Smiles
May 29, 2023
She smiled at me but I didn’t know it. I glanced behind me. Nobody. She continued to smile a great warm sort of sexy smile and I turned away and sat back down and wiped my slightly damp hands on my jeans under the table. A minute later as I pretended to take in the conversation, I realised that she must have confused me with somebody else, perhaps someone who looks sort of like me. That, I decided, was why she was smiling at me. It wasn’t really me that she had meant to smile at. That made sense. I carried on talking to my friends but my mind whirred away in the background. Something about this girl did seem familiar, I turned and caught her eye. Yes, I did recognise her. She was no longer smiling, she glared at me. I turned back to my pint. Yes, that I could understand.
Love
May 24, 2023 // For my children
This whole life death business has worn me out:
one day I’m running high just being here
and feel a crazy rush and want to flout
the anxious carefulness and dance the fear
right out of people’s kindly caring looks;
the next, I’m reading thinking making
meanings, ideas floating just above the books,
and wonder at the shapes this search creates,
without, of course, arriving: not attaching,
seems to help when stalking the unknown.
And other days, I find myself embalmed in
grief so sheer there’s no me there to be alone.
With flux prevalent, I hold what’s constant:
I love you fierce and always in this instant.
As I left I felt confused…
May 11, 2023
Have you ever had the feeling that having bungled something however slightly, that it should be destroyed? Maybe something you had been working delicately on but having made a mistake, you feel an urge to break. Perhaps a diet felled by a biscuit, that by itself would hardly have mattered but having broken the rule, was followed by another 10. It can feel like an all or nothing feeling. As if, accidentally stepping in a deep puddle and wetting your shoe, the only appropriate action to take is to jump in with both feet and roll in it, soaking the mud into your recently washed hair.
If you have ever said too much in anger, or smashed a perfectly good phone or computer, you may have experienced this feeling and I hope that both of us find a way to turn down the exposure and eventually, our way out.
Salonica
June 13, 2022
Mum
November 12, 2021
you fought fate through the years like a boxer and came out hands high and no less bruised
a fighter to a fault you fought the inevitable
i want to shout. ‘what were you thinking
why did you do it?’
but I know why
everybody knows why
today you’ll be praised for your fight
but here you’re praised for your surrender
Untitled monologue
October 18, 2021
I write but rarely for others. I wonder what others would want to read. What do they want to read? Probably not this, I sigh and clamber on. Trying to write to a preconceived plan is a struggle for me! In fact trying to write anything that isn’t this is a struggle, so I write whatever this is. What is this? This, never that. That thing I should write. That, that others might want to read, but oh! Only this comes out (whatever this is). It is a monologue I suppose, and I suppose people do read monologues, don’t they? They do, don’t they? I can see you nod meekly, and I wonder if you feel trapped by my words! I might well feel trapped if I were reading this. I might think, ‘Hey! You aren’t leaving me very much room to manoeuvre here, buddy!’. I might even say something out loud. I might say, ‘ Fuck off! Leave me alone’. Is that what you are thinking?
Do you want me to leave you alone? To leave and close the door? I hope not, but I’ll keep on going just the same, though why anyone would want to read such claptrap is beyond me, there being so many things to do in this world after all. Surely this can’t be worth your time? On what do you place your value! Actually please, I implore you, put this down and get out of the house eh? Perhaps a nice ambling walk, surely that is a better use of your time. Well anyway, I’m here, and you’re here, we shall better get on with it. But hang on, now I think about it, what about you? What are you here for anyway? What are you asking of me, for you are surely asking something. A story perhaps? Maybe to stop asking so many questions of you, eh?! No, that won’t do I’m afraid. It’s part of my style.
Is it a style you detest? Don’t worry your answer won’t offend me, I’m not sure anything could offend me you see, I’m not sure that I could write any differently if I tried, It only seems to flow like this. And flowing it is! Look at all this spilling out across the page. Anyone would think that I must have something important to say, using up all this space. And here I am starting to wonder if I have said anything at all! Well, I’ll let you be the judge of that, I am perhaps too harsh a critic. ‘Are you?’ I hear you say, ‘If you were honestly critical, you never would have started writing such utter nonsense at all!’. Ah! Perhaps! But did you actually say anything, or did I just think it? It is impossible to say, though you may find I ask you again.
You might be thinking that I seem a little mad, but I assure you that I am no such thing. I am but taken with an idea. It is like a force inside me, have you ever experienced anything like that? Like a fire inside your chest that rages and propels you forward towards god knows what and on who knows what purpose? I’m sure you have, is it not after all the most normal thing in the world? Well? Oh, I’ve quite forgotten my manners, you must be quite done with this by now. These extravagant ramblings of self-absorption that they are, eh? Quite bored. Are you? No! You needn’t lie, I won’t take any offence, it’s really a matter of taste and as you can see I have a serious taste for it! I feel like a cannibal, now bored by the meats offered and accustomed to stranger delights, but I wonder dear reader how it is that you feel? After all, I am writing this for you, am I not? But I am not sure if I want to hear, yes, perhaps I had better not listen. I shall hum over you if you speak at all in fact as your words could well be discouraging and put me off entirely. But again no! I will listen, in fact I will stop talking completely to listen to what it is that you have been trying to say. I’ll put the kettle on, and you can begin. One moment please.
an aphorism
June 3, 2021
The intellect is nothing but a means to avoid dancing.
Monument place
April 6, 2021
Martin awoke early with puffy eyes. He held the clock radio at arms length and squinted. He grimaced at the neon glare and placed it back down on the bedside table, turning the face back towards the wall. The green light reflected back at him in the tall mirror by the door and he turned over.
‘Margret, Margret,’ he shouted dully, his face half smothered in his duvet.
‘Margret, get us a smoke dear.’
A moments silence and then a rustling from behind the door preceded the clink of the latch as Margret stepped outside. She stood in the doorway in the cold morning light and felt the breeze on her face. She too was waking up but did so in a decidedly different manner to that of her husband. She awoke lithe and ready for the day, he slow and haltingly. She stood there a minute longer and then at the sound of the sparrows morning song she suddenly stretched out her arm and lay her hand flat open before her. Almost instantly a little bird flew down from somewhere in the half dark above the house and perched on her hand depositing a cigarette in the centre of her palm. She returned to the house.
‘Margret,’ Came a shout, still muffled by blankets.
‘Margret, fetch us a smoke wont you?’
‘Coming dear,’ She said as she closed the door and turned towards the darkened bedroom.
‘It’s a Camel.’
‘Oh, good,’ Came a clearer, fresher voice. ‘Oh good.’
Hilda
November 23, 2020
Her face was raised upwards in the pale light from the nearby window and her mouth protruded forth in front of such hollow cheeks. Her ears pricked as a poem was read and a smile of utter innocence painted her lips. It was possible to watch in her eyes and mouth the progress of the poem at each line, so clearly it impacted on her features. She seemed to strain upwards towards an experience that is on the whole invisible to us but a glimmer of which she could clearly be seen to recognise. She didn’t draw our attention to it, she didn’t seem to worry all that much as to why it was or from where it came but to feel her way through it moment by moment. Hilda was alive and kicking.
Wrongness
October 15, 2020
In getting some beer from the shop, I hesitated and turning, saw a young woman waiting for access to the fridge. She smiled, and I instantly felt that she had made a mistake in showing me kindness. Had my face not been covered she surely would have seen my inherent toxicity, my wrongness so thoroughly entrenched. Well enough of that for now.
It is in each action and relation that I find the evidence of this evil. Each passing stranger seems to stare at my bare soul or else look away repulsed lest they become infected by my mere proximity. So in this way it is painful to be. Being aware of the name of this curse is more than I knew possible but not enough to dislodge it. I can tell myself every minute for hours and days that I mean no wrong, that I have done nothing wrong, yet feel as though I have killed the family dog. I awkwardly stand having broken the best chinaware, a large slab in each hand as shame and guilt ricochet through my chest but I have in fact done nothing. I have always committed no crime, the shame unfounded. I think back over all that I have done to try to trace these feelings to a specific event. Did I do something? Was what I said harmful? ‘Well of course it was,’ says some well embedded part of my mind, ‘I am inherently wrong, incurably so. I cause damage and pain. It is my way.’
So there you have a glimpse of my psyche, my everyday existence. I guess that I am what you would call paranoid. I do not trust myself and as a result, seeing no good reason why anyone else should, I assume that they do not and can see me for the twisted man I feel I am.
Olive oil
June 24, 2020
We would always talk at cross topics and when we didn’t the conversation was short, frustrated with frequent interruptions, thoughts ‘jumping up now’ and out into the air, yet somehow we did ok. There was just one pot in his kitchen, full of small white dents. The first time he had turned on his stove was when I had turned up with a little k to cook. When I asked him how he made his food he said he ate out if at all and ‘I don’t live in London, I exist in London’ he smiled at his own quote.
Arabas
February 7, 2020
Back to the hostal. Hostal Arabas, a real travellers digs. A very well spoken French born American cooks lentils with cumin proudly explaining the virtues of cloves. Charming. They all bike. Bikes everywhere, talking of tents and sleeping bags, all very important. Cancelled a night out at a strip club with Aphrodite. To sensitive to watch an ugly scene – let alone take part. Tongues pushing out in force. No more booze. I want lentils, water, exercise. Enough meat and bad music. Give me silence. Patience. Fresh air. Fuck stale smoke, I want life.
A cycle through Spain
January 31, 2020
At first he would wonder just a few minutes from the hotel and sit in the sun and play but as the sunshine was broken by the tall buildings he went further afield and eventually found a small park overlooking the port and he sat and played there. As he had never had any lessons and only played when there was a guitar to hand he knew very little and played intuitively and simply. He enjoyed it, the basic, hypnotic patterns that he could create giving a musical mood to his surroundings and obviously he wasn’t alone in his enjoyment as one day, as he sat and played, a girl of his age sat on the bench next to his and listened. After a while she came over to him and in a soft Italian voice asked him if he came to play here regularly. He said he did and she replied that in that case she too would come to sit in the park and listen. After she had gone he felt proud of himself, he could feel the city around him, the work he did, the friends he had and now this interaction, however slight seemed to cement the life that he was starting to build. He could feel a future yet to be, full of possibilities unknown but starting to take shape. He picked up the guitar and feeling his height he walked back along through the narrow streets lined with their flower baskets and slight balconies strewn with clothes lines and when he got back to the hotel he put down the guitar and knew that he would never go back to the park again to play and knew he would never see the girl with the soft Italian voice again. He left town the following week.
Fortune found him cycling through Aragon in eastern Spain several weeks later. The weather was warming up and as he had only a tourist map as guide he took the hills as they came. He wore shorts and a shirt bleached with the sun and time. Alone again he thought of the things that he always thought of when alone. The same single track he had always taken. When he reached a town he would lock up his bike and passing the bars and cafes, would keep his head down and keep to himself, a stranger to all but his thoughts. Only in the very small villages of one or two houses, where the local men and women had left to find work elsewhere did he occasionally connect in a way worthy of the term. It was always an old man of poor sight who brought him food and told him of the town and it’s history. In these moments time slowed and the breeze if there had been one would stop and he would listen and learn and feel at home and then it would be over and he would be rushing through hillsides and thinking, always thinking. He slept under trees when it rained and made tea on an alcohol stove he had crafted from old coke cans. Sometimes, having covered much ground and having found shelter and food he would feel a great satisfaction in his life but mostly he went to sleep drunk, tormented by his thoughts.
Now he is surrounded by people. It is dark save for candle light and it rains hard on the canvas roof of the communal kitchen. It is hard to say how many people are here but looking around he can see at least twenty just in the few meters closest. The tent is full, he is sitting with three others under a table and from the dangling legs there are many more on top but he has eyes only for one. She talks to him in a slow husky voice that he feels he has heard before in a dream. She stares into his eyes and him hers and they talk and he is at one in himself. Through her he has found calm. In one word in this darkness she has stilled his mind but there is another and now there are three. He has been here before and he leaves.
Habibi
January 31, 2020
Pushed on a subway in the early hours drenched and sleepy. Habibi – friend. Smiles. Frantic good nature spilling over us. ‘I pay’ – he pays. Never before have I seen such movement man made. My own eyes dissolving in the wiggles. red yellow white – hot engines between buildings like giant broken shells.
Untitled beach
January 31, 2020
I opened my eyes. laying flat on my stomach each breath lifted me up and then down again back towards the floor now covered in sand and cold from the night before. The early morning sun glared down through the plastic windbreak that surrounded the cafe. Feeling in my pocket for my knife I turned over and sat up. Now in this new light the terrace didn’t seem such a bad place. A small flight of stairs led down to the beach from the wooden decking and sitting at the top I stared out to sea. The land curved out and round, presumably leading to another beach, another town. I lay back down and went to sleep.
I awoke to the same scene. The inside of my head hung heavy with static like the air before a storm breaks and rain comes. With slow certain movements I got up and found shelter to make some tea and cook something to eat. I filled the cheap Chinese cup that I had bought the night before with water from the tourist shower and lit the stove. A man walked past and I looked up at his weathered face. He hesitated and nearly stopped. Then he did stop and walked across the sand.
‘Hola. ¿Duermes aqui anoche?’
His large blue eyes shimmered.
‘Si’ I looked down at the stove. ‘¿Quieres té?’
‘No, No’ He smiled less nervously now.
‘I have place, drink café. I saw you sleep here. I sleep here when I arrive.’
His whole face was smiling now. I could see he had a few missing teeth. Suddenly he unzipped his beaten duffle bag and started pulling out large loaves of bread and packets of cheap dutch cheese.
‘Take’
I took a loaf of bread and squeezed it.
‘No please’ I said as he started to unpack the contents of his bag onto the sand. He continued to smile and handed me a clove of garlic.
‘I have place, give me food. Mira’ He pointed to the bread and cheese. ‘For you.’
I sat and ate as he examined the stove. Neither of us spoke for some time though his eyes often tried to find mine.
‘I have to go’ I said packing up my things.
‘You come back? his smile faded slightly.
‘Yeah, sure’ We shook hands and walked back to the road where I had left my bicycle the night before. Without looking back I rode off feeling the freedom of self sufficiency and the warmth of a southern spring.
The coastline curved up and round high over the sea with nothing but the occasional house or patch of pines to break the view. At every turn the whole world suddenly sparkled blue and fell away under the cloudless sky. Laughing at myself I remembered how careful I had been in finding a spot to sleep the previous night but as always the day had come and the surroundings had been quite harmless. An image of a friend came to mind who had awoken to two men stamping on his jaw. No. A certain level of paranoia was healthy for self preservation. Who knew upon which scene one may wander and of which unpredictable forces it may be built.
Muy importante
January 31, 2020
Ralph leaned over the plastic canteen table ‘He says he’s a professor of engineering Sam’
I finished my drink and looked up at a rather fat man in a bright checkered shirt.
‘Ah, is that so?’
We shook hands warmly
‘Sam’ I said ‘Whats your name?’
He wobbled on his chair and gave us a wide smile.
‘Roberto’ he raised his eyebrows in a knowing way.
He took a pen from his shirt pocket and held it up high. He smiled again showing big yellow teeth and Ralph started to giggle in the way that only he could.
‘Muy importante’ said Roberto nodding solemnly.
I took a glance at Ralph, he was quick to look back, pulling his grin down and matching the solemn expression of our new friend.
La Palomita
January 30, 2020
It is a simple drink. First the ice, a large chunk from a plastic bag in each cup, next a healthy slug of anis, starting to turn a soft milky pink as the ice begins to melt. David placed a pitcher down next to the cups and then topped off the drinks, splashing the water onto the warm stone underneath. They were drunk now. He looked up at the faces around him, happy to be drinking, happy for the company. He couldn’t remember who he had been drinking with before but it didn’t seem to matter as long as there were people there and of course there would always be people there for the man buying the liquor, even cheap sweet liquor like anis. Suddenly his mind having wandered hit upon truth and his stomach became hollow and heavy. He drained his drink and looking around quickly found empty cups on the stones and began to refill them much to the delight of the group who by now were shouting and had taken up a good deal of the pavement pushing passers by into the road. He stood up and without a word, walked off down the narrow cobbled street. How many bottles had he drank? Hm. Well there were three on the floor where he had been and he had been somewhere else before so presumably several more. Seven. If he counted the drinks he had taken in the bar outside the station then seven. An image of the bus station attempted to waver into view, he stopped still and eyes glazing over he quickly calculated the units in a bottle. ‘Hm’ he said aloud and continued walking. Forty five times seven. He stopped again and now smiling entered the shop. Then he was out again and into the night and as he walked he held onto the numbers that were so consistent and never failed to make sense even having drunk so much. Crossing the road to pass the drunken crowd he continued on and as the street curved it opened out into a well lit plaza surrounded by tall buildings of light grey stone. He looked around and seeing a small group by one of the great doorways of the law court he headed over to sit down.
‘Here comes trouble’ a man said in a gravely tone.
‘Hi John. Lovely night’
Seeing the bottles John muttered low under his breath but accepted the drink and watching David intently, refused to look away and ignore the truth that no one would address but through which they all suffered and drank. He poured another round, breaking the ice into smaller chunks against the marble floor and filled an empty bottle with water from a nearby fountain. This process too was soothing and he started to calm and forget. He looked up and saw smiling faces and pink hued cups and John still eyeing him carefully.
Time seemed to skip and the scene progressed as such scenes do and when he next took measure of his brothers, for at this point they were his brothers, they were arguing heatedly and only John sat silent and still.
‘Well done’ he said slowly still looking at David. He was angry and his eyes had a hard look about them but David wasn’t ready for truth and finishing his drink and leaning forward to refill his friend’s cup he turned and walked off. His vision lurched and faces swam out of the darkness only to recede again and now he was home and when he woke she was gone.
The girl in the street
January 30, 2020
A girl in the street took off all her clothes and starting jogging on the spot. She muttered to herself and a strange smile played upon her lips. Her arms were covered in the thick scars of self harm. A friend of hers appeared and we held her down while we waited for the ambulance. She struggled and breaking free ran head first into a stone bollard, later she tripped and broke a window with her weight. She kept saying that it was just a test and that it would be over soon. This is a life, her life. Later after she had been taken away an older woman approached and wanted to talk. She told us again and again that she had tried to help the girl with some food and find her the way home. The look in the woman’s eyes made me want to throw up so satisfied was she at the drama. I stared at the ground until she left. I wonder if she hadn’t left if I would have struck her. I think this impossible girl was the girl of my dreams. The girl I will forever chase and never hold. The girl I met that day, jogging and muttering in the midst of mental collapse.