Wot I Done Writ

Corkscrews

2009-03-31T23:41:00.002+01:00

This is part two of an experiment thing I did last week. I'm probably not going to post part one.
so anyway I'm probably going to either stop or change this blog starting from the next post. got a different idea and it's best to integrate rather than coordinate I reckon. maybe anyway. hope you like :)
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Corkscrews that break apart through overuse maybe or perhaps it’s fitting the more you come to think about the history. Cardboard as an excuse for cushions when the slats poke through the fabric.
The sun breaks through and somehow makes it harder to see, sirens wail and you can’t help but wonder what or who for. Toolboxes on the march and the drilling that could make a new song. Flowers kept in milk cartons and spiderwebs manmade. Peeking out through the blinds and seeing someone else doing exactly the same, the seer unseen perhaps thinking up words to tell his own grateful followers and never quite realizing the anecdote he’s just walked into. Ashes of ripped up card and sails that haven’t faced the wind, dust gathers and the spoons that keep collecting.
Bottles of perfume stacked just untidily enough to denote that the user doesn’t really use them or know how or when to. Shadows trace the steps of the fingers as they go about their dirty work, black on white like the sweetest piano. Half circles and jaded crescents held together by an ever-increasing network of crosses spikes and arrows, halted underlines and muted intersections that provide no clues.
Wearing hats indoors just for the look of it and rolling the sleeves up then down ten times a minute. Lightbulbs that never fully did their job, buttons that gave such distraction now face away from each other as if distracted themselves. The brown ring of too many cups of tea and the hood goes up to protect these pristine ears. Ninety three and ninety five, the card and plastic says it all but the only ones who look have seen it all before and pay no mind, not in earshot anyway. The gates are never closed and the front garden sits in messy counterpoint to the hidden neatness behind these walls. A wave of yesterday’s rain is disturbed by a man bound for salvation and hurls against the unyielding rock while the anoraks curse a job undone. No matter how unique one claims to be comfort is invariably found in the same subtle habits and that’s just what the outsiders need to know. Making the rounds a few hours after it’s convenient but still going the wrong way about it, perhaps out of spite, the clouds burst again in impotent envy at the power to glow and make their complaints in a far off land. The tendrils of the web catch nothing suppliers as they are, rooted in a hub as unnatural as themselves yet still prying small delights from observers angling for something to compare life to art with.
Parallel lines that dip and follow and it’s all about catching those who aren’t early birds. The doors are at the same height but the knockers a foot different, uninterested by the brays of conquest nor the flowers in the shawl. Scraping through myriad tiny entry points only to cluster round the same source of food.

I don't think this is funny

2009-03-17T00:03:00.002Z

I haven't posted for a while, been busy with music and things like that. also, because I haven't actually written anything for a while. (actually I've written plenty, but most of it was unfinished, private, personal or unsatisfactory)
SO instead of anything recent, here's a short extract from a story I'm in the middle of, which I wrote ages ago.
The title is misleading because it's a reference to some idiot I used to know, nothing to do with the actual story. I do think it's funny. or at least has potential to be. meh.

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It wasn’t that Jim was particularly afraid of death, nor the inevitable (according to them, anyway) toss-up afterward over which ineffable being was going to gain control of his ineffable bits. Nor was it the idea of what would happen to his non-ineffable bits, as he’d watched plenty of nature shows during his time, nor the unavoidable problems that he would bequeath his immediate family when they discovered that Auntie Jo hadn’t in fact been left that tea set she’d been dropping hints about ever since he’d had that first, less hardcore bout of the cancer that was now eating him
No, what really worried Jim about his impending all-expenses trip to the hereafter was the protocol, as indeed he had been worrying about the protocol all his life. Should he greet death with a faint resignation, a friendly wave, a fighting blow to the inane smugness of that skeletal grin? Should he tip the ferryman or try to blag that he was a VIP to St. Peter? Should he in fact go the whole hog and during the admittedly limited time he had left, learn by heart the holy books of every major religion so he’d at least have something to talk about the whichever deity decided his soul was worth the trouble?
These questions mainly remained unanswered for a while as Jim had enrolled into a monastery. Not just any monastery either- he’d done his research and checked into one of the properly uptight ones that take silence as read and go into excruciating detail about trivial things like how often thou shalt pee.
The protocol had quite appealed to Jim, fastidious as he was about how often it was socially acceptable to pee, among other things.

NB Fidelities

2009-02-11T15:21:00.002Z

Haven't posted for a few days because I've been moving house and stuff. This is about my new house, a little bit.
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The bass is punchy, groovy even. Perhaps it’s the card on which the panels rest. A stain or two that you don’t have to feel guilty about. The sharp contraction on only one of your hands, the same truncates your toes. Three squares and a couple of metres of cotton. The fan is only half extended here, now it’s fully closed. The wooden box that dominates and stores, pensive and clammy. Down the road the clocks are given more prestige than the law. Combinations of buttons that make you look so impressive when really you’ve only read the manual. Sipping and quietly debating the next move, and who the recipient will be. New habits started for the sake of a few eggshells, cracks that persist after all this time and you wonder what the reason – guilt, embarrassment, pedestal. Lights on screens on wooden legs, not what they were intended for but a quirky indulgence which keeps us close in other ways. Soon more will arrive painted and shaped to fit the relevant need. Boxes and cables which will find their own place in your heart once you know how they fit together. A slab of marble which serves only to highlight that which has long ago been papered over. Stacked side by side they don’t look as impressive as when they were piled everywhere. The new creaks and rattles that still unnerve you, and a comfort zone at the whim of onlookers and someone else’s gas bill. By turns the space is grey, loud and reduced. Voices crackle across the sphere and tell you stories about people you don’t know. Dreams based on last year’s mistakes and this year’s pranks. Steps on the steps. Slippers in a favourite spot, fortresses and elephants, heat that doubles as lightbulb. First things first, though it tends to slow the rest down. A drunken greeting that never fails to allay the doubts. Food shared like so many old rituals used to be. More space for hide and seek, more time to plan, more ground to scrape. Listening to the footfalls once again, in a good way this time. Reassuring thoughts from the most meaningless coincidences. Spare plates and false walls. Back in the groove.

Miniature Fires

2009-01-28T22:31:00.002Z

The power has gone out in our house. Here's some words to mark the occasion.
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Miniature fires dotted and flickering, a silence punctuated by creaks and rumbles. An orange light outside, rather than wonder why we’re glad of its company. Food that can’t be eaten in our prehistoric state. And yet technology tries to make amends, fighting the dying battle and giving short relief before another light flashes off – for how long this time? The debt has not been honoured. Layers on layers to compensate the fickle habits of steam, nerves that crackle with every unwarranted sound. An array of useless bulbs haunt every corner and remind you of the simple things. Distant voices provide scant understanding but their presence somehow comforts, knowing nevertheless they aren’t in this situation nor do they even know we are. Rags atop a metal pile, stopped in their tracks as they only try to do what’s natural. Judging the weight of objects to see if they will be useful here, now or ever. The gentle thaw should be beautiful in its own right – here though it brings new hardship, mistaking its place in our plans. The words are yet unsaid but they sound like they’d be reassuring in a time like this – maybe not yet but when the chemical reaction breathes its last maybe then we’ll revert to our former keeper. Knowing that a few hours here or there may have made the difference, then again they may not – at this stage it’s immaterial. Time has slowed and perhaps an early night is no longer an option but a tactic. The art is dependent on the finest circumstance, an inch either way could prove the undoing. Communication ebbs, and it’s back to square one for all we know. Keys muted and the sparks that so define the time won’t be back tonight. The words again, they pull and cajole knowing their calls won’t be ignored for long. Wondering if there’s more than one like this, wondering if it’s something different, and still knowing that in our present state we can’t and won’t find out. Comfort in warmth, whichever side it may come from, cold water and fresh bread. Another miniature fire dies.

When everything else falls into place

2009-01-20T14:55:00.001Z

Wrote this last night. like bits of it.
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When everything else falls into place for the sake of the one thing that falls apart. This message is designed to self instruct. Before we go around pointing the finger we should make sure we know that which we are pointing at – only humans look where the finger is pointed, after all, the rest look only at the finger. An empty frame for a burned portrait that died before the paint had dried. Spraypaint as manifesto, ego as palette. That same regrouping for the inevitable covering of your tracks. People say, you look fatter in real life. Sheep that have been static these last decades. A pile of wires surrounds, beeps, pretends not to be watching hawkishly for the least mistake – or maybe that’s what it thrives on, coming to life so readily when it occurs. A casual remark that starts a whole new friendship, a synergy derived from the unlikeliest of sources yet awash with coincidences that suit the story. A way to get back at someone on entirely your own terms yet feeling guilty for doing it and for thinking like that in the first place, not that it stops you for very long. A constellation of notebooks. Grasping for yet another empty bottle to make what use of it you will. The chair that once held great minds now only holds dirty clothes, and the desk groans under plastic containers. Towers and masks cling to the wall. You can’t afford to lose any sunlight this weather.

These Words That Stare

2009-01-16T00:52:00.003Z

I wrote this a few months ago I think. Messed up one of the verses but I don't think it's too obvious, and I changed the last one to flow better. I don't know if it's a poem but I think it is, either way I like the structure more now I've come back to it and remembered the method I used. It sounds quite sad but it isn't meant to be. Too many cliches though.
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These words that stare up at me unformed from a bank of helpful letters. Not a day goes by when I don’t wish for something. Stickers on the speakers and wine on your favourite dress. Proximity implied rather than assured.

Through it all we tumble and make what sense we can of the prevailing wind. Ears prick up at half remembered words that still remind you after all this time. The cold bites less and the dark comes with less of a struggle than it used to. Apathy played out to a half full glass.

Irrelevance doesn’t seem as important nor is it now something to strive for. This withered bag is all I have to remember the days when I tried to forget. The moon should be bigger and the sirens should stop at least for a couple of minutes. Hunger as exercise.

A silence made of stillness instead of content. Finding your way by compass rather than satellite when you never thought you’d have to. A pile of wet fabric and a flashing light that reminds you. Westernized and insulated.

The dead eyes of comfort that reflect my stare. Walls that resist the push to extend. The ghosts of meals well up and the cards don’t mean what they used to. Motors that whir to little end.

The great white hope has been shattered once again. The tears don’t well up like they used to when it was easy. The hidden trigger everyone has that no one asks about. A faint gesture as love note.

A slowed down reconstruction that only serves to reinforce. No matter what the background someone will understand you. A return to form and a pleasant misunderstanding. Hope is the message if you want it to be.

And so to bed

2009-01-13T17:38:00.003Z

I wrote this ages ago, I seem to recall I was messing around with a 'reading character from handwriting' book and it said you needed a one-page sample of the subject's writing, so I decided to do my writing and produced this. As with most of my stuff, it didn't mean a lot to me then or now. Still, maybe you'll like it.
Weirdly enough, I now live just around the corner from a shop called 'and so to bed'.
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And so to bed, the mystic hover calls. The repetition in his eyes the sanctity in hers. Between them comes a monster and strikes at will and leisure. As far as they knew one was the product of the last but none could tell for sure. Despite the evident craving for sympathy, for understanding, despite the eternal silent wail of a dream long shamefully forgotten. True were their hearts but that did not save them. Between the two a chasm made deeper by their previous communion. And look, the violent music does start. The drone of a thousand grievances yet unaired, the hiss of forgotten lovers now dredged once more. Fortuitous though their friendship be the fact remains they wouldn’t be in this mess and the silver screen would lose its sheen.
Graceful yet unassuming, charmed yet self deprecating. We don’t know who to trust. Asleep, awake. The pace has slipped as the words begin to fail. Touch is lost and the inevitable fear of lasts kicks in. Have I done my last work? The hiss provides slight comfort. Gaining in delicacy and complexity yet starting to sound more familiar. True, we tried, and true, we lied as well. Don’t forget whose side you were on. The heartshaking melody kicks in and plays us out to another sunset in yesterday’s world.

Who Da Man?

2009-01-04T20:22:00.005Z

i went to see the joy division film last year with my then-girlfriend and we got these little leaflets for submitting comments about how much we liked the place we were in. so to try and impress my girlfriend i wrote this poem straight off the top of my head and then i didn't post it for some reason. so here it is on the internet. and i've just realised i used the word 'yet' three times. now them's some vocabs.
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‘Who da man?’ we ask ourselves
As if we had a clue
We mention sex because it sells
There’s little else to do
In time of need the populace
Make sacrifice for greed
And smash and grab while making haste
There’s beauty yet in speed
But what of angels, high and low?
That existential need
We cut them off and sell them slow
Like others we must feed
There’s dark and more behind that smile
Those others yet deprived
And yet drink long, we’ll wait awhile
And press with muttered bribe
Excuses always cover
The failings hid within
And yet the vultures hover
To pick off every sin

Script Deficit

2008-12-29T13:16:00.003Z

this is a bit of writing that was in the liner notes to my first EP 'Script Deficit', available now from nowhere.
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Beating the branches away and swaying to the invisible beat the light that we’re made from shines brighter through those with miniscule holes. Beware the demons that await in every dark passage – sometimes their anger is not for you but the mask that projects these horrors is indiscriminate in its thirst. Striding forth with angelic chips on the shoulder and pining for what might have been for sometimes one reality comes from two much cherished half truths. Ignored, such manifest ideals might be safely closeted behind the psyche as best suits present occupants’ mood but acted upon mistakes bring out the best in both. Uncertainty shifted into a mutually beneficial legend for those who aren’t involved but would like to be. Promises of a tomorrow which didn’t go as planned and it’s all about what happened instead. Past tense, once emotion, truths as lies, lies as truths/ for is not the outcome the same for both armies but the story of the combat is tailored for each. Those in unpopular places who seem to stay there longer than is necessary just to see how much wrist action is needed. You and me both and a bellyful.

This is a broadcast

2008-12-15T17:07:00.002Z

I think I wrote this in early 2007. it's not really about anything, like most of what I write.

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This is a broadcast from the back of the theatre, the side of the alley, the bottom of the lake. We the souls of bodies abandoned to higher pleasures accommodate what we can and fit our routines around those who can’t, don’t, or just won’t. Before the inevitable onslaught of times past that nevertheless procrastinate into times future, the angle of acceptance is warped and shaped by the sublime yet unnoticed. Systematic inclinations preclude thoughts of charity and yet the pleading faces always tug the heartstrings into uncomfortable silences. A small fish in a large aquarium. Shifting dualities of perspective attain doubts of consequence far beyond light and dark yet betrothed as we are to lesser substances benchmarks are set and targets endlessly unfulfilled. A charming incident set against a moralistic backdrop, the shapes in her eyes and the weight of her footsteps. Aloof and undisturbed, a shot of coffee and a harsh awakening. Counting backwards and the art shapes the artist into changing the shape of the art.

You Know?

2008-12-14T17:24:00.002Z

When I was recording my album for a while I wanted to have a really doomy spoken word introduction (like on the Godspeed records or similar) and I couldn't find anything to fit so I ended up writing this as a sort of monologue and then recording it, messing around with it quite a lot, then decided it wouldn't work on the album no matter how much I messed around with it and was left with a page of random monologue which is what we have here.

So a more interesting introduction to this post would be:

So there I was, sat in the park and this old man sat on the bench next to me just started to talk at me, went really deep and philosophical and some of the stuff he said was beautiful so I recorded what I could of it and wrote it down here.

Yeah, the second version's better.

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…..and brought us nigh to ruin, and you know, I wept…. I did, I was cryin’ there in the street, I was there thinkin’ to myself for a good, oh a good half hour, this is it, this is the end, this is really it, you know? We’re too stupid to notice, we don’t…. we just don’t notice what we’re doing to ourselves, you know? And at the end of it all we’re just, we’re gonna be there thinking what did we do with ourselves, yeah, and we’re going to be wondering where this time went and what we did with it…..and that made me kind of sad for a while, you know, just thinking, just… I was just thinking that at the end of it all, when the sun finally sets and when you’re there in your bed and you can’t move and you can’t speak, and if you’re lucky, if you’re really lucky, all you can do is remember, you know? And that’s if you even CAN remember, and you’ll be sitting there…..you know at the start and the end of your life the time moves so slowly, the two, the two, the two least interesting parts of your life, the start and the end, that’s when you move the slowest and when time takes forever, and you miss out on all the middle part cuz it runs by so fast, you know? Anyway, you’ll be sitting there, and you can barely move, you can barely speak, people come in and go out and you’re just sitting there and all you’l have left is those memories while youre listening to that grandfather clock ticking away in the hall, you’ll just be sitting there as faces come past you in a blur, you know, and your memories, you’lll be thinking about your memories, you know, saying what did I actually do with my life, where did I actually go? The things I was planning to see before I even knew how to appreciate, uh, what I was gonna see, you know, and at the end of all that time, and with the benefit of hindsight and all, and you’re just lying there and it feels like you have all the time in the world and there’s nothing you can do anymore, and you suddenly start to think again, to dream, you know? You’re just thinking if I had an extra day or two you know, I’d go to the beach, or, uh, I’d go and sit somewhere, a café on a busy street, and just take the time to listen, you know? I’d just sit there and close my eyes and lean my head back like, you know, and I’d just listen, hear the footsteps, the fotsteps…. Those footsteps as they slooooowly walk on past you, hear the wind rustlin’ the trees or pushing a can across the road, listen to the girls chatter by the bar, any of that, you know? You start thinking, what I wouldn’t give for any of that, hear the sounds of the street again, hear those footsteps, hear that wind… not even, not even, not even anything special in particular, just hear the everyday sounds of life and you know why? Because the everyday sounds of life are the sounds of life, my friend, you know? And there you are at the end of your life and you’re sitting there in silence, you got nothing to hear but the tick of that grandfather clock and your own heavy breathing, your own last breaths and the stillness of that bed they set you on to die, you know? And those there, they aren’t the sound of life my friend, they’re your very own, your very own death march, the fanfare, it’s got quieter, all of a sudden there is no wind in the trees, there are no footsteps, and you know, that clock you hear, it ain’t telling you how young ya are any longer, you know, cuz you know that just in a little while you won’t be hearing those ticks any longer, you won’t be hearing the breathing’ any longer neither, but those ticks will go on and on without you, my friend, they’ll go on and on, and that is what I’m afraid of, man, that I ain’t…. that I ain’t goin’ to hear those last ticks. I’m not going to be there when the clock stops that last time, I ain’t going to be there to wind it up after its done….So that’s the death march, your own private death march, and that’s the last sounds you’ll hear, and you’ll be wishing, you’ll be wishin’ for those footsteps by the café or that wind in the treetops…..cos that’s the sound of life, you know? And yeah, that’s the sound of life. And here’s to life, my friend, …. Here’s to life.

Tree Song

2008-12-12T00:55:00.003Z

This is a kinda poem thing I wrote. Its about being a tree. I can't remember why I wrote it. I wrote it on a bus. I actually set this to music for a video I did for my course, and it sounds good.

I am a metaphor
For localised apathy
I am a concept
To give the ungodly
I am a heretic
My kind would reject me
I am unsupervised
And ostracised candidly
I subvert nature
And suck life around me
I am mortician
And midwife potentially
I am short shrift
You don’t even notice me
I give appearance
Of post-modern harmony
I am extension
Long reaching upwardly
I am half hidden
There’s more that you can’t see
I am mistaken
For meaning in poetry
I’m half castrated
And filled up with envy
I am a scorecard
For lovers who tally
I am a punchbag
And sloganised daily
I am a symbol
Of life in a city
I am a tree
And planted in concrete

Everything Everywhere

2008-12-08T14:11:00.004Z

I wrote this about a year ago and promptly forgot all about it. Found it and typed it up for this blog, and actually I quite like it, which is a rarity for my stuff.
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Everything around me is made up of pretty colours and shapes that flow in and around each other intermingling and yet assured in their own individual patterns thus creating a visual effect of a uniqueness made of a thousand million unique parts and as they all flow and mingle their inertia (small yet unstoppable like a tiny pebble dropped from a great height) emits a small yet audible hum which at once sounds like all possible tones and yet is so far at the edge of hearing that in fact sometimes it sounds like nothing at all, nevertheless this sound fits both colour and shape, both motion and rest and as our focus moves further away we realise that this sound, this colour, this shape and movement is but the core of a much larger sphere, and that this all combines into a semi-infinitely layered montage of ever shifting lights shades and that that the accompanying sound is all-encompassing, taking in not just tone but pulse and rhythm at once everywhere and nowhere both loud and quiet light shades pass dark shapes and minor keys segue into blissful melody unheard and unseen yet beyond the confines of our gaze a shadow and an echo run amok and play together swapping like for like meanwhile ever more layers are added to the sphere as it convulses, gently some spin fast and clockwise while some spiral slowly sliding on a moebius loop endlessly tumbling, still others are drifting with no aim or purpose, some interlink still further and some further still and push smaller lights aside or absorb them, finally splitting into two or ten or seventeen smaller entities, themselves to absorb or unite with the resultant hum splitting or merging sympathetically as a new light if born and continues on its own journey in the endless stream of new and old layers, tired and rejuvenated or languidly energised it matters little that this colour is like to that or that to this as the effect when viewed from just a few inches here or there would be entirely different again, a whole infinity of parallels all dependent on the beholder of the moment on the edge of time as the music draws to a simultaneous orgy of finale and introduction and middle eight and the colours grow to a frenzy before dampening and reappearing mere seconds later brighter and yet muted still and always, always moving and mixing, always, always, a living, breathing ball of pure light and sound, energy and heat, hum and contraction, rotating and revolving on an indefinable axis pausing only to pick up again, on a different plane, melting and erupting in frustrated destruction, with sonic boom echoing whisper and sound enveloping and all encompassing yet fades to nothing and back a thousand times in an instant, and all set against a backdrop of infinite dark which yet somehow reflects the light and shade, colour and noise, in a thousand directions and back upon itself and yet again with sounds and lights and hum and shade added extracted and reflected as one, and one again.

The Life and Deaths of Penton Decker

2008-12-05T17:21:00.003Z

This is the start of a short story/possible novel or something like that. I wrote it in a pub at lunchtime.

The Life and Deaths of Penton Decker
(or)
How to Lose Friends and Massacre People
(or)
a less cliched title I haven't thought of yet.

Much has been made of the life of Penton Decker. Biographers, friends, relatives, even for a while – before he got bored and shot himself – the man himself; all have tried, with various degrees of plausibility, to convince the world at large that had he known that as a direct consequence of his actions on that fateful night of 12 December, 1972, millions of human lives would be extinguished; countless more driven to upheaval, drug addiction, homelessness, and generalised calamity, he would not have gone driving in his newly-reupholstered Cadillac, armed with a flask of Ol’ Manfeller and a 12-gauge shotgun, and probably just stayed indoors with his fireplace and exquisite cushions, his monocle and moccasins, and just finished that god-damned crossword that irritated him so.
Most of the aforementioned advocates of this blight, this paean to society, would have you believe that his previous record speaks for itself in his defence – the tireless campaigns on behalf of the South Alaskan Sealion, for example, or the limitless funds he expended in trying to lobby Nixon for the right of every man, woman, and halfwit to bring pillows into the office on Wednesdays- and I for one would have gone along with that harmonious character reference were it not for his shocking, unforgivable habit of always, always referring to himself in the third person. For this reason, knowing that none who perpetrate such atrocities on this plain-speaking, glorious and humble language of ours should ever have a moment’s sympathy, I could never accept the plaintive efforts of his protractors to paint him in any kind of positive light.
“Penton Decker will not give in”, he said, and he didn’t: “Penton Decker does not do things by halves”, he said, and again, he didn’t: “Penton Decker is not an evil man”, he said, and he was lying, lying through the leopard-effect skin of his teeth.
It irks me considerably that despite the deaths, the scandals, the scientific reports that time and again established Decker’s complete, insoluble guilt- despite everything, he still remains, unaccountably, a folk hero for the masses - “A man who tried his best” – “A victim of circumstance” – “A jolly good sort, all things considered” – piffle. This was a man to whom all avenues were fair game in his pursuit of money, power, or prestige – whichever he bent his mind towards at the dawn of each day – to whom obstacles were there to be crushed, not skirted; barriers of morality, expense, physical impossibility – all were overcome with that same mix of bull-headed determination, media-courting charm, and unforgivable third-person self-reference.
Few are left alive who witnessed that first television appearance after the disaster, but those there are mostly remember the sense of poise, no-nonsense interview style, occasional answers that left his questioners flummoxed and desperately shuffling their cue cards – but none will remember the fine detail, such as the exact words he used, the commentary of those fatal few minutes which – as he claimed to have blacked out, had to be spelled out to him, by someone who had watched the three security tapes, in which he appeared in every frame – or his steadfast refusal to bear the brunt of any responsibility whatsoever – from starting his car right the way up to that single gunshot that decimated California’s population.