These tiny loiterers on the barley’s beard,
And happy units of a numerous herd
Of playfellows, the laughing Summer brings,
Mocking the sunshine on their glittering wings,
How merrily they creep, and run, and fly!
No kin they bear to labour’s drudgery,
Smoothing the velvet of the pale hedge-rose;
And where they fly for dinner no one knows—
The dew-drops feed them not—they love the shine
Of noon, whose suns may bring them golden wine
All day they’re playing in their Sunday dress—
When night reposes, for they can do no less;
Then, to the heath-bell’s purple hood they fly,
And like to princes in their slumbers lie,
Secure from rain, and dropping dews, and all,
In silken beds and roomy painted hall.
So merrily they spend their summer-day,
Now in the corn-fields, now in the new-mown hay.
One almost fancies that such happy things,
With coloured hoods and richly burnished wings,
Are fairy folk, in splendid masquerade
Disguised, as if of mortal folk afraid,
Keeping their joyous pranks a mystery still,
Lest glaring day should do their secrets ill.

Teach me, my God and King,
      In all things Thee to see,
And what I do in anything
      To do it as for Thee.

      Not rudely, as a beast,
      To run into an action;
But still to make Thee prepossest,
      And give it his perfection.

      A man that looks on glass,
      On it may stay his eye;
Or it he pleaseth, through it pass,
      And then the heav’n espy.

      All may of Thee partake:
      Nothing can be so mean,
Which with his tincture—”for Thy sake”—
      Will not grow bright and clean.

      A servant with this clause
      Makes drudgery divine:
Who sweeps a room as for Thy laws,
      Makes that and th’ action fine.

      This is the famous stone
      That turneth all to gold;
For that which God doth touch and own
      Cannot for less be told.

(not a poem i guess but eh)


–

Space keeps falling to the sides. I try to concentrate, - I mean, I make a token effort every now and again,- but concentration, fixation is always in terms of something external, something I'm not sure I can deal with.  I roll over and go back to sleep.

–

'Where's the flour?'
'Where you left it.'
'Which is where?'
'On the table. What you want it for anyway?'
'Which table?'
'Haha. The generic maple with the ugly-*** spandrels. What are you making?'
'You think we could afford that? Nah, it's like, faux-pine or some ****. And like muffins.'
'Oh good, there's banan's that need using up'
'No no, like, other muffins. Crumpets and such. Got any golden syrup?'
'I think there's some maple.'
'No, it's like, ply, I swear.'

–

I haven't moved in days. I need to. He'll come eventually and I don't want him to see me like this. Plus, I need to locate that smell. I can't have guests over with it here. I'm just not sure where it is though. I  feel like it's on my left arm when I’m in the middle of the room, but off to the right everywhere else. It's.. acerbic, but fermenting, like vegetables on the onset of rot but not quite there yet. Not that I know; I haven't moved in days. I don't want to smell it again. Also garlic, definitely garlic.

–

We visited the inland sea the other day. The hundred years since last time hadn't changed it one bit. The beached clay was brittle under the midday sun, and the cracking footsteps fragmented it into a hundred hexagons.
               'I hear a strain of the pathogen is airborne. It's only a matter of time now'
A group of tourists park up by the shore. A child holds out their arms and runs in small circles.

–

The corridor keeps flashing. And maybe spinning. It's hard to tell, the colour change starts at a different point each time and there's no discernible rhythm to it. You keep pacing up and down. I feel self conscious that you want to leave, but then again, you did show up unannounced. You shake the snowglobe disinterestedly. The fragments burn like molten static.
'Stop that. I feel like I’m vomiting spiders.'
'You're being dramatic.'
'None the less.'
'Don't worry; you'll get through it. The world is transitioning, and this is just motion sickness.'
'I know that, I didn't say I was worried, I said I wanted it to stop.'

'sorry'

–

We'd always go for a walk at night if we felt we needed to talk. It was an unwritten rule. The veil of amber filter let our more timid thoughts breath in the nebulous darkness. Stark daylight was always too suffocatingly real, and that was the one thing we were never allowed to be; real. You'd always talk superficially if we discussed personal matters. That day you did a one-third spin clockwise and faced my side, and talked grandeloquently, hammed up like on a stage. You gave an embarrassed smile and blew a kiss for the invisible audience. I always felt jealous of those nothings, those non-existent beings, that got to figure into your world.

–

'Christ it's warm today. I can't think.'
'so don't bother.'
I spin in the chair. Whooosh. Whooosh.

–

It's the end of a 6 hour shift. A customer, a mother in her odd thirties, was angry that a sale item was out of stock, like sale items always are: She'd only gone out of her way to shop at this store because of the advertised deal, and we had taken time out of her busy schedule under false pretence. Her child stared at the ground intensely, his eyes watering. I tried to imagine the situation through his eyes, to try and ground myself; to remain both present, but stable. She insisted on speaking to the manager. It's a relief really; He's a skeevy ****, but he at least knows when the customers are just there to start ****, and responds accordingly. He comes over, asks what the problem is. It turns out I entered the code wrong and the item was still available after all. He gets one from out the back, handles the transaction, says have a nice day and apologises for me and everything, and I just stand there blankly; I’d had the graveyard shift the night before and honestly I’m beyond feeling right now, but when she mutters 'dumb *****' as she turns away a tight feeling still twists in my gut anyway.
I come home and leave the door hanging open framed in the setting sun and just drop my bags in the hallway. You're in the kitchen, hunched over a workbench eating out of a mug.
'Whatcha having?'
'Cornflakes.'
'….Cornflakes?'
'Yep.' you pivot as I approach. 'corn..flakes.' you hold out the packet.
'coooornfllllakkkkkkkeeeessssss' I start laughing.
'coooornfllllaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaakes'
we chorus the term in groaning monotone, and I grab the packet out your hand and throw it down and violently stomp it into the ground with every non-energy I have left. You just laugh and egg me on, repeating 'cornflakes! Cornflakes!' in crescendo, ostinato. The satisfaction of each crunch gives me the drive to smash them further, and corn dust spills out of the pulverised cardboard and gets everywhere. In the end I’m panting, my face is a mess of tears, and I collapse over onto it and just roll, bathing in the glorious fragments of reconstituted mulch.

–

'They say another ice age is coming.'
'They also say we'll be swallowed by the sun'
'well, it's true.'
'Yeah, but which'll happen first? I need to know to dress accordingly.'
'Tunnel's up ahead'
'I know, I see it.'
I deliberately swerve to the side and speed up, changing back at the last moment.
'You know I hate it when you do that.'
'What, don't you wanna die together with me? Here and now? Immortalised, as if our existences actually meant something?'
'like Diana and the nameless chauffeur?'
'******* exactly.'
We step out onto the hill, frozen **** tufts breaking underfoot. It's cold as hell but the skies glittering. You get out the telescope you borrowed off your rich *** sister.
'I think that's Jupiter over there.'
'Pfft, Jupiter.'
'What?'
'What's the blankest space you can find?'
'Hmm.. that way?'
You point it in that direction. 'Look'
I stare into it, but it's hard to keep focus while shaking from the cold. You keep adjusting and asking ,’See anything?', eventually some hazy distortion comes into view.
'See, no matter where you look, there's always something there.' You're trying to sound eloquent. 'Even when it seems like you're drowning in nothing.'
I stand back. 'That's terrifying. I feel sick.' I try to breathe but it's shaky and shallow. I stare into the ground, but I can still feel it; the blaze of the myriad innumerable heavens burn into me. Their judging gaze pierces through me and tears me to shreds.  

–

'You know, I think I read that Spinoza thought that consciousness is manifest in the ability of finite beings to continue persisting in and of their own will over time.'
'Doesn't that make a toaster more conscious than us?'
'Yeah, you don't say.'

–

We were twelve and at the department store. It was strange. I'd never taken the bus by myself to just hang out in town before. I always feel disorientated and light-headed in crowds so it had a strangeness; waves of apprehension cushioned by the homogeneity of it. one can be truly alone in a crowd; floating in a sea of otherness, where each gaze is no longer a signification of anything, but a warm static. We were among the aisles of a department store, in the toys and tacky house ornament section. Like, the junk you buy children and grandparents for their birthday. **** that you'd only attribute to people whom have no discernible qualities of their own. We were looking at snow globes. We kept trying to shake them violently enough so that the scene framed within would become entirely lost to the fog; it always felt so disappointing when clarity returned and things re-became what they were. I remember saying, 'I wonder if it tastes like real snow', I don't remember, It was stupid, I don't know why I said it, it sounded cool in my head. But you responded, that I remember, by taking the thing and smashing it against the concrete floor, and pouring out all the fragments into our hands. We tried them together and coughed and choked in laugher. It tasted awful, entirely unsurprisingly. On a rush you stuck one in your pocket, grabbed my hand, and we promptly left the store, and my heart was palpitating, it felt like all the rules, all the natural laws that had prefigured my world were crumbling, and I was terrified, trapped in the gaze of my mothers look of disappointment when we'd be inevitably caught, somehow watching me from its potential future, and I'd no longer be allowed to visit you but it was okay because I was here with you now in this moment and we were alone in this faceless mechanical place crumbling around us, and when we left, and no sirens buzzed, I felt sick with excitement at the unbounded possibility present in everything in every second. I cringe thinking back on it, and feel ashamed at finding such meaning, feeling such unabashed wholesale virtue in indiscriminate destruction, but sometimes, sometimes I still shake that snowglobe as hard as I can, till everything determinate is lost in haze, and I still feel a wave of comfort wash over me.

–

‘We’ve been walking for ages. you know where we’re going, right?’
‘It’s just up ahead. I swear’
‘You swear?’

‘I mean, I’ve only been there once before myself.’
‘****. This way?’
‘Wait-‘
‘What?’
‘Huh. Nothing. Sorry, I thought I heard a car coming.’
…
…
‘I think that’s the ocean?’
‘But.. aren’t we heading inland?’
‘You sure?’
‘Yeah, I swear.’

–

We're in your room. Your reading on your bed and I'm in the swivelly chair by the desk, pretending to work, but really we're just chatting, talking about.. something. Whatever. It was probably stupid, laughing at our own jokes, as always, catchphrases repeated till they loose all meaning. It's been a long day and honestly we're both too tired for coherence by this point, but the lack of effort lends the air an easy comfortability. But then suddenly.. Suddenly you stare into my eyes as if you're looking at me and it's somehow different, an intense gaze that I can't escape, as if you somehow found something located there, something fixed in those abyssal pupils. The feeling is overwhelming and terrifying. I am grounded, ripped into the prison of being and frozen static like a dumb animal transfixed in headlights: I am outside myself facing in, and I’m falling away. I pull you in and kiss you to escape; now, it is your touch that is fixed, your smell, your taste, and I breath a sigh of reprieve. You hold my back as I fall into you. I lace my fingers through the buttons in your shirt and feel the faint pulse of your flickering heartbeat. At once an ever-changing epiphenomena, and a calming rhythmic certainty. I vacantly tug at the buttons and your expression changes, gone is the feeling of suffocating questioning, but one of transfixed observation. Your touch is not a reaching out into something, but a continuation of yourself; I am an instrument of your lust, an extension. Holding me in your arm, you nervously run your hand down from my nape and trace my bra from the strap over the line of my breast. The lightness of your touch is a painful tickling and I push myself into you further, my thighs wrapping around yours. Your touch shoots a burning into me, not painful, but like glowing kindling, or the warmth of a blanket; an immanence, a retreat. I let my mind go blank and we continue; you fumble with my bra as I fumble with your belt. We're both shaking but too far gone to notice, too distant to care. The dry freeze of the night air contrasts your damp heat. You clasp me as you trace your hand under my skirt and I feel your arm brush my thigh. I tremble slightly at the sharp coldness of the damp cotton coming unstuck. After a stretching moment of awkward liminality, I feel you pass into me. It's a burning smoothness, distilled liquor. The rubber is an alien feeling, and for some reason I imagine myself as a giant balloon; a malleable featureless surface, filled with emptiness. I feel myself through the threshold of your presence and I am afraid; I am a boundary which encompasses nothing, and by your passing through I fear that I will be pierced; I will burst and out will flow an obsidian wind that will wither you to nothing, but it will keep coming, an endless torrent that will subsume the world and turn everything to desert, and the only way to save you is to keep it bound up as tight as I possibly can till my heart feels like burning metal, and I feel my tears land on my hand tightly clasping your shoulder. You ask through wavering breaths if I want to stop, but I shake my head; if you left now I would be caught and torn open; no, instead I subsume your undulations into myself; till the rhythm is as oceanic noise; a surface rolling located miles above a lightless motionless centre.

–

The pale green lamplight flickers. A nausea, tepid, but understated. The sentience of moss; an almost motionless drone, but the sense of unfolding. The corridor seems larger than it once was. Blank reflections harrowing accusations, mechanically indifferent but piercing; an alarm clocks wail. I lie still, I lie still. The buzzing repeats. I lie still. I am flowing, seeping through floorboards into the pores of the earth, into colonies of worms and I am lost and free, a motion, a multiplicity, pure form without the anxious drudgery of parts; pure alimentary canal, pure Elysium absolution. The flickering quickens and gets brighter. A pulsating light, a strobe, a beat frequency wavering behind vision. The liquid earth, saturated by light, hardens and dissolves. And 'I' am lost among the ruins, a vague memory of a sentiment. A nostalgic grief, an asphyxiated longing. I reach out to you desperately in the drag of the undertow, but you are the chalk of faded bones; cast to the winds centuries prior. A thousand years pass of blanket darkness, and a unitary bell rings. The flotsam batters against the temple gates. Debris collects in cracks, and my pieces are among them. I cling to retention, and return. I am cold sweat outlining the floorboards, the feeling of clenching before vomiting, repeated endlessly.

–

A few weeks after, turning off an avenue onto the main road, I see you. You're crossing, coming this way. It was bound to happen eventually. I bite back the moisture forming in my eyes and try to remain faceless. You suddenly change your trajectory, and hit the side of a car. It honks at you and you dodge around it. I allow a bitter smile to myself; the fact I can cause you such disorientating discomfit indicates I still mean something to you. Even if it's just a discomforting anxiousness, something beyond the boundary to be avoided, I have causal powers, extension; I can see my flicker of presence in you even now, even if I cannot for the life of me find it within myself. You run around and I walk straight. It's empowering; I can remain fixed, even if the torrent of the world flows around me. At that moment, I feel the indubitable strength to persevere. I am stronger than this world; I am stronger than you. But then, just as suddenly, the feeling folds upon itself and is gone. I felt solidified, just now, by the fact that I was the one that remained in this random encounter. I won, you lost. but Won how? With the ability to pretend that I can exist alone, in a world that means nothing to me? The ability to maintain a solid spectral façade, when underneath, scratching away under the skin, I contain nothing? To continue terrifies me. Knowing that I have the strength to continue terrifies me. That last thing I ever intended was to outlive you. I feel the world drain away from me, and yet I remain, left standing, alone, in a of realm of perpetual nothing.  

–

I feel sick

a hundred years pass in the cavity of the desert. Merchants make trade off raided materials and makeshift weapons. A library is burned. A soldier, wanders freely. An insect buzzes around his face. He darts about the place in annoyance, but it remains. He can't shake it. He closes his eyes. It's still there

I feel sick

the sun burns bright arrhythmic  clicking.  A late twenties couple go clothes shopping, however the child is hungry and will have none of it. Lunch is suggested. They are jocular about the decision, but feel an uneasiness about the indulgence. The air is saturated and dries

That’s talent
Sniffing out drugs
Down two floors
Down deep in the recess
Of your drawer
Because it lay
Down deep in the recess
Of my mind
Down two floors
Stored for a slow
Calculated
Take down of your mind
Whilst it picks away
At my carefully
Orchestrated sobriety
Down deep
Layered over
With career
With kids
With paint
With healing sounds
Don’t come around here no more
But it do
But it do
Cause I’ve got a talent
for Sniffing out
The drudgery
For sniffing out
The dark side
Wars colliding in my mind
Cause the army I built is
Only as good as the fort I built in front of them.
And this nose. This nose..
I’ve got a talent.

Up on a feathered duvet a man conceding defeat
To the Sunday that had just begun
Reeking of last night’s sweat, smoke and self-deceit
Threads of reality so rapidly un-spun

All that he promised himself to accomplish this day
All that stuff to be tossed in the bin
Procrastination rearranges plans or lets them decay
And all because of his love for gin

Amnesia of last night’s antics plants the seeds of guilt
Shame shall be his shadow today
Enter a recurring thought... a sword driven to its hilt
Piercing pain added to his dismay

Rusted cogs of cognition screeched slowly into action
"A cure" he grumbled "A cure"
Wearily off the bed searching for medicinal satisfaction
To make last night less obscure

The stark bright light of the bathroom fried his vision
But as his senses normalized
He stared in the mirror shocked, BANG! In a collision
Mouth agape and paralyzed

Finger painted on his forehead, with what must be blood
G    U    I    L    T   Y
From down stairs somewhere
A woman's laugh
Mocking
Fear took its grip quick

A sword driven to its hilt



Part 2 of 6
a sword driven to its hilt

Arctic chills froze his spine
Pick axes hacked his mind
Tongue pickled in brine
Suffocated and confined
Heart beat pounding
Breathing short and quick
Terror was abounding
Throat swallowing a brick

Staring at his reflection . . . G U I L T Y
Unable move any limb
Even for his protection
Return of memory grim . . . a sword driven to its hilt

Back to the bed room to search for his phone
To make contact with the real world
From down stairs came that exact same laugh
Every hair on his body tightly curled
The phone was nowhere to be found upstairs
Again that tormenting laughter
He called out "Who is it?" but only silence replied
Then that laugh again soon after
"WHO ARE YOU?!" he demanded to know
Arming himself with a cricket bat
Tentatively descending the sweeping staircase
Noticing the post on the door mat
The newspaper informed him it was Monday
Confused, frightened he ran outside
A burnt pile of his clothes lay in front of his door
He yelled but only the laughter replied

Then through the dining room bay-window
Sitting at the table as if a patient guest
A gruesome wide eyed greying corpse of a man  
A sword driven in his head and out his breast

In the dead man’s hand a glowing phone
The source of the tormenting laugh
Not thinking, our man rushed in to take it
The phone flashed "maintenance staff"

Every sense heightened
Sickened and frightened
Feeling he was being observed
Part of a wicked game
Driving him insane
But so far he had been preserved
As he answered the phone
He knew he was not alone
"Hello sir... I hope I haven't disturbed"
------------------------------------------------------­-----------

part 3 of 6

Saturday Night

The late afternoon sun draped its golden satin light
To the house-staff, Giles (our man) seemed uptight
The butler Zamira dutifully stirring his drink right

The sun dipped behind the poplar trees standing straight
He orders "A Churchill  martini" trying not to sound irate
Giles watched her stirring, stirring as in a hypnotic state

Zamira presented a chilled, frosted Riedel martini glass to him
brimming to the top with Gilpins Westmorland extra dry gin
The sun slowly sank behind trees as the drink loosened his limbs
"You may both leave, till Tuesday" He said to Zamira and her twin
Liliana (the cook) and the butler were often dismissed at his whim
They sped off in their green MG, off to the Slaughtered lamb inn

Giles raised his glass to the bobbing full hunters moon
Waiting was now over, the others would be here soon
First a pinch of Peruvian sniffed from a little silver spoon

This day had been prepared in detail for nearly a year
One final act of courage and tenacity he must engineer
All hushed except the sound of large cars drawing near

Four black Jaguars and a white refrigerated van

Crunched over the gravel drive towards (our man)

Giles Bradshaw-Behran stood still.

It had began.

---------------------------------------------------------­--

Part 4 of 6

three years earlier

The Gallows and Noose

"This, THIS! I'm so tired of all THIS!"
Blurted Giles as Zamira dressed his wrists
Pathetic! (She thought) A dismal attempt
Then left the room concealing contempt
Giles just stared at the

drip

drip

drip

dripping of the morphine
Candle light danced on the walls
The demons sank back into the shadows
Giles returned to the womb
Basking in weightless warmth
Comfortably apathetic
Numb

The drudgery of the next day unfurled
As Giles accepted defeat around noon
Something had to be done about life
That something had better happen soon
  
He brunched in his office
and so began his search
All that day
and night
that week
That month

Deeper into the cavernous "dark web"
seeking any answer to end his despair
but every search became a cul-de-sac
No doors opened for this millionaire
No doors would open
All remained firmly locked
Sitting in his office chair
Feverishly typing as he rocked
He rocked as he typed
He swivelled as he clicked
Searching for something
That he was less able to predict

But that something found him
And sent him an invitation
Explaining that they had been watching
Seeing his frustration
Understanding his world view
May he could understand theirs
But before he were to be accepted
He must climb down the seven stairs
He
      Must
                Climb
                           Down
                                     The
                                           Seven
                                                      Stairs
Dis­tant from the blinding light
Cast yourself from the hallows
Embrace darkness embrace night
Take the Noose and the Gallows.

The mouse pointer hovered
over options "Yes" and "No"
His heart beat quickened
But then came the red glow
of two laser beams from directly behind
circling the yes option
From past the windows' opened blind
"Yes" and the two red dots disappeared
The wheels were put in motion
His future was now commandeered
A force that seemed greater than him
Changed the rules and took control
Embers deep inside of him flickered
Re-igniting the coals of his dark soul

The seven steps awaited him...
What ever could they be?


-----------------------------------------------------------­


part 5 of 6

The Seven Steps of The Thuggee

Giles sat statue still in his office
Unsure whether or not he should move
Like a hunted deer in the woods
Waiting for chances of survival to improve

And yet though he were vulnerable
Life coursed through every artery and vein
The lost keystone of his arched spirit
The panacea for tedious boredom and pain

DING! ****! The doorbell rang
"Zamira, who is it? Can you please see?"
Footsteps approached the front entrance
Giles felt instinctively "fight or flee"

He sat with silence looming over him
For what seemed like an eternity
"****** ancient bell!" he shouted
"This whole house repels modernity!"

Down stairs
At the entrance
The Cuban butler stared out into the night
Looking for a sign
Looking for who...
Who had left the parcel she now clutched tight

No one
Nothing
But for the song of a lonely nightingale
She hurried
To the office
Where she found her employer looking pale

Zamira explained what had happened
And handed him the black wrapped box
"Would you like me to open it Sir?"
"No! I would like... a chartreuse on the rocks"

She left to attend to his request

For the attention of Mr. G. Bradshaw-Behram
Soon after the two laser beams were on the wrapping
Inside the box was a detailed program
A history of the Thuggee cult and a Thuggee king

The Thuggee King called BEHRAM!
Behram, BEHRAM! His late mother’s family name
A Thuggee cult King relative?
With over 900 hundred murders to that man’s claim

900 strangled victims
To please Goddess Kali
Every drop of blood for her
So humanity can be free

Zamira returned with his drink
Giles had never needed one so much
The following weeks more instruction came

Weeks just turned to months
Months quickly turned to years
Six of the secret steps complete
So many grotesque souvenirs

All leading to this moment
On his lawn under the hunters moon
The waiting was now over
The others would be here very soon
First a pinch of Peruvian
Sniffed from his pretty little silver spoon
Adjusting his cummerbund
That soon would erase two souls fortune

Four black Jaguars and a refrigerated van
Crunched over the gravel drive to our man
Giles stood still and smiled, for it had began

Each of the six women and the six men
Were concealed with hoods and veils
But Giles' face was not hidden from them
Now that he controls the final inhales

Deep in the candle light of the wine cellar
Which had been prepared with plastic sheets and tape
A skirt of dismembered arms on an altar
A grim garland of forty eight human skulls, mouths agape

But fifty skulls are required
According to the ancient text
Two more to soon be provided
Giles planned to do that next

"Bring the two travellers to me" demanded Giles
"Let me send them on their final way"
Eight of the group left and within minutes returned
With four bound, hooded for him to slay.

Giles felt suddenly unable to function
"This was not meant to be!"
"The others witnessed the abduction, Sir"
"They...will not please Kali"

"Stand those women over there
Tie them back to back
Make sure your knots are fixed
Offer them no slack!"

The silk cummerbund slid
Effortlessly off his waist
Weighted near the middle
To offer death less haste
The first of the male offerings
Only kicked for 30 seconds
the world stopped moving when
the other felt the silk band

The back to back females started spinning
Their hoods removed and ******* gone
Giles did not look up to see who he knew
Focused solely on continuing strangulation

This time the Thuggee's had another view
Zamira and Liliana in a blurring spin
Black of space and ocean of deep blue
Zamira angered, Liliana peaceful grin

All but their arms becoming one
Morphing seamlessly into each other
The (previously twin) sisters had become
The universe's all powerful mother

          K A L I...


Final part

Nothing escapes the all-consuming march of time!

As KALI consumed time and space
Her dimensions grew and grew
Her skin darkened to deep space black
From unfathomable ocean blue
Rivers of obsidian flowed as her wild hair
Untamed, magnificent, streaming
Three blood red eyes past, present, future
Decided who needed redeeming
Four arms, three of which were grasping
A sword, a spear, a bowl
The fourth grabbed a Thuggee's head
Sword decapitated the soul
A crimson red snake of a tongue lashed
Out for every drop of blood
Then the sword slashed every throat there
Her tongue lapped up the flood
KALI'S gaze finally cast upon terrified Giles
Evaporating his body with fire
His conscience was that remained in that dimension
His conscience changed KALI'S desire
Frightful fury morphed in to motherly compassion
Her skin back from black to blue
Spewing out rearranged history, time and space
No other being could construe
But a mother must teach her children lessons
So she left Giles not without guilt
A ****** message painted on his forehead
And a sword driven to its hilt

*THE END!

Sinking further down as the dregs of the day come to pass--
painful, palpable drudgery.

There will be no recognition from anyone--
endlessly hoping tomorrow will somehow prove to be different
           insanity they call it.

Nevertheless, I go -- down the road to start again.

HARLEM BLUES
Lingering perfumes float through the night air,
Life was a drudgery for him and no one cared!
With neon lights blinking and flashing every-
where!
The jazz band in the saloon played a soft tune,
And the lady there sang the Blues and also
crooned!
Now the solitude of the night gets to him,
As he drops down into a corner seat where lights
are rather dim!
Signals the waiter as he lights his cigar,
And orders a large whiskey and soda, having
come down so far!
He remains enthralled by the lone singer’s
voice,
He must spend this ‘blue night’ all alone, -
since he had no other choice!
The singer now comes pretty close to him,
And he could see her white teeth dazzle and
gleam!
But when he looked into those dark eye lashes, -
Sad memories from the past before his eyes
flashes!

He had been a clarinet player of some renown,
But his wife couldn’t tolerate its piping sound!
His habit of playing the pipe at mid-night hours,
Made her to desert him for their marriage had
gone sour!
The 'blue notes' in the saloon soon comes to an
end,
But the music goes on simply to entertain!
The singer now invites this loner to her room,
He accompanies - trying to forget his loneliness
and gloom!
She pours out two drinks in her upstairs room,
And places his head gently between her *****, -
Which makes him to swoon!
The ‘blue notes’ still plays on in his mind,
It is then when she pulls out a clarinet from
behind!
Seeing him surprised - she laughs out loud;
He stares at the clarinet with misgiving and doubt!
“Don’t worry darling I had met you wife,
She had shown me your picture and told me about
your life!
From my childhood days I had loved the clarinet,
It turns me on before I go to bed!
So play the pipe gently as I get into my slip-on,
And we shall make love right into the morn! ”
He picked up the clarinet and played it so
tender and so light, -
The music echoed through the lonely Harlem night!
                      -By Raj Nandy, New Delhi.

(While reading up the History of Jazz for composing my Jazz Story Part Two, I received an inspiration for writing this fictional poem for you! For reading thank you!)

I saw you

I saw your brain spilling out its cerebellum, medulla oblongata, etc

All over- unrecognizable

indistinguishable

I saw

I thought those were some kind of pink pulses

Lord knows, weirder things have been found

and seen

I saw


I saw

I hope there is justice for you

I will pray for your soul

My soul will meet yours
when the knell rings for me


I hope you find peace

I hope you know that I called

And called and tried and tried

To help you even though you were already gone

I saw your friend- his eyes, his expression


I really did try
Please find yourself another life

I hope your friend finds peace
Knows it wasn't all his fault
I hope his eyes lose the haunted shocked expression
I really wish he can drive again

I hope he can continue working
- he looked like one of those people
you know those ones?
working hard to make it out of drudgery?

I hope he makes it through this
And I really really wish you guys hadn't had a fight before this

Find peace
Go safe
Go softly

Your death was sudden
Ripped out of this earth
Like you were never meant to exist
That was meant to be me

I hope it didn't hurt too much

And those ******* that did this to you?
I hope they didn't mean it
I wish they hadn't been high before this

Your death shouldn't be meaningless
And although
You might be simply another obituary in tomorrow's newspaper

This poem will say

"I saw you.
I prayed for you.
I greeted you.
I witnessed your existence.
You meant something
Just as your death did.
I wish you peace and that you go
Safely, soundly
Wishing you that your loved ones
Remember you with love
And maybe some heartbreak
But they find strength.
Tonight,
I
s   a   w
You"

It’s Sunday afternoon and several of us, Leong, Sunny, Anna, Lisa and her new BF Dave (well, he isn’t ‘new,’ he’s 26) and I are watching an NFL football game. The Eagles vs the Jets.

There’s a platter of wings, fries, celery and dips on the low-white table for grazing and everyone’s multitasking while watching the game. Leong, Lisa and I on iPads, Anna, and Dave are on laptops and Sunny has a book.

I’m rooting for the Jets, although they’re the underdogs and given little chance. Dave’s for the Eagles, he believes they’re SuperBowl bound and he may be right.

After every good Jets play, like a first down, or defensive tackle or a score, I start snapping my finger - like the dancing Jet hoodlums in ‘West Side Story’ and sing:

“When you're a Jet,
you’re a Jet all your life
all your kids will be Jets
and even your wife.”

When I did it the first time, Dave chuckled. Lisa patted his arm, saying, “You’ll get used to it.” I’ve only done it twenty or thirty times since then and everyone’s ignoring me.

“I could be a songwriter, you know,” I said, “just give up this life of college drudgery and hang with T-Swift”. No one denied my obvious talent.

A huge Eagles lineman bust through the Jets o-line, throwing QB Zach Wilson to the turf, “Jeez,” Anna said.
“That guy’s not an Eagle,” I protested indignantly, “he’s a condor.” I was hoping for a flag but none were thrown.

“I want some steak”, I announced suddenly, to no one and everybody, switching subjects as quickly as a brain synapse fires.
“Do you know,” I reasoned extemporaneously, “that a diet of nothing but healthy prime-rib or ribeye steak can practically eliminate the chance of coming down with mad-lettuce-disease?”

“Mad-lettuce-disease?” Sunny asked, looking up from her book with a smirk.
“Middle America,” I began, Leong groaned and Lisa rolled her eyes at Dave, who smiled.
“That’s where all our vegetables come from,” I said, “the red states on the electoral maps,” I clarified even further.

“Well, how can we explain simple, decent, hard-working people falling in love with a lying, craven, reality-TV huckster like Trump?” I asked rhetorically,  looking around for an answer. When no answer was forthcoming, I supplied it:
“Mad-lettuce-disease!” I proclaimed, “Those people are eating the ‘vegetables’ they grow!” Giving the word ‘vegetables’ the same scorn I might lavish on ‘cigarettes’.

“If we all just stuck to a healthy, all-steak diet, ‘Mad-lettuce-disease’ would fade away and America would be saved.” I concluded, like a lawyer finishing a summation to a jury.
I expected applause, or at least a few “Amens” but there were only a few grunts and maybe a chuckle.

On the screen, the Jets defense broke through the Eagles o-line and quarterback Jalen Hurts, under pressure, threw an interception. I jumped to my feet yelling,“YES!” and begin snapping again:

“When you're a Jet
you’re a Jet all the way
from your first sorry breath
to your last dying day”

I love football, and the Jets won!

Friends, Part Two will get posted after a break. I have added short notes at the end, for appreciation of all Jazz lovers. To know how the word 'Jass' became 'Jazz', - kindly read the Foot Notes below. Best wishes, - Raj, New Delhi.

    THE STORY OF JAZZ MUSIC IN VERSE:
                         PART- ONE

                      INTRODUCTION
Before writing about this true Jazz Story,
I had delved into its long checkered history!
I had plowed through many articles and
books,
Making personal notes to make Jazz better
understood.
My love for this music flows in my veins,
From writing this true story myself I could
hardly restrain !

THE ATLANTIC SLAVE TRADE
The story begins some four hundred years
ago in History,
Drenched in the blood and sweat of the black
slaves which was no mystery,
Painting a sorrowful background to our Jazz
Story !
It was a time when the English , Spanish , French ,
Portuguese and the Dutch became frantic , -
To gain control of the slave trade across the vast
Atlantic !
Slave trade those days was a very profitable
business proposition;
The funds generated had also financed Britain’s
Industrial Revolution!

In 1619  a Dutch sailing ship had carried the first
lot of fifty slaves from West Africa, -
To work in the cotton, tobacco, and sugarcane
plantations of English Colony of Virginia !
Only twenty slaves had survived that hazardous
Atlantic journey;
And here my friends lies the roots of my Jazz
Story !
While it is true that in New Orleans Jazz got
cradled and also nourished;
But it had taken birth in the regions of Western
Africa where slave traders had once flourished!
Later, many more slaves were transported across
to work in the plantations of the Southern States
of America,*  (see notes below)
And in their hearts one could hear the tom–tom
and drum beats of native Africa ! * (notes below)

HOLLERS AND WORK SONGS
Those slaves took no musical instruments with
them,
And worked under the whip lash of their white
Overseers bound in chains !
But they had cherished their ancient music which
fed their hope and the will to survive;
And from the depth of their sorrow and suffering, -
sprung the rhythm and beat of their life !
While at work they were forbidden to talk to each
other,
So they sang in a rich sing-song voice and called
out to one another;
Which was not understood by their whip-wielding
Overseers.
They also called out and communicated to other
working gangs in the distant fields,
Who also replied back in a similar fashion to
make their communication network complete.
The ‘hollers’ and ‘work songs’ also did help,
To lighten the burden of their treacherous fate.
This ‘call and response’ later formed one of Jazz
Music’s basic elements,
As ‘improvised music’ got composed with Jazz
providing a proper vent.
From their tormented soul they sang to wipe away
their blues,
Giving birth to ‘blue notes’ later , for WC Handy
to pay his many handsome tributes !
The slaves longed for freedom and emancipation,
Singing their ‘spirituals’ with faith and devotion !
While singing they often got into a trance,
And felt like the Israelites in ******* in Egypt,
ordained by fate and chance !
The Mississippi was like the River Jordan across
which they hoped to see, -
A band of Angels coming in their chariots to set
them free,  @
From their suffering, drudgery, and captivity !
Thus ‘improvisation’ becomes a vital ingredient of
Jazz Music;  $
For ‘freedom of expression’ is its distinguishing  
feature, which Jazz music forever seeks.

CONCLUDING  MY PART ONE
‘Jazz’ had come to America in chains, buried
deep inside the black man’s soul.
With a longing for freedom from torture and pain,
Which was then beyond their control!
The tom-tom beats, work songs, Spirituals and the
Blues, -
Were all precursor to Jazz, and here I pause to
pay my homage and heart-felt dues,
To those valiant predecessors who had come in
chains ,
Giving a painful birth to ‘jass’, - from which Jazz
gets its name ! # (notes below)

FOOT NOTES:-
Slaves were sold at 15 dollars per head. Early 1700s saw 75,000 slaves auctioned! By1800s there were one million slaves in US alone! Slaves came from Senegal, Ashantis, Gold Coast, Niger Delta, Dahomey, & the Congo; with a variety of beats and music buried in their minds and hearts !
** The Drums were an essential form of communication in Africa. They believed their Gods communicated through their beats . Those drums provided the basic beats of Jazz Music.
+ 'Blue Music' = became a part of cultural landscape of Southern US by early 1900s, but had remained unnoticed till W.C.Handy published his song –‘Memphis Blues’ in1914.
@ I refer here to the famous ***** Spiritual song -‘Swing Low Sweet Chariot’ ! I use to sing this song in my Missionary School in Calcutta in the 50s !  Slaves had sung them in plantation ‘Praise Houses’ during their weekly prayer meetings.
# "JASS" = originally an Africa-American slang meaning ‘***’! Born in the brothels of Storyville (New Orleans)  & the Jasmine perfumes used by the girls there; one visiting them was  said to be 'jassed-up' ! Mischievous boys rubbed out the letter ‘J’ from posters outside announcing -"Live Jass Shows'', making it to read as ‘'Live *** Shows'’! So finally ‘ss’ of ‘jass’ got replaced by 'zz' of JAZZ !
$ “Improvisation” = is the process of spontaneously creation of fresh melodies over the continuously repeating cycle of chord changes of a tune, which distinguishes Jazz from all other musical forms - raising it to its own great Individualistic Heights !
….ALL COPY RIGHTS ARE RESERVED BY RAJ NANDY OF NEW DELHI---
E-Mail : rajnandy21@yahoo.in

(Written 12/09/09)


Sometimes the sun sets early
On times that passed too soon;
When reality's not worthy
And our dreams carelessly strewn;
Sometimes hope appears as worthless
As the secret tears we cry;
Some people die on purpose
With no thought to say goodbye.


Perceived selfishness, derided
Over all they left unsaid;
All their years of trying to hide it
- All for nothing, once they're dead;
Though they never meant to hurt us
Agony is always there;
Some people die on purpose,
Driven by profound despair.


Misery is bleak and mindless,
It devours from inside out;
And we only seek the kindness
That so many go without.
Feeling purposeless and worthless,
Trapped by drudgery and fear;
Some people die on purpose,
Some wish, but are still here.

for however much i'd like to glorify the glorious wintry
months...
   and i must: glorify the winter:
for those splendours of the almost eternal nights...
as if i were living on the Faroe Islands or elsewhere
in that sort of dynamic of light...
   the biting cold: like the pinching of ***** on your skin...
or the frost, ice... one pavement at night...
tilting your head from left to right...
exposing a "red carpet" of paparazzi flashing of
the camera with ice particles lodged in the cracks...
but...
there's nothing quiet like waking up naturally
in May with the sunrise...
   even though you've set your alarm clock for 7am...
you wake up naturally with the light rising
at around 6am... almost like someone who is about
to go into the field and use a scythe to cut down
shafts of wheat...
    i find no compromise in that feeling...
i don't even mind the insects busying themselves
with a daily activity of "business": esp. if they're not bees...
even flies don't bother me ******* out their
maggot juices into steaming crops of garbage...
not when i wake up naturally with the sunrise...
i abhor alarm clocks: it's so unnatural to wake up
to their dictates: well... the dictates you yourself have set
up... besides the point...
alarm clocks should only be used during the winter
months... in the spring and summer months...
you shouldn't be sleeping with your blinds closed...
the light should wake you up:
calmly: gradually... no one want to be woken up
with a cold shower... in shock: subsequently looking
for a caffeine fix... to equilibrate... his bewildered
circumstance... best to fall asleep with the blinds open:
allowing the sunshine to creep in...
slowly ungluing your eyes...

        - and i don't mean this as some sort of
"neo-****" joke... the maxim above Auschwitz:
arbeit mach frei...
    that work sets you free...
        you must first spend your 20s locked up in
an ivory tower of creativity...
you must truly become isolated from people...
learn and relearn to have two legs to stand on:
two hands to wave and point with...
two eyes and a least one tongue to waggle...
    Bukowski famously wrote about the drudgery of work...
am i going to be the first person who will
write about work with pleasure?

even today: i don't understand why the stereotype of
northerners is so harsh by "us" southerners...
today? Sunderland vs. Wycombe Wanderers...
i was working the vomitory on the Sunderland side
of the affair...
well... there is one stereotype that rings true
about northerners... the Mancunians...
i actually don't like people from Manchester...
that demonym: borrowed from demographic...
is already unappealing...
i like the words Scouser... Geordie...
  but a Mancunian is a lying **** of a coo-nigh-ain...
i don't know why...
it's this pride-vibe relating to Mancunians
feeling themselves superior to anyone from Liverpool
or Newcastle of Sunderland...

fair enough, i was chewing my gum...
three Sunderland lads came into my vicinity...
one asked: what politeness... aye aye... you couldn't
try to get a YES... but? no chance...
aye aye...
                  great conversations...
but then one sneezed and his snot-phlegm landed
on my trousers...
i opened my mouth and started to chew
the chewing gum by also exposing my teeth...
i was sort of trying to hide the fact that...
hey! mate! why not as well ******* your *****
onto my tie while you're at it!

Bukowski wrote about the drudgery of work...
as a postman... delivering letters...
i don't expect he had to deal with old men
filing complaints about people ahead of them
in the stands standing up...
i had two neurotic old men today...
why are they standing up! blah blah, blah blah...

but these northerners... thank **** i lived among
the Scots for 3 years... i sort of know what to expect...
the loveliest sorts...
and the women? unlike southern girls...
so approachable... likeable.. curvy...
if it isn't a girl from Liverpool kissing your cheek...
then it's probably a girl from Sunderland
coming up to you: grabbing your beard...
stroking it...
      like i'm going to turn into a ******* leprechaun
and have my hear patted...
or turn into a hunchback of Notre Dame
and have my hunch stroked for good luck...
all: in good humour...

a goal is scored and the fans don't start hugging
other fans... just these "*******": traffic-cones
in high-viz. vests...
  
        i don't think this is work: to begin with...
maybe that's why i like writing about it...
maybe that's why this isn't drudgery...
    then again: the peace and quiet of delivering
letters... spam... with the email around...
                   maybe i just love people too much...
but i kept it hidden...
but why is it... that the further north you go:
the girls become prettier...
sure... they might be slightly on the chubby side...
what's that saying from high-school?
ah ha ha... ahem... ahem...
more-cushion'-for-the-pushin'...
        
after all... what was the trend back in post-medieval times?
the more blub on a girl the more attractive
she became...
    i could work around that...
ask long as her fat *** matches up to...
her fat *******...

eye-contact... hugs... getting my beard stroked...
i think that if my... "i think":
when my parents finally kick the bucket
i'll be thinking about moving up north...
Liverpool... Newcastle... i don't think i'll be able
to stomach London on my own...
i just love the people from up north...
so far: so good...

and it's almost funny... living in London for so long...
England really is a...
racial homogeneity...
                     maybe that's why i'm so relate-able...
pacifier...
             fair-enough: it's "not fair"...
                         not by the colour of the skin
but by the judgement of the character...
   honestly?
                   i find this statement morphed a little:
since it predicates that somehow white people
have a bad character...
but even the copper necks know this is a farce...
at least the ones that appreciate that
that narrative spewed by the masochistic whites
of a liberal persuasion is off the ******* planet!

like today: one Egyptian? Persian...
oh no... no a copper neck... more Aryan looking...
in the original sense of the word
asked the supervisor: can i work with him?
obviously i was assigned a chubby girl...
i still would... if she just slapped some make-up
on and did her hair in a style that didn't resemble
Shiva's head-knot... i still would...

i become tired: i become *****...
    i was walking home today... bought some lunch
for tomorrow... drank a cider... smoke a cigarette...
finally! life!
         work is not work but a hobby!
interacting with people after my dreaded hiatus!
anger management... of some truly neurotic people...
goose-fra-b'ah...
    go to bed quarter to 12am... wake up with the sunrise
come 6am... take a shower... fiddle with shoelaces...
shine those same shoes...
drink a coffee... attire myself with at least
7 different chemical substances...
turning impatient about Monday and painting
the fence... a glorious burn of auburn brown...

when my parents will pass-off... hmm...
i think i'll move up north...
the houses are cheaper up there...
    not that London bores me...
         but... there's too much of London
to even begin getting bored of it...
i feel the north of England calling me...
with each kiss on the cheek by a gal from Liverpool
by every stroke of the beard
by a gal from Sunderland...

     almost like a dog: doesn't anyone and everyone
require a feeling of being loved?
i think these northern gals are really
"conservative" in that they're not this global /
cosmic circus of poly-ethnicities coming together...
i think that's where the true England
is at... i want to explore it...

   i kind of like being showed these little showcasing
of a stranger's love for a stranger...
i didn't have to be kissed... on the cheek...
i didn't have to have m beard being adored...
with strokes... of a woman's hand...
my god... her hand felt s hot on my biceps...
by now i don't care whether or not she was
a ******* the BIG side...
        of "things": details...
            
         if i could salvage the life of a beached whale:
i would... like my grandfather taught me:
there are not ugly women in this world:
there are only abandoned women...
by abandoned women?
what did he imply?
   women who... have been underappreciated
by men...
                  even if she's a tease of chubby...
but she has milk skin...
  it's a walk-through...

i'm working but i'm not working...
   not at this rate... hugs, kisses... etc.
             half of me is watching the match... half is so disinterested
in it: since half of me has seen so much of that coliseum
*******: i want more! faces! circus! bread!

i think i'm going to relax...
sleep with my cat... i think i'll just do that...
go to bed come 12am... wake up at 6am...
sure... it would be great to have ****** prior...
i'm free throughout the rest of the week...
the brothel calls...

and here was me worried:
£1700+ savings on one account...
£900+ savings on another account...
    and do i have to worry about paying off a mortage?
last time: i heard the resounding echo of: NO...
so...
             investments in books...
in banknotes... stamps...
                              
             i'm sort of cured of caring for money...
i like earning money...
for: what i find to be: **** all...
because the money i earn goes into art galleries
or prostitutes...
while i pay off my life debts for food by doing
household DIY chores...

the basics that life allows:
hardly going fishing... hardly any fish in the matter...
all the better.

Have you ever been Cinderella at the ball?
Have you ever stood there so completely in awe of the impossible wonderful you're experiencing?
Have you ever had to leave the ball so no one sees your riches turn to rags
Return to the drudgery of a reality full of tyrants and sycophants;
Thinking that you'll be okay going back to being just you after the clock strikes midnight?
How do you go back?
How do you ever taste anything the same again?
How do you learn to not ache for that kind of love; that kind of beauty?
How do you go back to living as a scullery maid?
How do you go back to the cold hearth alone?
Do you tell yourself you never deserved it?
Do you tell yourself it wasn't real?
Do you tell yourself the prince never cared?
Do you just sit alone by your hearth, covered in the day's cinders and hope beyond hope that it wasn't all in your head?

The insidious wrath of age has pilfered her beauty ..
Rusted chains hang in quietude , wrenched in dubious functionality ....
Superfluous stockyards , fencing long in need of repairs ..
Barns that once bustled with the drudgery of agriculture can only whisper ..
Wind chimes trill in the cold afternoon , the crack of the hammer to the anvil gone ..
Tractor implements lie frozen , a lone Crow stands guard over barren orchards* ..

They come down the road coughing
Up beliefs between cigarette drags
And slight hesitations of who they are to others.
Orange-ish yellow unattractively
Embroiders their chests; they've got their protections,
Their unambiguous vests.
From hazy breakfast drudgery
To night's exhausted rapture,
The play the same stage, the same lines, the same players.
But this is living to them:
Shrugging at the future; believing just because;
Knowing the store still provides overpriced cigarettes.
Their feet rattle on tarry asphalt
As their tools swing away. Patterns
Are in their hearts, their caged, tamed hearts,
Stifling what they want to say.
They built the streets I drive on
As I fight with my nothingness
And I remember they must feel this too,
Just as darkly and definitely as the wheel feels the road.

No not the falls but the laugh phenomenal engaging pure intoxicating the crinkle of eyes the
Aliveness the reverberation does fall and streams down like water it washes ones face nothing
Holds it back part of its softer moods is its winsomeness airy innocence that speaks tenderly as
It outwardly shouts what a find recently I spoke of the money I spent trying to find a singer to
Move and touch my soul so many was good and held promise but time after time
Disappointment it’s the same nothing is prettier than ones smile they are wonderful you
Cherish them and then you see the day change in a moment electricity crackles a heart shines
Through every pour of a face we are all blessed with a special something that makes us unique
A quiet power to touch a sweeping away of cares and frowns it spills down country lanes quaint
Sidewalks of the mind when it is observed it is telling in that it dispels the lie that life is nothing
But pain and drudgery my contrary heart argues such statements but the soul and spirit
Overrule by having just been ignited thrown into a tizzy thats alright everyone needs to get tizzy
Every once in a while the blues is cruel laughter shoots them down allows you to bounce back
And enjoy life laughter truly is like a medicine well if she isn’t hospital size she is defiantly a
Clinic no guaranties in life they say I’ll give this one look into that laugh your expression and
Outlook will change it worked for her here is her own direct quote “Previously my life was
Complex, I helped make it that way. Now, I keep it simple and fun.” Take delirious look at it
Aghast as we must we can’t have that so throw a big pinch of sober a tiny dash of dower ok fine
Now just for a minute laugh your head off good lord what fun don’t worry about the stunned
Faces they will get over it I bet a lot of country people have had similar experiences if they own
A jack *** you know how they have those signs in some neighborhoods for different reasons
Well some Need no Laughing out loud fuddy dudy lives at such in such address go up behind
Them and Scream get Crazy they will live longer and that I can guarantee I have written about a
Great lady With a Great laugh enjoy making her acquaintance

Why you got those boots on your feet
Are you the wandering jingle jangler
That heeled high feeling easy dreamer
Lending ears to become the audience
Marking antonyms like Julius Caesar
Trying to rise before the failures fall
Sublimely for the mad beauty of it all
In desperate dreams of the final curtain
Draping the fading drama in the folds
The weatherman never read the script
And left his quill on the top of the hill
When Romeo betrayed Juliet to the fool
Stealing his chance of everlasting fame
Casting shadows before his own naming
Everything in the lies of playing games.
At least that’s why he sold himself again
For *** and drudgery’s rotting role play
Once for the money and twice to show
That charity begins when gambling ends
Throwing dice at the shaming of the true
Believers in the obviously innocent song
That sang itself to deaths other oblivion
Dwelling inside the flickering footlights
Burning soles who tread the dollar less way
To stage their very own beautiful demise
Before a paying and praying audience
There’s no business like the dying business
That’s the dumb an’ smart career move  
As death consumes all; here and ever after
The three ring circus hits the super highway
To heavenly pay days in the after math
That stole the souls of the leading actors
Wasn’t that just the smart career move
To die happily on the wings of disaster
Farewell sweet prince an’ princesses
May flights of angels love your music.

Your life is threadbare
and it's cosy

Uncomfortable
but safe

Poor
yet secure

It's not killing you
but then neither are you living.

The head is above water,
Struggling against the tide.

Grinding along on a hamster wheel
that badly needs oiling

I mean

You now earn less than you did at your first job.
It was **** all then

and that was 5 years ago.

The years have not been kind. The hairline has crept upward
Roughly in line with inflation.

A job's a job's a job's a job's a job.

There's a damp roof over your head.

Are you ready to trade all this in for a taste of adventure?

A main course of personal growth
washed down with a side order of

Drudgery

loneliness

and Japanese Encephalitis.

Will they find you out?
Will you be pulled into an office

while a polite local
explains how her English is better than yours?

That could all happen, says the head

but the frightened, quivering heart longs to change.

To jump into the fire and emerge reborn
strong, dynamic, brave. All the things you aren't now.


Just don't hope for too much.

When it’s dark, it reminds us that there is light nearby
Patiently waiting to dispel the darkness
We just have to search and realize the source
From where light can penetrate the darkness
And fill each and entire cosmic realm
We have not become blind yet, but disillusioned
By the constant onslaught of the wrath of darkness
Blinded, yet our vision is veiled by darkness
Waiting for light to be the savior or the misery
A single ray of light is like an army, to salvage
And defeat darkness, indoctrination the sinister minds
To dispel away the darkness, in stark daylight
Our souls were holed up in dark cellars
Ruled by the darkness regime
But now, the time has come to break away the shackles
Of the darkness, we got so used to
This will be a new beginning, where there will be light in our heart
Be it day or night, we will carry the light within us
And to help others to come out of the drudgery of darkness





© Amitav (Radiance)

Give me stairs
To attain some lofty pinnacle
For stairs are sheer simplicity
An elegant solution to reach some apogee
Incapable of failure unlike the
Mechanical complexities deriving from indolence
Presumed superior to the apparent drudgery
Of clambering upward unhurriedly and
Thus assembled ultimately to fail and frustrate my overwrought soul
While archaic stairs continue unwavering ever upwards  
Give me stairs

I captained logs lovingly across
a musky pond
to hang stars on this date
when so much happened.
Let’s wake in the missed-me morrow
and I’ll try to recapture it.

6am

My aroused heart pounds with the eager
pecks of new world sparrows
feasting on a found pile of saltine *******
crumbs.

With these easier pickings, they can gloss
over hypothetical seeds lost
and the unfortunate insects
still trapped in their tightly wrapped buds
while emitting
a silky trickle of pollen sweetened tears
I might have once confused as joy.

8am

My mouth is a cast iron bell
robbed of its moistness
and the service of a tongue that would rather be
surgically cut without
the requisite anesthesia
than extol with slithering anticipation
the downfall of cold-blooded prey.

A grubby grimace can’t
switch off the cockle-less warmth
gazed by an elegantly impolite swan,
but amazingly cottony soft escapes can
be ginned with the bait of a choirboy’s tender
“Have mercy!”

10am

My nutmeg brown irises are diced
fresh and tossed into a ***
where spiced hot they’re shown
the urgency this yet-to-be plucked rose feels
when the mid-morning light
accumulates with enough heat
to bake the earth chocolate.

The tattered edges of her puckered lips
glow an ardent shade of pink and make
a beacon, signaling kingly butterflies to abdicate
their aimless flutters and jet
directly toward her alluring realm.

Noon

My usually cool tips can’t maintain
their aloof trance and they trip
red with sudden blushes over the damaged
clasp on a school girl’s lunch box
crayoned with lemonade kittens,
their wordless greetings.

It’s unlatched to reveal no magic
pressed in the chunks of pickle loaf,
but the foetid and desperate
fruits of a wish for can’t-stay-at-home mothers
to be released from the wages of others’
drudgery.

A squirrel drags her white bread
and dappled meat onto the play lot
where the child’s storm-cloud stare
breaks with the flash
and low rumble of laughter.

2pm

My soles crave the touch of loose-dirt
roads, but it’s my ankles that meet
brambles and are torn by their tiny kisses
from which a rubbery
beauty of sappy drips trails back
to grow pastel primavera blooms.

Their long, tapered necks
and delicate, glassy horns blow
the modulated notes of an icy hymn.

Its diamante flecks freckle
the hovering blue before falling
to press these young,
painted plants into a frieze
and free them from wilting.

4pm

My nape aches for the subtle
weight on not supple joints
between thick fig branches
powdered with a maquillage of snowy dust.

No one care can snap them
or keep them from sheltering
the grazes of constantly bleating sheep.

Candy floss wool is tinted
jonquil then apricot then cherry
as the distant and fiery ball of a sun
slowly descends to the quenching
splash in its night-deposit bucket.

6pm

My unencumbered back gently rolls with a raft
adrift on ripples raised
when unknown aquatic creatures
stir in a shallowly cupped liquid.

Their pleasant plunks and gleeful gurgles
are carried on the crisply creeping evening
air to wash away
the unsavory wafts of salty rumors.

Here I can’t scent the far-removed
oceans racked by hunger’s
chilling frissons and the pundit’s
raging rants to at all-costs maintain
the elevation of market-priced pap.

And I drifted off...

The hundrum existence of millions of lives suddenly ceased
as did their obedience to the drudgery of habit -
taking to the sea, to their gardens, to boats, cool drinks,
sun-tan lotions, ice-creams, cool dresses,
to light and shade as dictated to by desire.

Sand scorching to the naked foot glitters like gold for the having
and every square of every town shelters under a haven of umbrellas
and lazy liquor assisted sensuous talk.

The farmers work on a Sunday too
and weekend traffic jams sweat it out
to the blaring of radio cheerfulness in the extreme.

Spotless blue skies progress to star-lit canopies
and barbecues are the dominant feature of the early hours.

Sun and good humour, honest abandonment, salads and heavy foliage rule.

I love the smell of incense
On the morning of Aug. 18, 2014

So what is this place
This place called earth
I'll work and work and work
Until my body breaks down

I'll probably always be alone
Maybe I like to be alone
Because it is all I have ever known

I am envious of beautiful women
Sometimes I wish I could have been a woman
I feel like I inhabit the wrong body at times
Oh what a joy
To experience the thrill of multiple *******
I imagine myself as a beautiful blonde
Riding my hot powerful black man

But those are just dreams
Wishful thinking
Better to accept the cold hard reality

Oh the emptiness of it all
Shunyata--Free from permanence
Neither permanent nor non-existing, and that is, ultimately, how things are

Lao Tzu says
"At the center of your being
You have the answer;
You know who you are
And you know what you want

I know who I am
I know I want to be a lifelong teacher
Beginning is so difficult
I hope I am able to start soon

Being a human being can be quite difficult

Future operations will use drone and robotic weapons whenever possible
Since human doubt in a rightful purpose in the mission
Is rapidly diminishing
The technocratic authoritarians diminish the sacred nature of life
With each New death system

It's all so terrible
The things people do to each other
Such a primitive race
Such a primitive race man is

And the young college kids are glued to their iPhones
I just wish more people had an appreciation for history
Of the human story

Buddham, saranam, gacchami
Dhammam, saranam, gachami
Sangham, saranam, gachami

I listen to these words as I write this poem

I go to the Buddha for refuge
I go to the Dhamma for refuge
I go to the Sangha for refuge

Please try to grasp the scope
Of what has gone on here on earth
We each write our own story

Please remember Colonel Glen Frazier
One day he suffered a severe cut on his hand
Which went to the bone
It was so cold and he was so emaciated
That the wound did not bleed
Some days later he was walking across the camp with his hands
In his pocket, to keep warm, and quickly found out
That this was against the rules
He was taken before a judge and sentenced to death,
But was saved by a miracle of God.

With a gun to his back and a saber to his throat,
His assassin asked Colonel Frazier if he had anything to say
Before his head was cut off

He was then given, as he recalled,
"A mouth and wisdom"
"You can **** me but not my spirit,"
He told the stunned Japanese soldier,
"And my spirit is going to lodge in your body
And haunt you for the rest of your life."

Buddham, saranam, gacchmmi
Dhammam, saranam, gacchami
Sangham, saranam, gacchami

You cannot **** my spirit
All those mean and nasty comments
He who must not be named
Has said to me
I hate you!

I do not ever want to see you again
My spirit cannot die

But the world is full of hate
And so as Colonel Frazier learned how the hate devoured him
He learned to forgive
I try so hard to forgive
But still so hard for me
Forgive but not forget!

Stone Buddha
Stone Faced Buddha
Impermanence of reality

Buddham, saranam, gacchami,
Dhammam, saranam, gacchami
Sangham, saranam, gachami

And what about the ego maniacs
The ego is a social construction

Anatman or non-self is the reality

The Upanishads sought to free individuals from ego-attachment
By pointing out that the real self
Is the Universal Self rather than the individual self,
The Buddha sought to free individuals from ego-attachment
By pointing out that there is no individual self
To which to become attached

No man is an island
There exists a certain mutual arising
Alan Watts says
We see how things kind of go together in a connected net, rather than as a Chain of billiard *****, banging each other around
The world is like a network of dew drops on a spider's web
And in each dew drop the reflection of that drop can be seen
And so we rely on each other

I live with one who does not live
Thirty years she has done nothing!
The degeneration of the American mind
Is what I have witnessed
Countless hours spent mesmerized
In front of the television

Wake Up!
A wise man would say before giving his lecture
You are all asleep and if you don't wake up
I won't give any lecture

Wake Up!
And still she sleeps
Her life away
Unable to face the challenge
How pathetic
Just to exist
And never to live
Blahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh
What a waste
Do something!
Don't just sit in front of Fox news
At 4 p.m. again
And talk to the dogs

Well, I've told many a tale by now
And still hope remains
That is all I ever had really

I know something of love
But not really much from human beings
And who is this Jesus anyway?
Well I love him I guess

I hope to feel love one day
And still
The drudgery continues
Work work work
For increasingly worthless American dollars!

I hope to be able to have my own small apartment
And work myself to death
Well, at least there is the incense to enjoy
And the occasional cigar

College graduate
And another 16 months after that
And still
I am going to the market
She has collected spare change
So I can put them through the machine
For a few lousy bucks
Haha!

At least I have a good car
And a good diet
And a gym to work out in

One should be determined in this life
As I see my life unfold I come to understand
That maybe this is the most important quality

Though shall not fear
Sayeth the Lord!
Stop barking dogs

Buddham, saranam, gacchami
Dhammam, saranam, gacchami
Sangham, saranam, gacchami
(Repeat)

Thank you to those
Who have liked my poems
And follow me

If one can call this poetry
I suppose it is like a stream of consciousness
I never did realize
How much I would enjoy this

Cries some

Will I ever leave this home?
Will my dreams ever come true?
I ask that you think of me
Off in internet land

Do you know I once closed
The Captains of Crush #2 gripper
Manufactured by Ironmind
Look it up, if you would like, it is a hard gripper to close

Do you know I used to bend and break the white and green nails?
Made by Ironmind for this purpose
The metal made hot by the pressure placed upon it
I bent it back and forth until it collapsed
I had to stop because it places too much stress on the hands over time

Do you know
Once did about 150 total pullups in one day
Up and up and up

What was I trying to prove anyway
I'm not sure
Sometimes we must test ourselves

Know thyself, and your limits!
One day the hard times may come
The tough and mean times
I will not live with fear in my heart!

Breathless . . . Heaving . . . Sputtering . . .
Many more steps to go.
Hardened feet.
No longer are my steps maligned by stabs of blood.
Condemnation . . . Damnation . . . Corruption . . .
My seasoned back launches into my perennial burden.
And another step I take.
Into an inevitable future of drudgery.
Hope . . . Exoneration . . . Absolution . . .
Have long been forgotten.
Their burnt ashes adorn my forehead.
My shoulder screams ahead, into the weight it upholds.
Rumble  . . . Rumble . . . Rumble . . .
Each step like the millions before it,
thrusts the stone another foot towards the jagged peak
that towers impressively up ahead.
Dum Da De  . . . Dum Da Doo . . . Dum De Da Dum . . .
And the day goes on.
Dum Da De . . . Dum Da Doo . . . Dum De Da Dum . . .
And the night lives long.
Breathless . . . Heaving . . . Sputtering . . .
My war-torn muscles relax.
And the stone sits.
Stares at the valley below.
Lightning . . . Rain . . . Thunder . . .
The wind caresses and cajoles,
And the stone rolls down below, echoing Thor’s exclamations
And my heart leaps with joy.
After all, there will be another day.
And my feet have hardened anyway.
Ha Ha . . . Ha Ha . . . Ha Ha . . .

Sadly this generation is more familiar with the death star depicted in Star Wars please let me try to
Change your mind the need for this is the war with terror an uncertain future for sure if you are
Only speaking in terms of a natural future it is dismal at best many are turned off by the true
Facts that this world is owned by a singular person that’s because your view is distorted by
Darkness languid stagnation you need to go to the edge of the universe meet the wonder of
Wonders a spectacle will leave you spellbound and speechless draw near and feel the verve
And Pulse of all light see Victoria Falls Niagara Falls but let them equal the globe in size their
Depth and breadth circles the known world instead of water envision light colors so distinctive
Ruby red Emerald green Sapphire blue just to name a few dazzling to the point of confusion in
Other words your minds grasp is exceeded introspection will be piercing the most mundane
Streets of dusty villages before thought not worth the time will reveal secrets swells of joy will
Carry you on their wings you will never view the world the same true dreams will knit
Distortions that are a plague and a Bain they have been fostered in every corner your childlike
Innocence will be restored you will find love that you think no longer exist all that ensnare the
Human community is revealed openly harnessing the light of the morning will realign and give a
True fix so much of life lies in shambles and in ruin with a clear head you will advance and not
Stumble the vexation of death will be transformed shadows will flee away a new day awaits
Pains sorrows will be accredited with unseen value no longer struggling through the mist but
Clarity will give way to adventure you will begin the climb ascend to great heights yes duty will
Still be in play but it won’t be drudgery that will be replaced with thrills stimulation you venture
Forth as kings and queens mapping your great domain anything less is insulting to you and the
Morning Star I will leave you with this so many words are spoken in this life but three are worth
More than all the rest they are of eternal significance they are I made it!

Is this really the life we must force ourselves to live everyday 
this blue collared white collared no collar state of affairs 
where we strangle ourselves daily with the grind of odd jobs poor paychecks an broken homes 
scattered like insects catching fire under the magnified heat of the sun 
our fingers ******* and our minds fall in line to what they tell us 
like obedient children we don't raise our hands to ask why 
no we just bite our tongues and call this a living 
Waiting for our death to come and liberate ourselves from this drudgery 
this mundane system of complications we've entangled ourselves into 
feeling like vines growing on the side of a nuclear bomb waitin to drop off the edge of this planet 
cascading into the imagination of nothingness we know we feel deep inside 
but we've buried it in a rush and sometimes you can hear it grumbling 
crying out to be set free 
this imagination has got us into trouble before 
thinking we can change the system we've built with our own hands and words we've cut from rapists murders and molesters 
Kings queens and holy saints 
we see what we are but do little in time to repair the perceptions we've become 
only tightening our nooses everyday like corporate wear neckties begging for a little more breath 
and a little more time so we can amass the collection the tv tells us we need 
so we wash out our morals And give in to the notion of supply and demand 
but never actually demanding the change so many of us crave and need 
we pull splinters from our teeth and sell them as souvenirs 
hoping someone else will choke on them and loosen these ropes 
binding ourselves to the hanging effect of effigies burning brilliantly in midnight shades of *** bottomed out with whiskey hangovers 
so far it's got to be the only way out of this but the exit we always miss 
when we're traveling two hundred ten miles forward without the gift of sight or intellect 
on baking asphalt looking for a wall to end it all 
looking for someone to call to end it all...

But I've packed my bags and I'm hitchhiking the rest of the way 
keeping my thumb inside my jacket because it's better to walk alone 
than get picked up by a car heading for the fall

Oh, Time, you are my mortal enemy.
Woe to those who wallow in your foul play.
Like a monarch ruling one’s sanity,
You dictate my every move night and day.

From your iron shackles release me now,
A slave to the drudgery of routine.
For when a youth to you I did not bow,
Coming of age entails pain unforeseen.

Family forsaken as work prevails.
Rest is absent amid hectic duties.
Allocation of your daily wage derails
Your subjects from life's priorities.

Perhaps when I’m senile I’ll smile.
But for now, I will mourn all the while.

Meaning of Requiem: A mass for the dead.

Winter's bidding;
Deep snow here, muddy pavements there.
Then, a procession of Roman Catholic members.
The big cross, the hymns and the dress codes are a huge give away.
The all black is a sharp contrast to the white snow covered country,
Or maybe it just serves to complement it
Like those little black poker dots that make white shirts appear natty and casual at the same time.


I struggle to watch the procession from above.
My office is on the third floor and I'm out for a smoke break.
I don't smoke, I just use that to get away from the drudgery that is my work.
The procession below reminds me of my co-workers - drab and solemn, all at once.
May the dead never have to confess how they truly feel about the burial rites that we perform at their funerals.

...

I was out till late last night;
Another citizen in the district,
Another observer minding his own business.

WHAT if I bade you leave
The cavern of the mind?
There's better exercise
In the sunlight and wind.
I never bade you go
To Moscow or to Rome.
Renounce that drudgery,
Call the Muses home.
Seek those images
That constitute the wild,
The lion and the ******,
The harlot and the child
Find in middle air
An eagle on the wing,
Recognise the five
That make the Muses sing.

Glowing faces
In beautiful destinations
Saying "Pay me so I can show you how to live like me"
Give them your money, your time
Their joyous lives fill your Instagram feed,
Filling you with a insatiable need
To consume what the lifestyle they are selling

Life coaches, spiritual masters, transformation guides
All these people who've got the life
While you turn to them
Through your screen
Looking to them to tell you what life means
They say "Pay up, happiness isn't free"
And you scramble in search for money,
Because they say they sell what you need

You work your nine to five,
And live your tired life
You try to make ends meet
Your kids are ungrateful,
Never looking up from their myriad screens
Your husband left you
In search of a woman who looks like she could be in her teens
You eat your ramen, no, it's not gluten free
You wonder how your life got to this--
In two words: Miserable drudgery

You go on social media,
Look at all these lifestyle gurus
Talking about how happy they are
That they could burst at the seams
They've got the money,
And the perfect honey
And the luxuries,
They take selfies on distant beaches,
Smiling cheek to cheek
They are happy
And they are trying to sell you their lifestyle

They create e-courses, e-books, e-everything-and-anythings
On how to follow what they did
to become so happy, so wealthy, so blessed
It's all a mindset, they teach
You can get anything you desire
If you work hard enough for it

It's a revolution,
With all these self love lifestyle gurus
Infiltrating social media
But are we selling our souls,
To these people
who don't truly understand
What it's like to be you?
What it's like to be financially poor,
Abandoned and lonely,
Unattractive by society's standards,
I'm not saying they haven't been through
their own stuff,
But can you really commodify a lifestyle?
Can you put a price tag on helping others?
Especially when that price tag is thousands of dollars?
This help is for the privileged,
And those that need help the most
will go without,
as usual

I guess I just crave humility
In this selfie culture,
I truly ache for authenticity,
Real helping,
Real healing,
And not all of this showiness,
Disguised as expressing gratitude for your amazing life
On social media

Perhaps we can all wake up
From the spectacular little daydream of our own lives
To the reality of the worldwide suffering going on right at this moment
Maybe if we stopped posting about the atrocities on the news,
Got off our phones
And did something to change our world,
Things would be different.

“Inasmuch as you did it to one
of the least of these my brethren,
You did it to me,” proclaimed the Master.
Inasmuch as the body is one
Tuning out the least among us
Is an act of self sabotage.

The mystery of many members in one body
Precludes apathy- abominable ambivalence toward the elect.
The epidemic of savage inequalities in the church
is a glaring act of self-sabotage.

To truly thrive is to transcend temporal tendencies–
it’s measured in connection with the brethren.
To prosper alone is alien to the gospel.
In such a mundane state, shiftiness and perfidy abound.

In an age of narcissism where tokenism thrives,
The redeemed spin out of balance
by taking their cue from the world.

By minding the least of these,
and by shunning an unholy, self-absorbed trend,
We are spared the cataclysm foretold.
There’s comfort in the unity of the faithful
That other state is pure self-sabotage,
added to the drudgery of life.

it's not like i was away from society,
sure, i crawled into my room and stockpiled on books,
the Tibetan Book of the Dead was never something
i was going to finish reading and find translatable
insights to compliment...
but there were plenty of books...
enough newspapers too... all the culture sections
written by critics: just today i was reading
up on two reviews in the culture section of
yesterday's the Sunday Times:
  poetry reviews! wow! wow! poetry is being
criticised in a mainstream media publication: still?
isn't poetry dead? last time i heard
TS Eliot killed poetry...
    well: if anything needs a killing -
i imagine trying to **** a dead person...
**** a dead person by mime?
**** a corpse by propping him in a chair...
talking to him, it, her,
pouring her, it, him a glass of whiskey...
dealing cards to them?
pretending the dead thing is somehow still
a body and all the mechanisation process of SIGMA
we dare to call soul or a seal of falling leaves or self?

horrors of the novel and all things
flashy and pop... i could if not for the autobiographical
drip drip drip...
   today i stood in the kitchen and imagined
myself: the demon cook of hell...
tomorrow i'll be making a Turkish dish
of finely cut beef... rosemary (oddly more complimentary
of beef than lamb), chillies, garlic,
sumac, pepper... cheese... white wine vinegar
to cure the meat...
                        black pepper... salt...
eaten with LAVASH...
                                          gorge of all gorges of
the thirst -
      but i will also be making two curries for the day
after tomorrow... to give myself more time for:
more time...

i went away from society: but didn't...
society tried to cement my ear into a lunatic asylum:
how i wished i made it among the madmen,
truly... how i wished i was at one point sectioned:
i tried my luck, i tried and tried but failed...
i never was... pop pill X white as nerves
and the bleaching of aluminium -
   pop pill Y... no result... the desired result...
the world span forward and still the same world
i returned to... although with quaked psyches
reaching out for hands instead of receiving
pointing fingers... exclude you: exclude i and you:
you-not-you i-not-i: or even:
i as "i" and you as "you"...
                    
in this kitchen: this, not this: any kitchen...
what was playing in the background? a spin on vampirism,
a blood-disease romance...
i thought about: if i wrote a YA novel about
vampires in the decadent period of the 1980s
with the height of the AIDS epidemic?
imagine: i "said" to myself...
    imagine vampires with AIDS... i started to imagine
vampires suffering from AIDS...
    not the sort of pristine vampires that needed
virgins or children to survive...
just a wild-thought: an unnecessary thought...
i'd be better off thinking of windmills...
    like that one coming up to Upminster from
Hornchurch...
               because this book, will never be written by
me... but a theme exists...
vampirism at the height of the AIDS pandemic...
vampires with AIDS...
             the homosexuality of vampires is yet
to be explored... seems these creatures might want
to exchange blood, spit and *****...
perhaps vampires would be immune to AIDS...
but then again: that's irrelevant since there's a cure
for ***: the virus that designated the past-"redemption"
state of AIDS...
or at least: this is what i "think" i "know":
point being - i don't care to know...
                              
the following rubric also came up...
on the topic of gravity...
swimming - ∇ (you find gravity in the top part
of your body... in the torso)...
the feet are slackers... they come in for the swim...
cycling - (again) ∇ nabla schematic...
your torso actually manages the coordination
of the body on the bicycle...
your feet do all the work... peddling...
but your upper body needs to coordinate
the centre point of gravity being: you're not falling...
you're not falling when either swimming
or cycling...
you're not falling when walking...
you're not falling when climbing, rock or tree...
∇... the legs are only there for the "ride"...

but? ice-skating... it should be the same!
it should be a ∇-schematic...
but is it?! is it?!
hardly some darkened mysterious, poetic O...
oh god... not another of those O O's...
like O is ****** or O is orbit
or O is eye or: whatever happened in Ur
and why not Oor for up-sigh-alone
   is not different to oh-mega-n: oh Meghan?
not a name in the tabloids... just
a coincidence, a little coincidence...

i can't be blamed for underachieving in the second
wave of literacy: basic example i can give:
frightoffreedom = "FRIGHTOFFREEDOM"
print(f"{frightoffreedom.lower()}")
who write so complicated but still performs
magic in 2D and can't translate 2D into 3D?
did every child start speaking said, any said
language to an unsaid capacity of a Buddha's
silence? gate-keepers some say,
a new literacy i say: i too could learn if
there was someone willing to teach...
but as the first pigs to the trough...
first learners come first and the rest "struggle"...
that's me sorting out the basics of ever used
EXCEL twice, properly...
HTML building blocks once...
sorting out my father's change of accountant:
three years prior to his retirement:
quick-books confuses everyday tax-payers
except for the intended audience of accountants...
but... how happy i was... filling out the rubrics
finding math fun without doing any math...
my new favourite expressions
are =SUM(D3:D34)
   that's for the total of money spent...
next column... =(D3*1.2)
   that's the rubric for the Netto (without VAT)
slide the mouse down from D3 through to D34...
next column the VAT (Brutto)..
    =(D3-E3)
             ergo... the VAT in cell F3... scroll down
to F34... then at F35 type in:
    =SUM(F3:24)...

                   modern poets are yet to have discovered
or used the internet or computers...
Poet-Luddite... conflated language:
i want to forget outside of the immediacy of having to
know an elephant is an elephant and
there are five blind men trying to tell apart
a chair from a table...
                 perhaps seeing each item represented
by a cubist painting would leave them
the same blind men if they were only given
a snippet of sight to tell a chair from table apart...

conkers left on windowsill and other locations
in the household allow you to spend the winter
months: freed from feeling spiders...
spiders apparently abhor the scent of oak seeds:
i've been huddling in my winter abode
freed from spider bites... in winter...
when spiders morph into mosquitos and draw
blood from mammalian flesh...

- i can't believe it though! it was so easy!
but... it had to take a lesbian to ask me out on a date!
it took me from the age of 21 through
to the age of teasing 37, done so casually...
hey: do you want to go ice-skating with me
after the shift is over? sure! why not!
today i paid for it... however many hours
i spent cycling, today i felt muscles i never thought
i had... but it took a lesbian to ask me on a date...
a coworker mingling scenario...
we worked the shift, we went ice-skating...
she filmed me trying my best not to fall over...
her laughter, or rather, her giggling reminded
me of Ilona... that masculine-feminine aura
of self-assurance...
i'm not attracted to these women:
they just seem to be attracted to me...
tattoos, piercings, bully-boy butch-Toms...
standing a proud 5ft4 eyeing up a 6ft2 example
trying to kick punch and kiss all at the same time...
well... it was so easy, so much fun...

it should follow that finding the centre of gravity
within the confines of ice skating
should be the same as that of finding the centre
of gravity while swimming or cycling...
i.e. ∇... that's the schematic...
upper-body: the torso is giving prime psychological
concerns... the legs are secondary...
but no... it's counter-intuitively: "intuitive"...
you can't exactly begin finding gravity while
either swimming or cycling by flapping your
arms about pretending to learn to fly:
but you do! you do!

            a drowning man is flapping his arms about
but his legs... his legs...
i'm starting to think i'm getting this theory all wrong...
swimming = cycling = ice skating = ∇...
i kept looking at my legs
pretending to walk while simultaneously trying to glide...

Δ schematic insinuates: don't look at your legs...
no one who walks upright looks down
asking the legs to do the walking...
one looks down to resemble a humbling
expression of grace: thank you: mechanisms of
what binds water to a tide and the mountain
to itch for rising above the setting sun...
thank you...
no one looks at one's legs insinuating:
you're not performing my unconscious demands
of moving from X to Y...
but on ice? ice skating...
it's a fake schematic... ice skating is truly like
swimming and cycling...
next time? my 3rd time on the ice? i will have to let go...
i will have to fall the nth number of times...
what's scary is generating a momentum
so easily without any obstacles of a hill
of grit of grind...
     it's a bit like: people exercising in the gym...
performance art... they can lift weights as a spectacle...
they can create a sexed-up physique, body-shape...
but throw the same people into a manual-labour
environment: with the drudgery of manual labour...
the bulkiest of them will stumble...
tell them to lift, perform "art work" on a roll of
      felt in the roofing industry...
lifting weights is an abstract compared to actual
physical labour...

still... aged 36 and the first "date": it wasn't a date...
was with a female who just so happened to be a lesbian...
what sort of heterosexual woman would go on
a date with me so simple... she asked to go ice-skating
i would have asked: want to go cycling with me?
want to go to an art gallery with me?
was there any talk about what job i have?
was there any talk about what living arrangements
i'm living "under": more like over given
the current climate of renting in London:
12 months upfront rent?!
             of course i still live with my parents...
i clean the house, i cook, i sort out my father's invoices...
i do the VAT for the accountant,
i tend to the garden...
                              i pay "rent"... well...
thankfully i didn't have hopes to get married...
so... my parents didn't have to fork out from their savings
for some grand fakery parade of ceremonial pomp
of ****** white: bride to be...
easier with the prostitutes in the brothel...
but i figured: if the the 8 year old me figured out
how to ******* before he could produce *****
he could also have an inkling into the current debacle
of men who *******: like that was ever a hindering
"problem": because women are all pristine
because they rarely talk about it:
cipher: Madame Bovary...

         two bad experiences having *** in one brothel
and i'm thinking about curing my ills seeking out
another brothel... but it's winter and my libido is
obviously not up to scratch...
so? three times daily... jerking off to the point
where i: i don't have to actually enjoy it...
no movies... just pictures... cleavage... ***...
eyes... mostly eyes...
                           bacon, butcher, bacon,
tenderising meat, curing meat with acids...
spices... herbs...
                 the more i do it the less i think of it...
worried about communal hot topics about loss
of testosterone?
                   i have hair on my chest
my stomach, my back and on my chin...
                  blah blah some parrot said...
seagulls dived in for a *******... the Kraken yawned...
Norse mythologies crept up on dying Christianity
and all was well... meadows covered by frost come
late January somewhere in the open green patches
of Edinburgh...

                - the labour and the pains of the crucified-foetus....
some say it's like waking into a world
where women perform the splinter-membrane
argument of what's living and what's not...
how ancient male mammals performed infanticide...
yet how chemistry and the abstract allowed
a new-mammalian-wave of female infanticide:
because: early birds in the dynamic of ***
made their first falls the fault in the opposite ***...
while some of us waited and waited and
by waiting became freed from ugly brides
and social expectation: Darwinism's pressures
to procreate...

i can't listen to both Darwinism and Buddhism
at the same time: i simply can't knife through
to the fork to subsequently spoon up and gulp down
this sort of duality...
like i can't stomach the dualism: if there is one
of consolidating the aesthetic with the ascetic...
i can't consolidate the AESTHETIC with the ASCETIC!
Christianity did just that! Christianity
married the AESTHETIC with the ASCETIC"

Honest
He who doesn't work, works **** or just can't commit
He homeless
He an affair and a **** good fix
****** with a tendency to show underwhelming ****
Twisted into nicety by such anger at the human, the wants
Good at *** when in love
Un-abused
Un-poisened
One of my best mates like
Dyslexic thick ****
A problem
Step child and real life son, grandson always, always, grandson
eldest unappreciated, underestimated, paranioder? Paranoidist.
One of the needers of therapists
Panicked by past
Fractured by future
A depressive, doesn't drink, do drudgery like drugs
A fearfull mess mummy's boy
Fatherless
Fathered less
A letdownshowoff
overconfident,
Anxious, ex husband, probable poofter, please Goddot, please, let he be a cheater  
A ex punk, definite *****, pushover, almost poet
So easily hurt, yet never hurts
My love one. (Cary you Guardian)
Too damed romantic
Cant read but by gosh buys books
Genius
artistic, Autistic, an idiot and just another bad student
manish
Little Boy
child
Unable to be alone and not a good flatmate
Justifier of the almighty grey areas,
The cheated...

the Strong willed.

I’m lost.
Inside a conversation
With a ghost,
Who keeps a case of beer,
On my back porch,
Year round.


I struggle.
With his take,
On things.
At best, he says, you perish in a fury,
His mouth a fresh full fill,
Raw oysters topped on spice baked kelp.

I wait.
To hear the worst.
His pause is theatre 101,
All fog and drama,
Ephemeral guest,
Sweet mist and ****.

I lean.
Against our red rose sun,
The window warm from spring to fall,
My back porch home a hobby now,
The worst he says, in adagio,
Is drudgery, no end at all.

A whisk of alpine pollen
The whisper of the wind
Bowed heads and unheard murmurs
And the songs to cleanse their sins

The casket enters ground
We seal the doors unmade
Grind through the formalities
And shuffle our separate ways

The breath of breezy flowers
The scent of reveries
The many hundred hours
We spent in drudgery

Gone high and low in hunger
Dim tides and hues and aches
The earth shut off forever
and in the death of wake–––

I watched your eyes open in joy
I watched them shut in shame
Time gave you less than all my years
and leaves me crying in vain

Steeped in frigid air,
The winter breeze thrills me.
This sweeping force of change
Has left the landscape unrecognizable,
And barren,
Devoid of people
And as still as the breath of dawn.
This dreamland of snow and ice,
As far as the eye can see,
Tempts me;
I long to abandon dignity,
Control,
And launch myself into a giant snow drift,
Or create heaven on a wind-blown sidewalk
Staring breathless at the starry sky above-
Or possibly assault some poor passerby
With a snowball to the parka.
I just want to soak in the glory of the quiet streets,
The glimmering clouds,
Hanging,
So still in the night sky,
To skip down the streets as though I wasn't freezing my **** off.
I want to pretend I'm a dragon,
Glowering at the pathetic humans
With their bundled ignorance,
And their pitiful resistance to cold.
I want to dance,
And leap,
And play forever,
Ignoring the idea that I'm supposed to be doing something important right now.
It is a wondrous feeling,
To live in the moment,
To revel in the small magic of recaptured youth-
But tearfully,
I turn away from the window;
The vibrancy of youth is wasted on me
In these bleak and stress-filled hours,
Slaving away like the pitied adult that I am.
I can no more abandon my learned responsibility
Than I can turn back time to my long forgotten childhood;
Like the winter outside,
I am frozen-
Stuck like a tongue on a flagpole
To this monotonous drudgery;
Day in,
Day out.
But today,
I think ill share a secret with myself;
I still have that awestruck child within me,
And I don't need permission to let it out
To scamper across the blank hills of snow,
Laughing and shrieking in chilly delight.
I won't be an adult today;
I will let the snow take me,
And like the snowman I used to build when I was small,
Mold me into a new shape,
From a forgotten age.