This morning I rose before the sun, 
Stretched slowly and yawned wide,
Then drove to the skate park,
knowing it would be empty this early. 
I skated, really skated, 
braver away from others' eyes. 
Others trickled in over the hours. 
Sitting, resting on the bleachers
A question from another,
"why is no one skating?"
I, confused, reply incredulously
"Why are YOU not skating?"
His explanation saddens me. 
He doesn't skate, 
is twenty years old,
and so feels it's too late. 
I'm 26, I tell him,
I just started and I'm terrible. 

It's true. 
I'm unsure of myself
and my form
       is
   off
but I'm trying. 
We have this one life,
one chance. 
Why would you not try
for something 
you've always wanted to do
or something you love?
You don't have to be good,
but ****, 
you do have to try.

There was no joy in Mudville,
The air was cold that night.
For the hockey team was losing
And shorthanded, following a fight.

With 5 minutes on the penalty clock
And 1 minute left in regulation
It seemed as though the season was over
And the team would be heading to the unemployment line by the train station.

The next face off was won by Mudville,
And they dumped the puck down the ice
Wilson raced down after that 3 pound puck, and out of nowhere came Johnson, a pass to score as he fell down the ice!

Tied with about 30 seconds to go,  the crowd gave an almighty roar
Because they tied the game shorthanded,
Johnson, a defenseman had scored.

The teams headed into overtime, and you could cut the tension in the air with a knife,
For in hockey overtime is sudden death, the next goal would win the night.
And after a 10 minute intermission, the teams returned to the ice

The referee skated out to center,  and dropped the puck between two anxious Sticks.
The duel was on,  and both goalies were tested
But neither one would fall for the forwards tricks

With overtime ended, we went to a shootout,
This seemed to be the only way to decide the game.
And after Wilson stepped back onto the ice, he scored giving Mudville a chance to win the game.

But Jeralds would tie the shootout in the second round, and Johnson, following him would do the same. So after a miraculous stop by Mudville's goalie,  it would fall onto Casey to win the game.

A hush fell over the crowd, as Casey stepped onto the ice, he took a deep breath and started on his way,
He skated wide left stick handling down, his head up at the goalie trying to get him out of play.

Oh, somewhere in this favoured land the sun is shining bright, The band is playing somewhere, and somewhere hearts are light; And somewhere men are laughing, and somewhere children shout, But there is no joy in Mudville—mighty Casey was shutout.

jumped off the bridge, hung out with bros, floated a log down the river chilled in the back of a van, skated, bombed a hill with a guy playing the acoustic guitar...coconut icecream and a ******* would be a great ender but either way im happy

This one time,

12. or 13, when me
And a bunch of other kids
From a different neighborhood
Played. Outside. From about sunup
To 9:00 at night. I dimly remember
(This light-bulb memory is the barest bit of energy
In an ancient filament of thought:)

It was a nightmare come to life.
There was this one kid across the River
(Rock Island)
They found him naked and dead,
In a discarded pile of coal.
His life brutally taken from him.
But that was the only time
I'd ever heard of something so horrible. Happening.
It was as commonplace as school shootings.
Which is to say, it didn’t happen in the
World that was ‘As Far As I Knew’.
Outside, everywhere, as far as I knew;
Was just where you went. No matter what.
It’s just what we did. And we did a LOT.

We played. On a job application, I would have
Written that. “Player”. As in: “Hey, I’m a kid.
I mess around. I’m unhygienic and smelly and
My hair is long and arms sunburned and sweaty
And tired and about as happy as any kid
Could be in 1975.

This one time,
I go in this dumpster and grab a
Sandwich the Mgr. of the 7-11 mistakenly threw out
It smelled. Badly. I pretended to take a gigantic
Bite out of it. My buddies weren’t ROTFL.
That stupid phrase was pre-born.
They laughed so hard they fell off their bikes.
Probably painfully so.
I worshiped this praise. Ate it like
Seinfeld eats applause.
They were rolling
On hot Iowa summer pavement, laughing fit to split.
On top of that dumpster, that day, in that single moment,
I was the King of Whatever

The manager heard some kind of ruckus.
The sandwich was in my hand, a cheesy spoiled grenade.
Which I promptly threw at him. ‘Cause he was the Adult
And I obviously wasn't Victor Mature.
He waddled back inside and called the Cops.
Not amazingly,
They were literally right around the corner.
My buddies took off like scalded dogs
I got on my homemade trail bike, laughing so
Hard I pedaled into a sticker-tree.

I didn't know what "irony" was back then.
Back then, I was so inherently goofy, that funny
Hilarious crap was somehow attracted to me.
Ironically, when I tried being funny on purpose...
Fill in the blank. There's a lesson in there somewhere.
I'm pretty sure.

We met at that French word I still can't spell.
Ron Day View.
Cackling like
Loony loons. We laughed out little butts off.

And we rode bikes EVERYWHERE.
Through the trails. There were bike
Trails trailing everywhere, short-cuts from point
Hay to Tree. And oh yeah, I climbed trees.
Constantly. And ate apples and plums from
That mean lady’s yard. She stood in her
Kitchen and glared through cat-eyed glasses,
Daring us. Daring me.
GO AHEAD. PICK JUST ONE SINGLE PLUM.
THEN I'LL CALL YOUR MOTHER!
(Interestingly, we didn't hang out with the
plums which didn't fall too far from Mrs. Tree)

Ate whatever was edible. Wild clover.
Yeah. Grass. And
Crab-apples that held the promise of
Painful bowel movements squirting out of
Your ****. Not ‘***’ because cussing wasn’t
All that big of a deal. You heard it in R movies.
But it hadn’t permeated the marrow of
Our entire culture. Not yet. It wasn’t all over
TV after, say, 8:45.

Nothing about ***. Absolutely Nuttin' Honey.
'Cause I'd be making stuff up in 1975,
When I was 12. Kissing was just...
You know.

We messed around, got into and out of trouble.
We laughed. The future hung over us like
Those mean-sounding thunderclouds,
Miles away, but moving from the North-East,
Because severe weather in Iowa always came
In the same direction.

It’s what we did. It’s just about
All we did as kids. Man, we were crazy, and had
Crazy fun.

We built bikes out of spare parts. They were low-
Slung and cool. Mine was always breaking.
I did a lot of stupid things, and somehow,
Somehow I got away with doing a lot of
Stupid things.

I believe in God. Now.
Way back then, I was Catholic. I don’t
Know if that sufficiently explains it
Or not. We ate fishsticks on Fridays during
Lent. We went to church sometimes
On Wednesday nights, the Guitar Mass,
And on Sundays. The Mass felt like it
Lasted 93 minutes, like our services do
Now. But it seemed to go on forever.
It as about 45 minutes, and we would always
“Leave Early” which meant, we’d take
Our Communion, solemnly, eyes
Downcast and humble, but I would slow,
Then stop, lost in the visage:
I looked up at the Man on the Cross and
Wondered when the Priest would ever
Get around to explaining why He
Died for my sins.
Someone would wake me from my
Reverie, and whisper, “Please move ahead.”
Shamefaced, I would say, truthfully,
“I’m sorry, Ma’am.” Because, in 1975,
When I was 12, I really was.
Sorry.

Then an hour
Later I was dressed in
Salvation Army rags (today)
And I would jump in the creek with my
Jean-shorts and off-color shirt on.
Sometimes, the bikes weren’t in the picture.
So we hiked. Never ‘walked’ but “hiked” which
Was moving with a greater purpose.
Great distances. The distances weren’t the great
Part. I forget what the great part was, because
This was when I was a kid. When I was 12.

The things you did
As a kid
You store them in a secret kid-locker
In your heart
And your heart, it grows, along with the rest of
You, like a quarter pounded into the meat of
A young tree. The tree envelops the quarter,
Taking it in to itself, swallowing time
That you only try to clumsily relive
(Like I’m trying right now)

It used to be cold, icy, and snowy in Iowa.
I know this; I was out in it most of the time.
Does anyone sled anymore? Toboggan?
Round-saucer spinning uncontrollably at
About 12 mph? Metal sleds with runners
And power steering? Down crazy-steep
Barreling down frozen white hills, crashing
Into copses of thin pliable young trees.
You only see this kind of stuff on Youtube
In somebody’s ‘All-time Epic Fail List
The failure is epic, alright. We’ve moved on.
And not necessarily to a bigger, brighter future.

Ice! I skated on long-bladed racer skates.
I could stop on a dollar’s worth of
Dimes.

And this one time
I
Fell right on my knee hard enough to
Grind a hole in my jeans. It looked like a ******
Meteor crater. A pretty girl named Tina
Felt sorry for me and sat right next to me
She wore pink pom-poms and I fell in
Puppy with her for about three hours.
Then she smiled and hugged me and
I was more frozen than the ice outside
And she left, her Mom picking her up
And eying me balefully as I stood
Pink-faced and flushed and utterly
Confused about the randomness of
What had just happened to me.
Girls from my town all knew
More about myself than myself knew
About me. They had me PEGGED, brothers
And sisters. But not this girl. She was from
The next town over.
That was a good day, if I’m remembering
It correctly. If. I’m pretty sure I am.
Or, I’m pretty sure it doesn’t matter.

We played a game called ‘Blackman’
Like a tag game in Gym, where
One kid is “IT” and a mass of skaters
Goes from one end of the ice pond
To the other, and the people you capture
(I couldn’t catch an old man in front-wheel
Drive figure skates and I got so frustrated
I gave up to jeers and yells and found the
Trees were good listeners to kids
Who couldn’t skate as coordinated as
They wanted to.

So ten minutes later
I would go into the Warming House, and
Listen to am radio. All the Hits! KSTT! Davenport,
Iowa. On ******* Blvd., which was really
River Drive, because the Hostess Plant stood
Sentinel on top of the hill, pushing out
Sponge-cake filling and HoHos and Cupcakes
And those awful coconut snowballs, and
This one time, in high school, I shoved one
Inside my mouth and tried to swallow it
And about choked to death.

I walked to Mark Twain Elementary School
And ran home for lunch, and was usually
Late because I was easily distracted
And when the school day ended,
I walked or ran home, hurrying, because
Captain Ernie and Bugs Bunny Cartoons were on,
And then Gilligan’s Island from about 4:00 to
5:30, when the news would come on,
And then Dinner,
And I couldn’t stand to sit still
To save my life. I have ADD. I
Know this now. I didn’t know it
(Nobody knew what it was)
I knew something was wrong with me
Or not-right. It was just the way
The World Turned.

Back then. I had no sense of ‘self’.
I was a changeling. I tried to fit into
Whatever people expected of me, which
Was very often extremely difficult, because
These people I emulated and thought were
So **** cool were just as messed up
As I was, maybe more; But I
Didn’t have the emotional maturity
(Or I couldn’t face the awful responsibility
That went with that awful truth)
To deal with it, so under the rug it went.

I was moody and happy and singing
One moment and crying in the shower
The next.

This one time, I was stuck
In the borderlands of childhood
And the beginning of a man
It was safe, for awhile
This one time.

Gathering up my thoughts like the Pieces of a broken vase smashed by a careless hand,
passed times  all over the floor the future not mapped out as before,
a vase no-longer holds flowers for me a life time on the floor for all to see
trying to step trough the broken shards and not cause more damage and Paine even if I could glue it back
Together it would never be the same, the cracks would show and the pattern not Mach so the broke vase will remans skated for all to see .
Was it her or was it me, was it never ment to be
it's  all smashed up for all to see Broken shards scattered pieces tell me it wasn't me

We sat outside the coffee shop
next to a fire,
watching the sun set behind decrepit buildings.

I lamented over the lack of a roller rink in the area,
reflecting on memories of wobbling around in circles
with dizzying lights and blaring speakers
ejecting Pink, Daft Punk, and Eiffel 65 onto my critical youth.

I felt like a king.

We finished our smoothies and retreated
to an empty hotel parking lot,
where I taught her to skateboard.

One foot over the front bolts,
the back foot over two of the back bolts
but resting over the tail,
kick, push,
it's in the ***** of your feet--
weight distribution.

Tic, tac, scrape, thud--
she falls repeatedly
and gets back up.

I admire her resilience and perpetual smile--

This is what skateboarding is all about.

We roll around the hotel parking lot,
our endpoints being a lone luminescent lamppost
and a telephone pole beleaguered by a plot of shrubbery
that demarcates itself from the pavement.

We circle around the poles for hours,
forming an imaginary oblong track between the two,
our laughs carrying into the cool summer night lullaby
that sang the drowsy small town to sleep.

The fading throb of the wedding reception
at the bottom of the town square by the wharf,
carrying over to us.

The stores closed up hours ago,
silent empty windows reflecting the lonely streetlights
and our ambulance back at us.

We skated on unperturbed into the night hour.

A man walks outside the hotel
to have a cigarette on the sidewalk--
I imagine he is watching us and admiring our glee.

Rolling between this telephone pole and lamppost,
the glare and reflection of the empty silent windows,
the soundtrack singing above our heads,
our laughs, and the tic-tac of skateboards
and groaning of wheels over stubborn pavement
bringing my melancholic reverie to a halt,
recognizing and understanding happiness in the present moment--

This is my roller rink.

I close the door of the bathroom cabinet, revealing the figure standing in front of it. I tilt my head back, bring my hand up to my mouth, swallow, and feel the slightly farmiliar sensation of the little pill sliding down my throat. Anything that used to be normal is only slightly farmiliar now, an effect of these little pills.
I look up into the ghost in the mirror, the one that slightly resembles my own face. I can barely pick out the individual features, but I'm pretty sure that's me. I bring my hand back up to my face, this time to pull up my cheeks in something that somewhat looked like a smile. Yep, that's me all right. The hand moved to the left, and grabbed my ear, tugging at it. Slowly, it made its way across my whole face, surveying all my features, feeling everything. I'm still here. Wish I wasn't.
I sigh and continue staring at this ghost of a person. She looks tired, and *****. Her dark brown hair ******* in a messy, greasy bun on top of her head. Her once bright green eyes are now a dull brown. Her once flushed cheeks, now completely pale and lifeless, still bear the scars of the crash.
I sigh once more and turn around, almost losing my balance.
I start toward my room, remembering I have to do something today. Not school, nor work, nor anything else in particular. Well, of course there is a reason, but thinking of that reason makes everything clear and painful, so lets just keep things hazy and safe.
I pull my once too small jeans on, which are now extremely baggy on my scarred legs. I try to steady my shaky hands as I attempt the eyeliner, but give up, and remove the waterproof makeup. It's not like he will care, he can't see my face anymore.
A sudden stab of pain envelops within my chest as everything suddenly becomes clear and I can see his face, his beautiful face, laughing. I blackout and end up on the floor.
When my eyes open, they are greeted with the concerned eyes of my sister-in-law. She's holding my face, trying to wake me up. "Woah there, woah. Are you okay?"
I sit there thinking of what just happened and what she said. It takes me a moment, but I reply, "As okay as I ever am."
She rolls her eyes and sighs. "C'mon, get up. We have to do something today."
Another stab of pain as I remember where we're going today and what we're doing. I ***** on her as the pain overcomes me once more, this time not blacking out. Instead the images, the very ones I have countless nightmares about, flit across my mind. Every one bearing pain, bearing a very specific pain. I start to scream and convulse, as I claw the arms of my brother's wife.
My brother comes in to pull me off of her and put me onto my bed, as I continue screaming. I can very clearly feel the very farmiliar pain in the middle of my chest. It's as if 10, no. It's as if a 100, a 1000 knives are being shoved in, turning, breaking bones, slicing organs. And then it feels as if someone is spitting salted lemon juice into my wounds, stinging.
It's all in my head though. Everything I'm feeling is all in my head. And that's the problem right there. Why couldn't I have just died in the crash, why can't I just be gone already.
I blackout again. And when I wake up, both my brother and my sister-in-law are standing there, watching over me. I see that my sister-in-law has changed clothes. Their troubled faces brighten up a little as they watch my eyes open. Unsurprised. This happens every time we plan to go to the hospital to visit him in the ICU. It's happened before, many times, so they know what to do and how to calm me back down.
They help me up from my bed and out into the living room, where there is a tray of fried eggs and bacon sitting on the coffee table. Probably for me.
I disregard it and instead walk to the kitchen to grab the *****.
My sister-in-law was right there to stop me. "No no no, not this early. Besides," she says as she takes the bottle from my shaking hands, "you already took your medication."
I begin to protest, and quit, knowing that it was no use.
Asides from the ***** and my medication, they have baby-proofed the whole house because of me. All knives are locked up somewhere in the garage, any tool that could be used against myself gone. No rope, shoelaces, small appliances, or other things that I may use to **** myself. The ***** was out because they confiscated it from my room. I had shoplifted the liquor the other day, and was trying to start a collection so that I may drink several bottles of alcohol at once and overdose. Not too smart, they search my room all the time. I'm too drugged to even care. And my medication tastes too nasty to overdose on, asides from being nearly impossible to OD from.

In the car on the way to St. Rosemary's hospital, we stop at a florist to get some 'Get Well Soon' stuff. My brother gave me some stronger medication, as he always does whenever we go to the hospital, and it makes thinking better. I'm able to think about what happened, but it makes the images in my head seem like they're from a movie, rather than my own eyes. I'm able to think about the man who lays there in the ICU, day in day out. That man I was once in love with. No, I still love him. And he loved me too. Loved.
I'm brought back to reality by my brother.
"What colour do you want to give him today?"
I don't know why he asks. I always say the same. "Green. His favorite colour."
My brother sighed. "I think he has enough green. But oh well, it's your choice..."
I love my brother very very much. I'm so grateful that he puts up with me. It's kind of a funny thing, when we were much younger and he was a ***** up, I could've sworn that he would have to end up living with me when we were older. Ironically, I ended up having to live with him. Well, 'living with him' isn't what it is. It's more like 'babysitting' or 'mom didnt want her in a mental hospital.' Like I had said before, I'm too drugged to care.

We also stop by SubWay just before we get to the hospital. I get the usual, a footlong ham and Swiss, with three chocolate chip cookies and a large Dr. Pepper. It's not for me, of course. I never eat anymore. This food is for him, if he wakes up. Because if he wakes up while I'm there, I want the satisfaction of being there with his favorite food. I do this every time. It's been a very long time since my brother or his wife has complained, wasting food and such. I don't care whether or not they're mad I waste stuff. I want this, no. I need this, for my fiancé.

Hospitals used to always scare me. As a child, I never had a reason to go to the hospital, except for my mother or grandmother, and even then I never went. I just knew people died there sometimes. I used to be so afraid of death. Now I'm wishing for it daily.
We head up to the ICU. He has his own room to himself, but he wouldn't care whether or not he had other people in there. All the people here know me, since we come around so often. They always look at me with extremely sympathetic looks, and then whisper about me to the people who they're around.
"Poor woman... Was in a terrible car crash... See those scars?... Just about to get married... **** near lost her life..."
They think I don't hear them but I do. It's a complete blessing for this medication, and that it makes me not care anymore, but sometimes I wish I could care. I wish I could turn around to them and tell them to shut the **** up thank you very much. I just literally do not care anymore.
We get to his room. The nurse comes out with the same sympathetic look as the rest of them.
I close my eyes and take a deep breath, trying to remember the last time I heard his voice, seen his eyes, felt his smile, heard him singing, the last time he told me he loved me...
And then the whole scene of when my life basically ended flashed across my mind, like a movie.

We were in the car, driving, listening to the iPod that was hooked up, singing along with whoever the hell was on. It was the middle of April. Nice weather. It was the perfect day.
We were on the way to this favorite place of mine, a 'special date' he had called it. At the time I had no idea what he was going to do.
We went into the place, a rollerskating rink. We got our skates and went into the rink to skate around. The DJ called out a special song for a special someone. As we danced and skated to the song, which was 'our song', the song we used to sing to eachother all the time, when a spotlight shined on him and he stopped what he was doing.
"You know that I love you," he said. "And you know that I want to be with you for the rest of our lives." He got down on one knee. "Will you make me the happiest man alive, and marry me?"
I started to cry. I said yes, if course. It was the happiest moment of my life.

When we were finished with the date, we were driving back home. We were seated very close, holding onto eachother.
We stopped at a stop sign, and I wanted a kiss. So I turned my head toward his, and we kissed. When I opened my eyes, we were in the middle of the intersection, and a car was coming our way from the left. It's headlights were shining in my eyes, and it was too close, going too fast. Right before the hit, I looked at it, knew the danger, and screamed my fiancé's name. He looked into my eyes in alarm, and that was when it hit. The other car smashed right into us, t-boning us on the drivers side, while my husband-to-be was driving. That moment felt like an eternity. We were flown around, and we hit some **** I don't even remember.
The next thing I remember was the sirens. The ambulances came and took us away from the wreckage. He was hurt severely, put into a coma. Me, I had some bad injuries, but not as bad as his. We were rushed to the hospital, and he was flown by helicopter to a bigger hospital that dealt with more serious injuries. Within two days he was considered brain dead.

And now, here I am, walking on this earth, while the love of my life just lays there, brain dead. I don't know whose brilliant idea it was to make it so I have to walk around, wondering whether he will ever wake up. The doctors always say that it's been too long, or that there's no hope now, or that we need to pull the plug. But every time they tell me that, I flip out. I flip out so bad they have to basically tranquilize me and send me back to the mental hospital. It's horrible. I just wish I could die, and that they would finally pull the plug after my death, so that we can both be together, wherever we go when we are finished with this life...

And the picture that always haunts me? The one of his eyes, in alarm, when I screamed his name. That picture is what haunts me day and night. It's what my nightmares are composed of. Every. Single. One.

I think all of this over for about a minute before we walk in. No one urges me to go in faster, they all know what I'm doing. They all know that I'm reliving the moment that pretty much took him away.
I open my eyes, ready to see him at last. I take small, careful steps into the hospital room, watching the floor. I finally looked up to see him lying, like usual, in his bed.

...At least, that what I was expecting.

Instead, he was sitting up, eyes wide, waiting for my reaction to see him awake.

And that was when I fainted.

In Lisbon, we blended
ended the day with spectacular culinary
Shopped and hopped side to side

In Dublin, we vented
as the whisky and Guinness was **** good
Shipped the hire car to Galway

In Italy, we invented
dropped coins in fountains of love we already held
From Florence, to Milan, to Rome, to Bologna

In Paris, I rented
alone in protests and hippies at Place De La Republique
Dreamt of you as they skated

In Romania, I persisted
up on the icy Tranfagarasan highway traps
I saw a bear and it had your eyes

In Stockholm, we insisted
As the Vasa sunk on tables of *****
Pecked on the trains and shied away.

In London, we protested
It was an ordinary day and the flowers didn't bloom
The Thames was gloomy and stale

In Oslo, we transmitted
The reindeer meal and cranberry was a disaster
The gloom followed us to southern skies

In Copenhagen, you were sorted
Smiled and amused by the Tivoli gardens
The night became day and the wind withered

In Amsterdam, we did what we did
Stored the memories on the reclaimed lands
Free-spirited in love and in eternity

It was a heap of plaid,
Orange and vinaigrette
It dully blended the white washed denim
The sod contrasted around his knees
Pete Abrams Jonesy was a discovery on his own.

The glow of the night sky released
The party goers and the venomous tendrils
That loomed beyond the tree hats and
The milky grey drift of dust that
Skated around Jonesy’s fingers as he dug
Scattering the Earth,
Searching and searching for the creepy crawlies
Between the plates of dirt,
the patches he’s scabbed away before;
His mother,
Hard at work building a nation in the kitchen
And Johnny filling his swine
Slipping between the cushions of the sofa.
It was that very night
Tucked away under the fresh linen and the feeling of
His mother’s lips pressed against his forehead
Warming his entire body –
That he realized his kneading desire to take his journey farther
To take it to school.
That day on the playground,
His hands knuckle deep in the land’s treasure
Creating pressure beneath the stubs of his fingernails,
Did he meet her
He met Charlotte Anne Avery.
Her ladybug blouse was loosely cast away from her shoulders
And he felt the urge to push her into the sand
But he couldn’t.
Charlotte Anne stood with her
Pine cone hair mushed on either side of her face;
The chocolate spit smeared on her cheek
Was enough to lure the mosquitoes all around
And he wanted to be her friend;

She’s always seen him around
Though; never before had he been keen on
Gazing back at the eyes of curiosity
Or rather her brown ones,
The plain and wide innocence –
It loomed over her face as she knelt
Bent beside him and dug a hole into the cream sand
With her elbow, gently brushing the circumference of
The minuscule hole she created.
Her glitter pink glasses were
Riding down the bank of her nose,
With her bottom cushioned in the crevice of sand
And Pete Abrams Jonesy’s sandy-fingers
Shoving her glasses back up
To rest beneath the kind eyes
That laid on him.

The end of germs and suspenders came fast,
Summer sped around the corner
While Pete Abrams Jonesy and Charlotte Anne Avery
Flew through the highlights
And the untouched parts of the forest –
Gallivanting beyond the age of the bell toll of adolescence,
Did they lie beneath the Sugar Maple Tree.
The promises they made of an un-relinquishing friendship
Grew beyond compare
And ever so did a union of love between him and her;
Every day was a hot hurricane of journeys spent
Devouring the wilderness together
Until the occurring reign of school
Sprung up again.

A new appreciation for the human body
Was as much as Pete Abrams Jonesy
Had accumulated for the first semester
Attending Mayfield Middle –
His life was horribly array without the presence
Of Charlotte Anne Avery.
His new herd of acquaintances
Brought about a new kind of education,
One that was foreign to the halls of Mayfield
And while his afternoon lunches
Sparked a flame in his soul
He became well oriented with the hypnotizing effects
Of Rummy and Black Jack 21,
His mind still sauntered to the round table
In the bull’s-eye of the café
Where a cloud of pink headbands and perfume
Captured the interest of his Charlotte Anne Avery.

She couldn’t believe the variety of books and music
That were made to live in this world
Sharing the same space as her –
It was enthralling, thrilling, and slightly frightening
The tales and the morals were anything but limited
Was it possible to live a well versed life having heard them all?
Would the chance ever be presented?
Her friends were of everything that was made to be
From sports to gymnastics to video-games to art;
It had all been opened to her in a flurry of welcoming gestures
From the minute she sat down at this particular table.
Even as her best friend now swung in the birches
As his friends, the panthers, ran low
She’d always be welcome on his other side;
Though, surprisingly, she was comfortable in this
Shade of manila spotlight.

A second semester, of many years,
Was a gift in its own
A surprise gesture wrapped up in a bow
Of questions, tutors, late night studying
It all amounted in a pile of stress –
A mound of snow
Of tests and quizzes and failed homework grades;
Pete Abrams Jonesy wasn’t alone in his mind
There in the far corner of sawdust
And memories of the plethora of parties he attended
Did lay his old friend from miles ago;
Charlotte Anne Avery had moved away across the lake
On the tips of his fingers so far away
For whatever reason she had moved away
It was amongst him unknown.
“Should I feel an ounce of sorrow, of grievance
For this new found distance between us?
I suppose not; we have new friends now
A new family
I haven’t known her in a while.”

Solemn years passed.
Days of solitude and confinement,
Days of pondering and guilt – heartache
Mr. Avery had passed away
Lost to his kin
His pristine precious child
Charlotte Anne Avery.
The wake had been nothing more
Than shades of black and blue and grey
Uncomfortable heels and rough tissues
That rubbed her eyes and nose
As raw as the pain she felt for the absence
Of her father
Her mother’s happiness and
Pete Abrams Jonesy.
It’d been years since she’d uttered a word to him
Years since they’d even been in the same room for long,
Though her hands still cowered
When she shoved the letter in the mail
Serving him the news of what transpired –
He made no appearance
Her expectations should have dwindled over time
But they remained the same
As strong as ever,
Slightly calloused with time
Until there was nothing left but a sore spot
Of where he should’ve been.

The rumors still rang clear as she began to heal
She fell in love with Marcus Stalling
The final year of puerile days
Now left to rot in the past;
Graduation was held at noon,
Her cap was arced on her head
Perfectly set in place
The rumors still rang true.
Pete Abrams Jonesy was the
Shadow of a boy she once knew when she was
Figuring things out
He didn’t even make it to this day.
The rumors of the hit and run, the drunk driver
It spread around the halls like wildfire
She had been ashamed to have once claimed him
In any form of the word –
She missed him still.
What would his life become?
“No one will visit him. What will become
Of the adventurous and jovial mind
I used to spend time with?”
When she heard the news on the local station
She’d lost her father all over again
And still no one had the answers
To any of her questions.

College and Marcus
The grand scheme of life begun with those two
Wisdom came with age
Anger subsided
And joy was restored –
The life she once dreamt of having
Still rendered mist to her eyes
So many individuals were supposed to be
Toe to toe;
Charlotte Anne Stalling the center of it all
Yet she felt the same orbital satisfaction
Yielding around her with only those two elements.
All mornings were the same
Her sanity strove from cycling about
In comfortable routines and an endless screenplay –
A memory of a future once shielded her sight,
The warm bodies were anything but familiar now.

The winter would always be cold
Rushing the blood to the tip of her nose
But spring came about
In a parade of confetti and open arms
The coffee shop on the girth of the boardwalk
Met her every day during the breakfast of the sun
And the coffee kept her warm.
It was a morning where the tide was crashing down roughly
The sun fried her skin,
She was glowing
Her attention was snatched away from the scenic grounds
Stolen away by the scream and shouts that traveled
From the end of the boardwalk,
There stood Pete Abrams Jonesy
Clutching his arm while peering at the welt
Given to him by a Sugar Maple Boer.

I was dog tired. Just keeping my eyes open was tough. My timid body was drunk with fatigue. Staring for a whole day at a computer screen and typing as if in a trance, had left my mind blank. My skinny hands were frostbitten in the cheap artificial leather gloves, as they clung to the motorbike handles. My heart raced as I looked at the ominous black clouds.          I tried to focus on the gloomy scenery as my mind drifted in and out of my dream world. Winter had turned the green hedges into lifeless shapes with razor sharp thorns. Mud from previous vehicles had turned the hedges into the edges of a war zone. The trip felt endless as my threadbare tyres skated round the bends. After driving for a hour, the icy chill of the evening air had made me regret not putting on my old trusted army jacket. My rusty red Honda 500cc motor cross motorbike kept up its duel with the dirt road as its exhaust barked continuously. The beam of my headlights kept stabbing the gloomy sky.               With my frostbitten hand, I switched on my CD player, in a desperate effort to focus on the road. The words of Golden Earrings Radar Love pierced my eardrums  "...almost there, gotta keep cool". My goggles started to fog up as I echoed the lyrics. I started to breath shallowly like a chain smoker, to stop my goggles from frosting further. I had just became used to the soothing distraction, when the motorbike gave its last bark and gradually coasted to a stop. I got off my stead, with my joints feeling like a geriatric patient that had completed a rodeo. I surveyed the bust engine as my cursing breath formed little clouds in the gelid air. I dug around in my shabby jeans, whipped out my cellphone, only to discover that there was no reception. I salvaged my flashlight from the bikes saddlebag and popped a "Life Safer" sweet into my mouth. I realized that I had to walk to the nearest town.                 I started down the road, remembering my fathers reference to isolation, being between "hell and the hotel." My flashlight reminded me of load shedding and sudden darkness. As I walked past a small lake, the clouds parted, revealing  a crescent moon that hung in the air like a haunted vessel. The moon reflected in the lake, to a watery grave for the sailors. I got the eerie feeling as I walked, that someone or something was following me. I stopped and swallowed the stale cold coffee that was left in my hip-flask. The howling Arctic wind had ceased and I could hear my own heartbeat. Ledd Zeppelins Stairway to heaven started smoothly...

This cobblestone led me to
as I skated back a righteous fro
swooning over tin men
with rugged qualities
and wholesome care,
lending me arms
and legs as spares,
to appease to this nomad
trundling for yarn spun lips.
So fine so fine
this great divine
tie back your hair
and cross your arms
this wanderer is aware
with a hoodlum snare
and fully aghast
to these pretentious fiends

Even as he spilled over with confidence
While his tongue smoothly ice skated across the chalice of my pelvis
I was not fooled.
I could still feel his caged heart race and buck
As he laid between the cradle of my hips.

several snakes spiraling
hissing a message in her ear
telephone is dialing
waiting for a call from someone dear

(on the velveteen tangerine)

roller skated through the town
laces strangle each other like constrictors
gravity is upside down
the pair of skates are like twin sisters
(on the velveteen tangerine)

ivy climbing legs and boughs
stemming into leaves and flowers
time is spinning backwards now
the clock has been gone for hours
(on the velveteen tangerine)

cream and sugar sweet
share a cup of tea with company
friends talk about their week
lounging in the leafy canopy
(on the velveteen tangerine)

eyes stare at the strange sight
unattached and independently
moonlight shines on glades of green at night
trees blend into starry scenery
(on the velveteen tangerine)

citrus spheres hang from tree limbs
peel the hard rind to make it nice
pick one or a dozen at your whim
drink sweet juice or swallow a slice
(on the velveteen tangerine)

beware of seeds and centipedes
but take a chance and you will dance
with delight around midnight
on the velveteen tangerine

Brian Molko was already doing the current wannabe-trend of trans-sexuality long before trans-sexuality was a common "thing"... tracing back some ulterior taboo settings... today on my way to work i spotted my first trans-******: wow! obviously he had manly hands... large... he was tall... he had large feet... but slender legs... and a face, with all that necessary make-up of eyeliner... hair? not very long... shoulder length... yes... a deep voice... but then again my godmother has a husky voice from all the smoking and drinking... but i fancied him... the dynamic on the tube was magnifying... three women sat beside him while he was talking to his geeky (maybe, probably) boyfriend, a plump chap with eyeglasses... i couldn't stop thinking: ah... the solidarity of men... when in shortage of supply of women, men will find alternative avenues to compensate for women, men will find women in men... the idea that i might be a transphobe never occurred to me: but it did occur to me that women: for all their supposed glorification of acceptance would never allow men to be attracted to men who are: beyond merely the thespian gay-lord, *******... ally... this... "freak"... i fancied this man... i could omit all the stressed "imperfections"... but such a feminine-feline face... it really suited him... i wanted to kiss him... i was thinking... i'll tend to the "oysters" and all the tender bits and bites of being with him... andd do the butcher's work with a *******... problem solved... this skin-head middle-aged (i'm coming to middle age, or life expectancy, not the lottery of mortality, mind you) sat next to me and was sort of nudging me with a shadow missing in the full-glare of the lights of the tube... you fancy him? insinuations via body-language: yeah... i do... is it wrong? nope! check the women sitting next to him... do you fancy them? nope... me too... of the three or four women sitting next to this trans-****** specimen... none had a lovelier face... mutations just... "happen"... the eureka-oops moments... i could seriously forget about the shared dimensions of large hands twice as big as that of a geisha, same with the feet... i could forget the baritone voice... i really fancied this boy... in a way that gay-lords just make it difficult having mingled with actors too much and not retaining an aura of: suspense and: something in me is frigid, alien... i shouldn't but... hell... i really should! i will! benevolent London that is... he was prettier than all the women i saw that day... like my grandfather once said: there are no ugly women... there are only abandoned... if not abandoned then neglected women... to think that women could ever be neglected: says as much about neglected men... men will find alternative avenues to women when the women self-exfoliate in their "privilege" of: first-come-first-served-and-thus-the-only-served menu... **** that! but what was special about this trans-****** specimen? it reminded me of the time i fancied Brian Molko, still do... in a non-gay sort of way... in a Plato the Plumber there's a blocked toilet of reincarnation afloat... it was actually, sort-of, actually-sort-of-funny watching the women on the same carriage trying to read my reaction... for once a man was more attractive than a woman to me! wow! being accused of trans-phobia... in London? well... only if you can't pull it off! it's like saying: coulrophobia! fear of clowns! with the clowns being without make-up? conflating the Apex Twin gargoyle from Window-Licker?! yeah... scary ****! the grin that's the length of the equator... i couldn't be attracted to a standard homosexual... Thespian leeching or intellectually pleasing akin to a Douglas Murray... or body-building blah blah... but this trans-****** specimen? that's an affront to a woman... all women... a man can have a prettier face to a woman's if... a man deems the exampled woman to be nothing more than akin to a lineage of... never arrived at cosmopolitanism... beetroot countryside proud... all red and irritated... i fancied this one... i was one step away from askig him: can i have your number? again, to reiterate: i didn't mind the deep voice... i didn't mind the size of hands that could match mine or the size of feet that could match mine... i was... infatuated with the magic dust of PIXIES! maybe that's what i learned from going to the brothel... but if you're going to play the trans-****** game... can you please avoid the mishandling of the Hippocratic oath... so little is actually necessary to accomplish a ****-heterosexual confusion-attraction that leaves women feeling inadequate: you, wouldn't even want to begin to believe! i'm now currently thinking of that film: the Odd Couple... Walter Matthau as Oscar Madison and Jack Lemmon as Felix Unger... Felix being the male-feminine counterpart of the feminine-man slob child pampered to: or however this quadratic works... i wouldn't be doing the cleaning and the cooking out of a feminine dignity to avoid doing the hard work of society's demands... no... i'd be perfecting my cooking to match up to the sort of food available upon heading out to a restaurant, i.e. not eating out... i've seen some car-crashes of trans-****** attempts... but this one stuck out for me because i started to think along the lines of: who needs women if men can appear prettier than women?! i'll just close my eyes when hand meets hand... it's a sickly sweet sensation but i could stomach it: if the conversation was kept to a satisfying lubrication: and it wouldn't be even remotely associated to the feminist-gay "commonwealth"... alliance... i don't need homosexuals to tell me XY&Z... i'm actually grooving this trans-****** trend: if spotting the exacting specimen to curtail all the wannabes... if there's an authentic Brian Molko specimen walking around... wow! reimagining being *** starved on the Western Front... a few guys with more artistic inclinations... rather than the rough sea-faring roughage of **** on the spot job done become involved... prettier faces than those of women... i could: no! i would succumb! it's just the terror in the eyes and on the faces of women... hey presto! a stick has two ends! freeze eggs... follow a career... demand a car a mortgage blah blah... my my... what a curiosity this trans-****** worked up to a perfection specimen of disphoria awoke in me... good enough cushioning blanket of sleeping with enough prostitutes... now i really want to sleep with a man... which is not gay... i'm bored of prostitutes... they're like any other woman: you pay them... yet they still complain as if you haven't paid them when not getting a hard-on because of (x) tiredness, (**) distraction, (***) life... per se... whatever... but those female faces... i pretended to be snoozing... they knew i knew... i kept an itch of a blink at this specimen... woman: ANGRY... no... actually... not angry... woman... what the **** is going on? of the times i went to a gay club and didn't pick up a Francis Bacon i wondered: did i drink enough? homosexual lust and all that same-for-same feminine-pro erotica of the jealous stone-rub-stone-offensive... the trans-****** "confusion" is a bright light... if done properly... done... naturally... i'm mesmerised... without... obviously... without... people succumbing to the breaking of the Hippocratic-oath... obviously... i despise the gay-pride movement... at least the authentic trans-sexuality movement is subtle... it's philosophically laden with a curiosity of more lips and less **** stressing fist-*******... this morphing of the pareidolia toward: seeing a female in a man's face... or seeing a man in a woman's face... hardly gender dysphoria... *****-utopia and... just as children look alike, regardless of ***... so do old people... also regardless of ***... but to achieve a heterosexual attraction in the realm of trans-genderism? it can't be forced... it has to happen ha-ha-naturally! i'm laughing at myself... only briefly... i'm more inclined to see the female in a man without seeing the homosexual... because homosexuality is like that quote from... no... not Human Traffic... about being gay and eating *****... how... eating ***** is not for real men... while ******* **** is all All Spice Alles Mensch... whatever... the gays are too proud might as well look out for the shy, proper, proper shy... trans-sexuals without any anti-Hippocratic-Oath mishandling(s)... the women become jittery thus...

i should have come home and reflected on spending
the past several hours on a shift
in Bishop's Park, overlooking Putney Bridge
watching the tide of Thames' recede back into the great
mouth before mingling with the salty waters
of the North Sea...
     all loved-up with the cold the dark and the wind
putting on some Woljiech Kilar soundtrack music
from Dracula - love remembered...
well... i was in the mood for something like that:
i put the track on... nope... can't feel it...
i'm tired, i'm cold i need to put on something to groove
to... we ain't going out like that - Cypress Hill...
tiredness swells the imitation pigeon-strut
in my head... bouncy-Billy will also ask for a chance
to express himself...
    the joke ran with Martin's team (Chelsea)
losing for the first time since 2006 to Fulham...
         the police officers were in a good number...
they even brought their horses...
two stood across from us when the final whistle was
blown... one of them started "laughing": if that's
what horses do, i.e. laugh...
no onomatopoeia here: hey Martin! even the horses
are laughing that Fulham beat Chelsea in the most
local derby of London...
    Craven Cottage is what? a mile at max two from
Stamford Bridge...
          one can only love the ever infuriated Martin...
but still the Thames receding...
   at first glace i might have stretched across
the balustrade and probably touched the surface of
the water... by the end of the shift when the river-bed
started to be exposed i started to wonder:
all that volume and now apparent air where once
there was water...
  no river in the world akin to the Thames...
tide in and tide out... at Westminster it's a river
that rid itself of the kettle and is nonetheless standstill
and boiling - during the day...
while eating a chicken wrap of torsos and tortillas
talking to a Norwegian who came over to watch
the football for the week...
last time he was here in the 1980s... have things changed?
the oyster one-touch travel card...
sure... it has just become a little bit more expensive:
but nothing has changed that much...
but during the night, and if its windy... well: clearly
there's a flow... a tide in or a tide out...
by the time i got to Goodmayes i walked past the brothel:
thank god i have nothing more to prove
thank god i have satiated my base needs and that's that...
what am i looking for? a compliment to a pharma-knock-out
of generic painkillers in the form of a bottle
of whiskey...
    too tired to **** not tired enough to think:
maybe i could fall in love again...
   fall in love... fall in love: but... ugh...
               fall in love and not pamper a woman's needs
with all those basic "tattoos" of courtship...
i might as well ask any future father-in-law:
so... where's my cow, my wedding dowry?
                     where's the pick-me-up to work with?
well if manna from heaven will not drop into my lap...
i hardly think... who the hell needs a car in London?
given the oncoming ULEZ restrictions?
bicycle, underground and the trains, plenty of buses...

today i was sent the most odd message from a coworker
who i am supposed to do a shift at the ice rink
on Sunday...
i was rather surprised - a "box" i never thought i would
unbox (as it were)...
i'll be honest... she's damaged - seriously damaged:
i'm on the "top" of the pile of damaged goods...
a mythological schizoid - ageing - each year turns
out easier as the madness spreads around me:
madness or the crushing mundaneness -
mundaneness or mediocrity -
    in a democracy it's all and the same: in the grey yolk
of bureaucracy -
         pushing letters through keyholes that leave
no door open: unless playing the "system" like
a criminal or a mummy with five different shades
of children from five different fathers...

                       the trouble with Russian girls is that...
they don't like a boy who appreciates music by Placebo...
huge disagreement... her take on Nancy Boy was
rigid and could never be biding: no appreciation of the music
for you... well... that be that...

this girl is hurt... i am hurt: everyone's hurt...
but i still find reasons to find silly happiness in cooking
cleaning, general groundwork labour of changing
the garden - some carpentry: cycling...
keeping up appearances of a well-kept diet
and perfumery of all sorts... at least dressing like
my idol Karl Lagerfeld... like an animal wears its fur...

she even changed her name to Frankie -
Frankie... i.e. is that Franklin, Frank?
no... it's actually Francesca...
the running joke with another girl i work with
runs along the line:
wouldn't that be something, to put on your CV
if you managed to convert her?
convert? or reconvert?
after all she has managed to produce offspring...
god knows why she's not in contact with her daughter...
but it's not like she was always a lesbian...
forced lesbian... it's not something a priori:
it's a posteriori...
after the facts that include: her biological father
beating her biological mum...
her biological mum abandoning her and her siblings
to escape with her dear life...
    how her step-father is like her biological father
but then the problem arises: the mother is unhinged
and now her step-father is facing splitting up with her
mother... of all the siblings she's the only one
keeping contact with her mother...
the other siblings, at least one... is ******* up to
her biological father who was: the greatest intersexual
boxer of the domestic environment to have ever lived
(in her eyes at least, i bet Tina Turner could compensate
such allowances of vanity)...

she used to be a man's woman once...
but now she switched... ******* without all
the Hippocratic misdeeds of the modern, current, narrative,
cutting off ******* and other genitals,
hormonal treatments... it's almost as if Joseph Mengele
died in body but his spirit lived on...
it's like a never-ending Auschwitz or at least
encryptions of mad-scientists for thirst of knowledge
have continued on a side-note of eugenics...
but at least with the closure of the 20th century
there was safe ******* experiments undertaken
by individuals without any authority of government:
the boys would grow their hair long and put
on eyeliner...
    perhaps even use girly perfumes or wear
dresses, nail-polish... hell... even sniff ******* or wear
them... but not with medical authority creating
irreversible ****** changes...
the girls would put on more weight or work out
and pretend to be East Germany's Olympians...
cut their hair short... who came the Pixie girls...
get tattoos wear signets: those bulky rings worth not
a gram of gold but their own worth of bulk...
    and like Francesca get an undercut with a Mohawk...
change their tone of voice... defence defence defence...
and become suddenly less and less agreeable...
still retaining a feminine smile and the odd feminine giggle
that could be unearthed...
or like with her text...
'hey... i want to go ice-skating after our shift...
do you think you'd be up for it?'
sure... although i only ice-skated twice in my life...
a long time ago, 13? i fell every single time...
i looked like someone who escaped from having
suffered from Polio...
i'll still look like someone who suffered from childhood
Polio akin to Israel Vibration's
Wiss", "Apple Gabriel", "Skelly"
      or Ian "Lane" Drury...
                                    instead i sent her a text replying:
sure... but i'll look like a spider equipped with
roller blades... i'll need to bring a casual set of trousers
just in case i fall and rip my work trousers...
'ha ha ha ha(insert crying with laughter emoticons)...'

oh sure... it's not a date... i'm not just going on a date...
we're not going for dinner...
i'm going ice-skating with a lesbian...
a butch-lesbian a hiding woman...
tattoos six-pack and muscle...
no wonder: only hours prior i was admiring
a would-be Brian Molko on the tube...
        
she followed up with a text of yet more defence:
but i'm skint - it will cost £10.50 for an hour
and a bit...
      we'll see i reply... as if she was implying:
if we can't get in for free... would you be willing
to pay?
i didn't reply with agreement to paying for...
then again: i'm not thinking about ***,
or homosexual conversion therapy...
i just don't remember when a girl last asked me to
go on a date with her... after all:
isn't a girl asking a boy to go ice skating with her
sort of asking a boy to go on a date?
she said she was quiet adapted to ice skating:
she owns a pair (of ice skates)... and i'll be the hilarious
polio walker / spider strapped with roller blades
trying to swim in quicksand...
mind you... i'm trying to rid myself of the past two
interactions in the brothel... terrible ***...
that one with the madam where i was limp...
the fate of the Sabine men gripped me...
i won't deny it...
second time... she calls herself my favourite:
she isn't... she's deluded... to the amazement of the other
girls i like to **** in the brothel...
i only extended my per usual 30min stay
by clocking up an extra 30min because i was so close
to climaxing from a *******: knock knock on the door...
time's up... no... not this time...
i'm going to finish... ergo...
but even she has paved her way onto a path of too much
physical augmentation...
if the **** don't come first... then the duck quack lips
reveal themselves first... she's an aging *******
and she has never done anything in terms of work
prior... no laundry no till service...
pregnant aged 14 and in the profession aged 16...
this is the murk and the sully of the gallows
of everyone: once, former, youthful idealism of love...
trotting a horse with broken legs like
waking up into birth by a man sitting in akimbo
for too long... standing up with numbed legs...
moving awkwardly...

obviously i was going to be robbed of Khadra and Mona...
Mona became stupid for getting pregnant
with a customer... hmm... i wonder who...
last time i saw her i teased her without a ******
and this massive fright gripped her face
because i was only teasing and she thought i was
a premature ejaculator... clearly a ****** was subsequently
used and the deposit in it: **** knows...
she should know... i haven't seen her since...

i think i'll text Francesca (Frankie) and tell her...
bring your skates girl... if we can't get in for free i'll
pay for the two of us...
only two shifts prior she was insinuating about
going for a pint: i just replied: i would...
but i had to help my father write the fortnightly
invoice and send it in...
like tomorrow... tomorrow i'll have to help my mother
with the taxes and VAT...
they're getting a new accountant and she lied
about doing her taxes on a spreadsheet...
**** me... i probably used Microsoft Excel twice...
twice, properly... but since i only used it twice...
i'm a bit rusty... so much worth of secondary school
education or the university...
   they taught us the bare minimum of real-world
life-long tools of the onslaught of technology -
   hammer and scythe i can use to count heads...
oh well: there's bound to be some crash-course for dummies
on the internet...

i waited until 9pm for the three of us to sit down to
eat some fajitas...
i overdid it using Kashmiri chilly powder
and three fresh chillies in making the pineapple salsa...
but the hotness neutralised itself with the addition
of the tomato salsa i made... and the guacamole...
the sour cream and obviously cheese, esp. cheddar
neutralises all possible excess spices...
we ate, chatted... one big ******* family,
me, father and mother and my "brother" and "sister"...
well... at least the cats meow and don't bark...
oddly enough: i'm happy... mediocre sort of:
that scene from Hellraiser: Inferno...
were the protagonist - a corrupt police officer -
is forced into a nightmare of having to relive his
eternity in his childhood's bedroom...
living with his parents...
shouldn't the horror be... your parents getting divorced?
i don't know why mine are still together...
they must be freaks... i must be a mutant:
well... born only two weeks after Chernobyl:
no riddles, only clues...
     i keep the conversation going...
i help around the house...
  
                        Frankie dealt me two nuggets of hashish
in the past 4 months... once i was desperate
when the hashish ran out so she gave me the number
of a marijuana dealer: great green all the way from
America... i only used the service once...
maybe that's me being bulletproof...
i'm cutting down on drinking and i will never return
to smoking marijuana to achieve a Buddha-esque glow
meditating while high and hungry...
weighing in at 78kg... it's a bit of a yoyo with me these
days... from 99kg through to 103kg...
but then... i pinch myself: i summon the ***** to pinch
back... hmm! no man-****... so i could try out for
some amateur rugby matches...

a butch lesbian asking a boy for a date to go
ice skating... i feel... truly terrible for all the conventional women...
i would have offered a cinema date...
she beat me to the better sort of entertainment...
she said: let's go ice skating...
i would have retorted: i do own two bicycles...
how about we go cycling in the night...
round and round Raphael's Park...
round and round... and if we're lucky...
and if the winter air aligns itself with some idiot
setting off fireworks... we can get snippets of whiffs
of imitation autumn... as if the leaves of the trees
have fallen in the dry crisp air and someone
set them alight and there's no rot and knee-deep
digging of plush-decay exfoliating a sickness
in the air... how's that?

i'll send her the text... hell... i'll pay for her...
i'm not interested in ***...
she might be a butch-lesbian trying to hide her
femininity... but she still smiles like a woman...

oh sure... i remember the last conventional:
heterosexual date i was on...
we met in a sweaty night-club... if we kissed we kissed:
i don't remember... she gave me her phone-number
i gave her mine... i was in the company of
about 3 girls who i met elsewhere, otherwise:
also randomly...
at least one made something of her life...
she ****** off to Norway - totally off-the-grid...
by now probably breeding huskies for sleighs...

the next time we met... i bought two bottles of wine...
the "date"? a job interview... we talked...
subsequently we went to a pub while i had a pint...
she was feeling claustrophobic...
i was the alcoholic and she became the **** of boredom...
she excused herself: some prior engagement
with her girlfriends... i guess she thought she got away...
i way happy to get away by same mechanisation
of oppositional psychology...
all this talk within the confines of carpe diem that
centred upon: what do you / what's you living
should i think about life insurance - will we live to be 70
years old?
well... that's the cherry on top with Francesca...
you want to go ice-skating? sure...
you want to go cycling with me in the night?
sure... life insurance / what do you for a living?
how much do you earn?
             can we live a little outside a prison within a prison?!

so much for Dawid Bovie's idea of the androgynous man:
if i'm to be surrounded by "butch" lesbian
and prostitutes: that's my lot then...
i'm not going to succumb to the CV-project-veritas
in-vitro infanticide females with CHOICE
like... my spunking into a bucket and calling it:
falling asleep with the sound of rain
trickling trickling on a metallic roof...
in the night when the horrors come and horrors
claim all the little details of frailty
of mortality...

                  for every tear-jerking sympathy for
a Romeo there's the mantis of
   a Judith kissing the decapitated head of
                                                             Holofernes:
**** it... the prostitutes i truly loved ******* are either:
pregnant or on "holiday"...
i passed the brothel only two nights ago...
i spotted a man walking out from the door...
he froze like a doe in the headlights and didn't move
until i turned my head and kept walking...
i was about to blast out with wind and voice:
no shame in having to share women
we will never impregnate!
start thinking like a woman, dear man...
think on ground of evolutionary bias...
for every women there's this boast of:
50% of men reproduced successfully...
while all the whole lot of them the 100% of train-wrecks
and Piccadilly butcher's antics with the flab
have... their greatest success story to ever live...
i could be worse off... than right now...
i could have married an ugly woman:
by definition: if a most feminine man
grows his hair long and applies some slapstick
makeover creases of eyeliner...
i can forgive him his match-for-match size
of hands... height... size of shoe...
but never an ugly woman... UGLY...
that goes beyond mere the physical-glass...
i'm talking: character... there's no prime-ego
LEGO building block... no architect's corner stone...
there's nothing to work with...
just everything to work around...
to avoid...
                    
    if: for ****'s sake... i'm not planning: i'm providing
the revenue... i want to go ice-skating!
she doesn't have any money? i have "too much"...
i don't: but for the worth of life in life that's only
to supposed to span a month's worth of living it...
hell: i have no better idea to pass the time...

at one point i found out that Francesca has some Irish
roots... you're Aye-Reesh?!
              really? never would have conjured up
a sharing of ******* on a leprechaun...
**** it for good luck... like circumcision:
that's apparently Hebrew for: good luck...
with the addition of: ensuring your bride to be
be donning a niqab and all those "other"...
culturally sensitive, exclusive terms of
cultural-dis-appropriation: or whatever the **** is
coming out of H'America...
             once upon a time when that cultural export
was relevant: these days: nothing new to be
found... except the abandoned moon...

well... i sent the text... sure... i'll pay for the ice-skating...
but you have to promise me to go cycling
with me during the warmer months
with me... don't worry about having a bicycle...
you can have my mountain-bicycle
i use for the winter months
while i'll get on my summer month
road-bicycle...
we'll head toward Thurrock...
and elsewhere that's Essex friendly
and far away from London outer-suburbia...
fresh... fresh...
Jean Claude van Dame...
                       Fresh: that's her idea of working out
before the shift... and then going ice-skating...
FooR x Majestic x Dread MC...

                oh well... life in Loon-downs...
or is that: no apples... i'm sure there are no apples...
if she takes the bait...
i.e. i pay for both of us going ice-skating tomorrow...
she better go cycling with me during the
summer months...
she says no to ice-skating tomorrow
i'll become Trojan in my own defense...
if she wants to be all ******* lesbian defensive...
i can be defensive too...
i'll arm myself with enough brothel visits to erase:
first... comes... oh my grandmother disappointed
me... i could have been there for my
grandfather stabbing himself in the leg
while entering the state of AGONIA...

                    i could have been there: she? trying to protect
me against the advent of mortality?
or her... biting my grandfather's alcoholism she
induced by being a terrible woman?
his last pleasures?
crossword puzzles... cycling, fishing,
rekindling with the day-tripper postcard sender
vouch! you're the simulation tourist with
his... grand... chill... no... not -dren...
his... sole and only grand-child... i.e. me...
him buying me the books i read over the summer holidays...

women are so ape so cruel...
i stopped believing in what's idealistic and rare before
me: which i can't replicate...
i'm happy being freed from:
i don't earn the sort of money that the state
demands taxing me... weird? no!
i don't earn enough to be taxed!
weird... i'm sort of pretending to be a jellyfish
afloat... simulating gravity:
gravity is always a simulation in the medium
of water...
                by air contra vacuum:
the mountain breathes in winter a cascade of
frigid snow slides down...
a Michael Schumacher goes skiing...
****** races cars at 200kmh... one loose turn and twist:
cranium like an opening of a watermelon...
jellyfish fighting for life dead-locked style
in a sick-bed while people nearest to him
think about magic-spells: how best to live without
him: how best to milk the cow with *****
instead of milk... hmm hmm hmm...

if she wants to go on a date with me to go ice-skating...
and i'm supposed to be paying for it...
she better be readied to go cycling with me
during the summer months...
if that's not going to happen:
she shouldn't have suggested
going ice-skating in the first place, for ****'s sake...
like: anything by Bricktop in ****** is
Shakespeare to me... perhaps even more...
living with the times...

                                oh well some well: Samuel!
Samuel: you're not Samantha... learn to become
a transvestite first... before we employ the ****
Hippocrates to mutilate you, o.k. darling?
    learn to grow your hair long...
learn to put on make-up... learn to wear dresses...
learn to sniff female underwear...
Samuel! Samuel! you're not Samantha (yet)!
we will not give you up to the Joseph "Hip-replacing-******"
Mengele: shy away from everything American
in the realm of: worth being culturally exported
and influencing foreign cultures: esp.
in the basin of the origins of the English ZZZUNGE...
that's England...
                  
HIPS FOR KNEES!
                    America: beacon, former: beacon of the world
to come... came one Cain for every second cannibal
no Satan was spawned: at least that's Iranian paranoia
covered: converted, shut the doors on Tehran...
bigger whoops happened when...
Garry Glitter became pop once more
with the release of the Joker movie
and that mad dance scene...
on the 132 steps where Shakespeare Avenue
meets Anderson Avenue...

    i will never, ever... visit... anything... remotely...
resembling... or being curated as being:
North America... i've had too much north american
cultural anemia...
             prior to words not being so much politcal
as agent orange doing all the "talking"...
                                  
  tam tam tam dam dam dam... ditto... do no more than
the necessary "evil": just, bass: on the base
on insinuation;
hell... if the afro-cosmopolitan is the new "cool",
the new "groove"...
let's just keep it... marred: in murk: in murky.

Our fates aligned on the ice,
She stole stole my hear with a slice,
her movements so mesmerizing
our eyes forever locking,
wanting more but not wanting it enough,
the regret i feel,
i can barely deal,
but our fates never aligned.

i seldom remember
what i remembered
before I could remember

remember december
the snowdrifts, remember
you skated down memory lane

my memory failed me
my lifetime defeats me
forget about leaving alive

remember?

In summer, water is used
For many purposes.
It is swam in, played in
And jumped in.
It is also used to
Tube on, ski on
And surfed on.
Water is a necessity for summer to occur.
In winter, water is used
For many purposes.
It is played on, skated on,
And hopefully not fallen on.
Water is a necessity for winter to occur.

it was last winter by the icy river
covered with crisscrossing cracks as we skated the tenuous surface wanting only to fall
into each other’s arms

it was when I found a bruise on my collarbone
and I believed it was from you loving me so much you wanted me to break
just so that you could kiss the pain away

it was the darkness of a movie theater as the backdrop for our obsession
we grew together starting with our fingers as they interlaced and never let go

it was me carving scars into my forearms so that I could reassure myself that I still existed,
even when you weren’t there

it was lying on the roof under the stars and counting constellations and being worried
that you would dislike how I named them and push me off the edge

It was later, the wanting to jump

I was only a half of a whole
I was never as interesting or pretty as I was with you, so I was always with you

If you had told me that to save you from drowning I had to go in your place
I would have jumped in the ocean  
begged the sharks to surround me
tied myself to the smooth worn rocks

I think you would have let me

it was when you would act as if you were blind
and try to learn the hills and hollows of my face with your fingertips
sometimes following the line of my neck to the triangle shadow at the base of my throat
and farther onward than I wanted you to go

I should have known it in the way I shivered when you touched me
I could never figure out if it was happiness or fear
anxiety or anticipation
you tried to cover me with a blanket but that only made it worse
I wanted to expose myself to you
needed you to see every dip and curve of my stillness
so that I could prove you were right for me

you gave me a pendant for my birthday that hung heavy round my neck
it was inscribed with the word forever in spiky script
and I knew that you were claiming me for yours
knew that the necklace was my dog tag so that if I got lost, people would know they couldn’t have me.  
I say people
I mean boys
The other boys, the ones you seemed so afraid of
you were sure that once your back was turned, I would ***** around
offering my love and kisses like party favors
I never would have.  

I offered you all of myself
yet somehow, you always wanted what I was holding back
I was holding back nothing; there was nothing else for me to give away
my arms were holding together the little bits of me that were left
but you wanted those too, and because I loved you, I gave them to you
and fell apart in the wind
crumpled to the ground like a fallen house of cards

instead of kissing in the rain
we fought in the rain
our shouts were in sync with the thunder
when lightning struck I cursed God that he hadn’t hit you
he never seemed to hear

I liked the summer the best
It was too hot to do anything but lie on the sticky grass
watching the fireflies spell out our names
in phosphorescent afterimages in the southern night
that was where you hurt me so silently
your hands around my neck like an extension of your embrace

by that time I had been trained to think that was all it was

I remember how you looked that night.
We ate McDonalds,
you hate McDonalds.
And you played in the play place with me.
We laid in the tube,
just staring.
Wanting.
And I ached to close the distance between
Our bodies and stay that way forever.
Then we decided it smelled like ****,
so maybe we should go.
I drove us to the parking lot
where we spent so much time
*******, holding, sweating, laughing,
listening to Jack Johnson.
On the look out for cops.
Just two kids trying to love
without consequence.  
I should have known then.
And I decided at that moment,
that I loved you still.
Despite everything.
Your drunken stupidity
your ******* *****
     You stole for her.
And I took you to her house
     where you would
     have *** with her
     and I would drive
     away crying.
I loved you still.
In that eternal moment, I knew
I would always forgive you.
The kiss that led to disaster.
A plane crash in the making.
But at least it was beautiful at the time.
Time waited for us, only that once.
We got out of the car and you told me
to meet you in the middle of the pond.
It’s frozen.
No no, I protested.
It’s dangerous,
It’s dangerous.
And I was right.
Out you slid
Large gashes in the snow covered ice
as you slid gracefully.
Or maybe it wasn’t so graceful after all,
But that’s what I liked about you.
I followed you to the center
you held my hand
and we skated for hours.
I never let go—
     If I was going down,
     I was taking you with me.
You were the only one who could
     ever save me anyway.
Then we walked down the path,
towards the place where it all began.
That place still creates an emptiness
in me every time I pass
without you.
Still hand in hand,
we danced under the
biggest snowflakes I have ever seen.
The heavens were falling down around us it seemed,
or perhaps we were finally leaving that
hell hole of a town.
Finally going somewhere where
we could just be alone.
Alone at last.
Laughing as we caught
them on our tongues.
I told you I would love you forever
and I wish it was lie.
Maybe you even said the same to me.
Your words fade as the
time passes,
the bitterness grows.
My mind can never agree
with my heart
on the subject of you.
But back to the story—
It felt
felt very real
at the time.
And if I could stay in that moment,
I probably would.
For in that moment,
it was us at our best.
You. With me.
But all things must come to an end.
And though the image of
you spinning
me laughing
at you trying to
eat snowflakes,
will be mine forever.
I felt it at that moment.
Maybe that was a sign that I knew
you would be mine to miss
one day.
Alas, we decided it was getting late,
we had only told your mother
we were getting McDonalds.
But I’m pretty sure we ****** again.
Adding to our pile of condoms
littering the school grounds.
It was a point of pride.
Still don’t know how we
never got caught.
We returned to your house
to watch animal planet.
And for that night,
all was right in my universe.
And now,
as the years go by,
you slowly fade.
Your voice
Your laugh
Your love
Your smile
Your face
Who you were.
Alien.
Something cold and unfamiliar.
Uncomfortable. Awkward.
Rude. Judgmental.
I hold on to those moments
of the real you.
The you that was mine for a short while.
As I try to let the stranger
you have become
slip away,
those moments remind me
of what it is to be alone.
Perhaps not all is lost,
because they give me
that overwhelming
out of control feeling
of finally knowing everything.
That everything is ******,
but it’s ok.
As long as we kept spinning
in the snow.

I walked to school in the snow
up to my knees
like an acrobat trapezed
from snow angel to man
to summers
as humid as saunas
but we still rode bikes
and played ball in heat
and jumped off bridges into the canal
in front of retired fisherman
who wore straw hats and smoke pipes
like snowmen and they ice fished
in the harbor where we skated
and sprayed snow on each other
until the ice cracked
in spring thaw
where bass spawn
and they fished
and we swam
until fall.

I am a skater.

Sort of.

I ride a longboard.

And one time, I skated home in love.

It was 6am. And the sun was starting to rise again.

After spending the night at her place.

At the point I didn't do sleepovers. I loved to smoke **** and watch reruns of old **** that made me laugh.

But that night.

I didn't care that I was sober, that I was ugly.

I didn't care that I wanted a bowl. Of food of ****. It didn't matter.

All that mattered was her hand on my thigh, the silent sigh. The moment her sister when up to her room at five in the morning.

After watching countless shows and music videos we finally were alone.

And we kissed and we stripped and we were marry. We almost had *** but then she carried me, to her bed.

And laid me down and with a smile she covered me with a blanket.

I couldn't take it.

So I woke myself up and kissed her good bye.

Maybe that was my first mistake.

And then I skated down the hill to my house. On my longboard

And it was morning.
I took selfies at that moment wanting to pinpoint the memory.

But nothing was stopping me from playing all the previous nights actions in my my head and in my mind.

She broke my heart in the rain. I've never felt so much pain.

And then I finally fell asleep.

There is no hope.
We walked in circles round the worm, its amorphous purpose lost on us. A sleek, black, rotting corpse, buried within skyscrapers and city streets. We could see no end to it. Everyone had done their best to avoid mention, even as traffic backed, markets stalled and entire city blocks went down.
The pier was bustling at noon. Sweet, burning, haze of smells. Business men wandered out for lunch, laughing to themselves as they secretly wondered how they’d pass the black mass. Children scurried round it, morbidly curious. Their parents would wring their hands, shooting sights at everything but the worm. A throng of oblivious teens skated into it and were knocked flat on their backs. A business man stepped over the moaning mass, eating a hot dog.
Three days passed and nothing had been done. The smell worsened.
The media continued their daily fluster. Weather. Sports. Local news. Farmer John had gotten pink eye again. They held awkward smiles in their teeth, and deadpan concern in their crows feet. His meat would be safe once cooked.
The government were curiously absent.
Conspiracists were already calling it Non-entity 012. The world worm. The dead god in the room.
If we close our eyes, will it disappear?

-- Anonymous Male. New York, USA.

We spent hours on our skateboards
Hot days and cold nights
Skinned knees bleed slightly; they drip lightly on the same asphalt
that we glide over all afternoon
Rubber wheels smack cracks in the sidewalk
Wood scrapes concrete as you launch into the

                                          air

if only for a moment
Everyone comes down

Rosy from the sunshine
T-Shirt stuck slightly to my sweating back
I wheeled myself under the installed cedars,
over littered leaves,
around suburban corners
A man in an orange vest held up his arms, beckoning mothers in their
vans to stop for me while I skated by but
I didn’t thank him
I felt regret

In your room we fumbled awkwardly in the half-light
Sunshine warmed us in slats through your dusty blinds
Partially filled cups sat atop your dresser, full of water and red pop
There was a buffalo springfield poster on your wall and I thought you
were devastatingly cool
We’re sixteen and we’re not in love but we love what we’re doing

I still remember your skin, it was olive dark and bruised all over,
when I ran my fingers down your back white lines remained for a
fleeting moment
Short shorts and a long shirt, these memories are vivid
I wonder where you are now – an actress I hear, which is funny
because I never really thought you were any good
I wonder if you still find the minutes to take your old skateboard,
covered in dust and the film of time, out of whatever buried corner it
inhabits

Back in your bedroom, my hand lingers next to yours as we sit close on your bed
While you contemplate my lips, I contemplate yours
I’m a little late for dinner

I've heard it's about control
sounds simple

I'd control myself in shops
sustained by other people's greed
                           temptation
             hunger
that croissant's half fat that
caesar-salad dressing       oily depths
of calories

this pineapple is my five a day
my first my last
vulture-gripped and smuggled home
brown paper bagged

at my desk I'd lose control
cutting in ahead of schedule
tearing an espresso spoon
through fibrous sinew gorges
                                                   hunched
hacking into flesh

until I'd hollowed out
scraped off every scrap
and filled myself with bile

I ice-skated for hours that day
blisters on my fingers from the spoon
round and round

There is falling
and there's FALLING
and I was good at both
I swear to that completely
I'll swear that under oath
If there's a way to take a tumble
A way to fall on down
Then I'm the best example
I've spent a life time on the ground

First, we'll tackle skating
Couldn't cross and make the turn
I'd get caught and then I'd tumble
It's something I never did quite learn
I was always out there falling
While the others skated by
I could never make the motion
So...I no longer even try

Athletics, you know track and field
High hurdles, running track
It's evident, I couldn't jump
So from track I got the sack
Always had weak ankles
Was always falling down
While most kids shorts were crisp and white
Mine were stained all green and brown

I gave up and then tried camping
Just a tent, the woods and me
I never even got out once
I tripped over a tree
I mean, I fell out in the forest
And yes, I made a sound
I mean if anybody heard that noise
It was me hitting the ground

I'm not much good at anything
You can see that from my past
My body moves  at one speed
My feet just go too fast
I've always been a faller
Falling's the one real thing I do
And the last time that I fell
Was the day, that I met you....

Softly she tiptoes across the lawn
Warm muffin hand snuggled in mine
Off we go to watch the sunrise
see the dawn get born

Hungrily I turn for more of the dream
Another re-run - my favorite one
Wide-eyed she tastes the fresh new air
Dips her piggies in the stream

Why does it smell so different dad?
Willow trees heave a sigh and blink
Frogs smile and wink in the sparkly dew
Well you see darling... gone! begad!

Don't stop now! More I implore
Play how she skated to me down the hill
long before she learned to drive
the thrills, the spills, kissing her sore
Now the  **** crows a new dawn, fresh
Someday soon I'll see what she saw
Return O Lord! restore shalom
as it was in the beginning - afresh

I was supposed to for-get you.
You were supposed to be dead to me.
But piece of you remained
And when it rained
Vines crawled out of my soul to yours
Your name, found its way back to my heart.
The spiral, began all over again.
Give me a break you selfish *****.

For, the wars that we fought,
Its a shame no one ever really died,
Though most times I got injured.
Each gunshot came from our lips.
Every bomb exploded from my finger tips,
Poetry, fell to pages like grenades,
As I figure skated above landmines for days.
Tip toeing over these trip wires,
Loving you is a dangerous thing.
But I don't think I can survive without the affliction
It is, kind of becoming our little tradition
Where I,
Love you,
You love me
Then build me
And break me
And leave me
But I still Love you.
As if my soul,
Beckons at the mercy of your beauty.

You once stood,
With an arm full of lightening rods,
Dared me to stand still, and I did.
I trusted you.
You fired every last one at me.
I never healed.
I will never heal,
Because I will always feel.