Tucked away deep in the woods, miles away from civilization
Where primeval screams go unnoticed and the people go unkempt
No one to impress, everything is everything
The effigy made of wood, a colossal abominable snow man
Which would later be burned in a blaze of glory
Accompanied by fireworks, fire spitters and fire spinners galore
There were drum jams, free spirited belly dancers, and herds of hula hoops
The name of our camp site was "Goonsville"
I kept mistakingly referring to it as "Ghoul Town"
There were a lot of other camp sites,
We bordered "Camp Glue **** Together"
And "Tribe Named Search"
The first night was bone chilling
I had no gloves and all I had to soften my brain was cold cold beer
Sitting next to the fire was all we had to stay warm,
But we didn't have a fire
So we walked fire to fire, auditing camp sites
Greeting strangers with hugs and beers offered
A stranger with a beard walked up to us
Holding a bottle of whiskey
He extended it my way, no words, just whiskey
He wore soft toes boots, worn out bell bottom jeans
Yellow sunglasses and a red beanie, it was night
We were friends immediately
Being in a place like this makes you free
If you had the curiosity to come to a burn
Then you were automatically excepted as a friend, all equal
My friend Sam even called him cutie to which he responded,
"I'll be by your tent later tonight"
If gay jokes are in the air,
You're in the company of friends

My notes tend to trail off there,
I kept getting fed psychedelics
Teddy Grahams dosed with sunshine acid
The fungus was among us
I snorted a grain of something off a tooth pick and
The stars came together like a connect the dots worksheet
After that everything became a memory within a kaleidoscope
All I have written are quotes from passing strangers

"It's essencial to bring a beach ball if you want to have fun"

"When I let go its like Cleopatra letting her snakes loose"

"I woke up at 8am and had my first psychedelic sandwich of the day"

"**** buying ****, you don't have to do that, it's just an illusion"

"It's best to be sleep deprived when you take LSD, it enhances the trip"

"You can't occupy that space because it's occupied by my spirit"

"Whats the purpose of number 42?"

"You'll have to excuse me I just got this guitar from a pawn shop the other day, mind if I bust a tune on ya real quick?"

"******* beatin' on drums and drinkin' beer! Hell yes!"

"This is a good first burn man, not too many people, just real chill"

Andrew, Ben, Chris, Collin, Frank, Greg, Justin, Olive, Sam, Travis
Freaks, Friends
Freezer Burn January 14th, 2012
Bedroom’s painted fisherman’s blue

There’s a cut out of Hayden Panettiere naked in a pink bikini with a hula-hoop on the back of the door

Copies of British Vogue desperately hidden underneath the bed accompanying an empty bottle of Glen’s

Manchester United duvet cover and matching pillows to boot

The bin’s filled with pre-packed home-made lunches from the last six months

Wardrobes a collection of ill fitting blue jeans bought for me by grandmother and football jerseys for teams that I’ve never even heard of, yet let alone see play a single game

Uniform ironed and sitting out ready for school on Monday at 8am sharp

***** clothes cover mostly all the floor smelling of Lynx’s finest even though there’s an empty laundry basket just waiting in the corner to be used

Inside one of the woolen blazer’s (that is way too big for me) pockets a single unopened ****** and an AES 256-bit encrypted USB stick

An old PlayStation 2, with a single controller; games including FIFA years through 2004 to now, Tom Clancy’s Splinter Cell, and GTA.

Blood red shoplifted lipstick that’s now melted hidden in the little secret compartment at the back, meant for network expansion.

Artemis Fowl, Alex Rider, and Harry Potter all adorn the bookcase

Physics, Maths, and IT textbooks remain firmly closed on the desk in addition to a smashed phone from me and Daddy’s last “physical altercation”

Lady Gaga’s “I Like it Rough” is playing in the background on repeat…
Jordan Gee  Jul 2022
spanish
Jordan Gee Jul 2022
spanish

I’m sitting in the 8am sun by the end the driveway,
trying to get a handle on the day.
folding chair
house basket
coffee.
such is my custom
and my delight.
driveways are a luxury this part of town.
my back is to the brick
sidewalk to my right
sunshine upon my face and forehead
eyes closed.
a rundown hispanic fellow
about my age
appears
from nowhere
out of my blind,
asking for a lighter.
my eyes open and all is light.
he recognized my lighter sheath
heavy *** metal with the bottle opener at the bottom
told me that he had had the same one;
picked it up from some no name bodega
out of where he originated in
spanish harlem.
he began telling me his life story, you see.
he never heard the word
‘****’ until he moved to
Lancaster County, Pennsylvania.
told me he was the black sheep
of the little family he had left,
and that he hadn’t seen them in years.
he stood before me on the sidewalk
in the morning sunlight.
I asked him for a cigarette.
he was raised tangled in
a cultural straight jacket;
one tailored to his demographic.
an urban person of color.
his Divine Masculine
red lined and impoverished.
hand me down outfit
tj max rap music video.
I told him I identified as a stray dog,
sitting by the end of the driveway
8am sun.
he told me he was just doing the best he could.
best he can
with what he got.
our hearts were bleeding there together
pooling up on the driveway
8am sunshine
sky, blueish white.
I told him where I worked,
gave him the address
told him
come get some free samples of CBD.

everyday I forget that
it isn’t my job
to
save anyone.
he’s walking away with a limp up west orange.
i close my eyes.
I hope he doesn’t need any CBD.

©️  Jordan Gee
Boundaries

— The End —