the hiatus

between the 9th of december and today things have happened which, even with my relative anonymity, are hard to share. i'm sorry. this whole thing is for sharing thoughts and yet there are some thoughts which are too dark to share. i got back on the heroine. you probably guessed from my last post. i got back off the heroine. it was a blip. for how long only time will tell. i'm back now. and it hasn't been easy getting back. thank god its been quick. i feel as if i have been away on a strange island, playing my role in a rigged game show. truth is i feel like this all the time. as i'm sure you do too. but the last two weeks have had an edge to them that made me that little bit more conscious of my island surroundings. it will be christmas in 3 days. somebody once told me, in spain they don't really celebrate christmas until the 6th of january. that's when the 3 kings came with their gifts for the king of kings. before christianity came the pagans would have been celebrating something to do with the sun or the moon today. i'm sure many still do. today, the 24th, the 25th, the 6th, whenever you decide to celebrate whatever you're actually celebrating this time of year i hope you truly believe in what you're celebrating. and when you go out on to the ice-shrouded street to spend and spend, give a coin or two to a homeless man, woman or child. or buy them a cup of coffee and a warm meal and chat with them for a while. not because they have nobody to chat to. they probably have more honest friends than you. and not because you feel sorry for us and you want to prove just what a fucking saint you are. make them believe that whatever you believe in - whatever will drive you down into the pits of drunkenness and gluttony today, on the 24th, the 25th or the 6th, or any other day in between - will one day make this world a little less cold, just that bit more livable. i wish i knew you. i wish i could sit like a ghost in the festive room where you will be disappointed by your gifts but smile nonetheless, and quietly fight with your horny uncle and avoid your embarrassing aunt, skirt carefully around conversations about your dead father, or your parents' divorce, or your own divorce, skip the bit about the girl you fucked at the christmas work party, or how far in to debt you've sunk this year. and then? inevitably it all goes there. every road to a rome of ruins. this is all i believe in.

to those who have faith and never ask questions...

a turn for the worse.

things. everything as if drowning.

under and under.

beneath below.

oumou sangaré whispering sweet

indecipherables.

swoon. low.

and back up again.

but the lows are so sweet.

besides that.

what else but

a mess. brown and

a shimmer, a shimmy

of the wrist. some

tap-tap. tzat! the

burn as you, i, we

but i inject. and the

low so high. ouch.

i'm not sure why i did it. it's been two years off that shit. been doing so well. well, as well as things could be well. but things change when you get back on that shit, fall off the horse. wagon off the rails, all the metaphors. got a bit of cash after selling the old stereo and the books; early edition of a sinclair lewis book i never got round to reading sold for 50! and the park was cold. and ricky, the kid from cuba said i got some shit that will fuck you up bro. no! serious, you'd be crazy not to try some. i'll do you a ricky special discount. only a fiver. sweet grace, why? now down to my last tenner. spent and spent. 4 days in a daze. even the rhyme seems tender. the keys on this keyboard feel like frozen butter. only warmer. and yet they spill no warmth onto this screen, into the virtual ether. only the cold, hard words of a man who wants to prove he has even more left to lose. red vapours of unquenchable bitterness. but at what? but then what? when everything is lost. is it ever really? its all still there isn't it? the bones, this flesh, these dirty fingernails, these diseased toe-tips scratching the moist extremities of these old dead shoes, the alien veins, and if i concentrate hard enough even the seeds of my manhood cause some sensation of being indeed alive, here. still so much to extinguish and yet the junk only lasts so long, and yet stays so much longer. i've fucked it up, haven't i?

the chaos of a market: chasing a sentence

sigmund freud had a nephew apparently. well, i'm sure he had a few other nephews, nieces, whatnots. but he had a nephew, edward bernays. the man invented the modern consumer, its rumoured. his full name was edward louis bernays which is an anagram for "land was by our desire!". that doesn't really make sense. it shouldn't. but strangely enough while it took shape in my head today i had the feeling that it was starting to mean something. if you've never been to birmingham you wouldn't know the bull ring. maybe heard and know of it. but not know it. its one of those places that is at once singular and yet so recognisable, as if you've been there so many times before but with your eyes closed being led to a surprise. a huge shopping mall that sits on the site of an old traditional bull ring. its about 5 years old. before it have come other replacements for the original structure; places of laughter, for families, for selling things, for stealing other things, for getting lost, eyeing up 16 year olds with cruel intent and mournful sighs, making up stories about what that jacket would do to your self-image, and how that piece of plastic would liven up the living room, places for drunkards and saints and old women pushing their carts of trash into the abyss of eternal slumber, marble and glass intertwined as if married at birth; the designs so woeful they almost feel like the last stand of postmodern genius, places of congregation and dissipation, centres for the last thing you need that you just must have, syncopated footsteps dancing to the tune - coming through the omnipresent loudspeakers - of a song their owners surely must love (why else would they still be here after 3 hours of running around an irregular track?), places of passive exercise, and active mind-cleansing till the numbness forces you to buy something just anything to prove your trip was worth it. i could go on. the bull ring has been all these things and more... children have been abducted here, and young boys fondled by their fathers or uncles in the toilets: daddy'll get you that gameboy soon as we finish here ok? and it's a secret. mommy doesn't like me spending so much on you. you're my boy ok?. maybe i'm dreaming of the past. no, i was never fondled, never buggered, never touched. i was never touched. i imagine it would have been nice to have been touched, have the back of my neck stroked by a powerful fatherly hand. feel the warmth of god's fingers soothing the bruises on my shoulders. i needed a smaller bag. the hiking bag's straps have lost their padding. and my shoulders are red from the friction after each day of wandering. sometimes they bleed. so, get rid of some of the heavier past loves that are weighing the damn thing down, the old stereo i haven't used since the batteries ran out 2 years ago, the brick from the fence of my old house, the dozen or so books i no longer have use for since getting hold of this library card, discard these miniature white elephants and take the weight off a little bit. but a smaller bag, yes, for fewer things. the christmas traffic makes it easier to take stuff from the shops in the bull ring. and, i imagine, it is the same in countless other malls around the world. even in the arab world where they have replaced christmas with 30 days of alternating self-denial and king herod-like feasting. in the west, you prepare for the feast for two months, then are utterly disappointed by the result of your expectant exertions when the feast finally happens, and then you are forced to deny yourself of anything remotely excessive for the next two months because the credit card company says no!.

first, bring yourself to the attention of the security. ask a question. not just any question. something he (it has to be a he) possibly couldn't have an answer for, where is the best place to buy a self-cleaning douche bag?, for example. once he has admitted to not knowing the answer, lure him away to the information desk where he will do the questioning for you, and make sure the person he asks is female, sexy and chatty; they invariably are at information desks. you've achieved 3 things: lured the security away from your target store, made yourself seen with this security man by other security men so they recognise you but won't be suspicious next time they see you, and finally you've kept the security away from your target store. the actual steal is a stroll. walk in, take bag, walk out. did i really need a smaller bag? surely a bigger bag is more useful. and the truth is i've only really had bruises on my shoulders twice or three times in the last 3 years. but i saw this kid last night, on a skateboard. everything about him, the oversized trousers, the untied shoe laces, the NY hat slightly sideways, no jacket, just a t-shirt with "jesus loves you" across the front, and an eastpak satchel hung so low it swayed in the opposite direction to his body every time he curved around an obstacle. a ballet of rebellion. and all the kids had eastpaks when i was growing up. they would tip-ex or spray paint "nirvana" or "public enemy" or "the ramones" on them. and i had my grandfather's old leather briefcase. and nobody cared that i was the first with a gameboy. without an eastpak i wasn't in. a man my age should be building things, his only desire a plot of land on which to erect a place of his own, for the wife, the kids, the dogs and the cat. but fucking bernays. fucking bernays laying booby traps of things we never really needed anyway everywhere in our memories, want want want! 3 and a half hours being questioned for theft by 3 burly men in clownish hi-vis jackets, their walkie talkies going off like a war was surrounding the building, questions about motive and method and knowledge of the law, and for some reason when was the last time i took a shower, and why an eastpak, why try steal an eastpak and not any other bag?, they wanted to know. took some weight off the old shoulders, being in that warm secret room, they even made me tea, bought me a sandwich. the police officer showed up at last. with a thick brummy accent and even thicker mascara, her eyes bored and dropping, taking a deep breath every 15 seconds. cuffed me, walked me out, walkie talkied her partner once we were outside. yawned. then set me free before her partner arrived. bye!, she yelled after me.

some winter haiku

tree trunk without friends

how brown and dead alone now

snow will soon comfort

nick drake, rilke and the story of tiny gates: december

wrote to her today. my paris love. things haven't been making sense of late. consider the following and have fun looking into my thoughts: the rain submerged in white noise, cats wilder than the storm, fire ants what have you stolen from the rogue regime that they have not seen forsaking the past, fewer tunes than the last guitar string yet he keeps tuning, the odd ends and beckoning hollows, what felt felt felt felt the lonely silk worm, if such was the murderer's tally then perhaps we would all begin the journey south but not before the eve, not for some warmth to these tethered hearts, hanker for a man a fool a breast an aeroplane a swimmer's strength stop dead the tracks and live foundationless heck to heck with older fewer than the ancient have ever sold to dark mind, fly birdy founder the island next and call it takrit, wholare, beforu, maekkathore, anything for the foreign to see joy and rest pixelated and become full then fool, songthoughts i spoke jim morrison first as child then hung the blues from the ends of my heart strings before drake took me away to faraway islands, rangoon rangoon, rangoon, you old sod the bastard was born in myanmar, hardly an island not burma for the sisters in drag have they forgiven me i think there's a beach though, no? sense is hard to come by sometimes and maybe thoughts are better left without cause. read rilke today. a picture of him on the back of the book, his eyes were like marbles, gaunt face, shades of the nameless grey everywhere, such darkness it overcomes your apathy for anything, and you wonder how the mind behind it wrote of our happy endings... dancing tears. how such phrases could have made sense to a man whose face was so full of the night. i wish i could read german. i don't want to speak it; it would twist the curvature of my tongue which is so perfectly suited to english. i wish i had a better use for this language than this senseless vomit. never want a job again. all that work was too much strife for an illusion of respectability. i wish i had said other things to her in the email today. i used all the wrong words. i wish my french was better so i could make sense to her. how dreadful life is without her, "chagrin", "peiné", "l'amour", "concevoir" as opposed to "imaginer", "colère", peiné d'la merde: this worthless life. with words, but no expression, no way of expression, no route to her, but by zeros and ones, and even then the gates are too small for the chemistry to pass unscathed. rangoon, what language do they speak in your streets? have you space for another lost soul?

and on the sabbath he showered

sure, hey, of course i was around over the weekend. had a bed, some clean clothes, a good meal, the lot. went to see arthur at the weekend. arthur is the dog i talked about. not sure what his real name is but i call him arthur. there's a man who lives in erdington, just north of the city, or maybe east. i take care of his dog for him. and help myself to whatever is in the fridge. the arrangement works out fine for all 3 of us. looking around the place i've built a picture of his life which is as close to reality as anybody could get. i don't break in. no. he leaves the keys under the old flower pot round the back of his two bed house. goes to visit his mother every saturday morning. i go in 15 minutes later. having watched the house from across the road since early. walked through the night to get there. no luck with big luce friday night, she went off with tom the badger just 'fore ya came old boy, i got told by owen the celt! the lock on the back door jammed a little this weekend. cold hands. did the first thing that came to mind. urinated over them nice and long, till i felt that tingle of life in the tips of my fingers. tried it again. home sweet home. the dog barked at me, and i rubbed my wet steaming hands into his thick nape. he's not a pure breed by any measure. grey coat with a brownish underbelly. a snout like a warthog. he's short and stout. not much exercise. i would take him for a walk but what would the neighbours say? so i take off my clothes, lay them on a garbage bag on the kitchen floor and switch on the kettle. run up to the bathroom, turn on the shower, it takes a little time to warm up, eventually does, i turn it off, run downstairs, jam the front door with a chair in case arthur's owner makes a u-turn for something or the other. kitchen, teabags, sugar (fucking bastard has none), too risky to use the milk, a sip, two sips, the smell of piss still on my hands, suddenly realise its cold, switch on the heating from above the knives drawer, wash my hands in the sink, leave them there till the water gets warm, back upstairs, oh my oh my fucking my there is nothing better than a hot shower. the water at my feet flows in spirals of assorted dirt like ants heading to a party in the ground, the brown cake that has kept me warm these last few days breaking off and forming a silted ganges at my feet, my hair silently exclaiming freedom, free at last free at last, god almighty i'm so fucking fond of a wank in the shower, free at last free yourself into the darkness of the gutters oh milk of my scrotum, find eggs in the sewer and come back grown and alive. he's left out a white towel for me this time, so i won't use it. he's trying to trick me, spot the brown spots and figure out the reality of my existence. the house has warmed, the radiators are buzzing, i stand in front of the one in the bedroom, gazing at myself in the full length mirror on the inside of the wardrobe. still got it! belly is falling a bit, i could do with some work on my chest but my shoulders and thighs have benefited from these past 3 years of life on the outside. my dick seems bigger too since last weekend. big luce missed out on some sweetness, and she'll never know it. what's tom the badger got that i don't! how old is he, 42? she must have been on something going off with a petri dish of germs like him. bet he didn't wear a jimmy hat either; fuck em, hope their children are as ugly as my sewer offspring, amphibian horns and everything, like those moles with a dozen noses. fuck em. rumour is she's got warts anyway. but there's food in the kitchen. plenty of things to watch on the tv. watched the news, last part of a game of footie between one team and another team, read yesterday's paper; the guy reads the daily mail. made a few farts on his couch. arthur barked at the first one. but to smell your own fart in its pure form is a luxury only those with a roof over their head and four walls only ever get to experience. so i farted and farted. ahh. the life. i thought about using the telephone to call my sister early sunday morning, after some bed-sleep. but for the 10th weekend in a row, didn't want to risk it. i have searched up and down this place for some bills, to see if he gets them itemalised or whatever, you know, with all the phone calls written down, but there aren't any; maybe next week i'll call, find out how mum is doing after the operation, ask for some money for some new guitar strings, see if jack got the job, how her pregnancy is coming along, just her voice, for a taste of home. i spent the morning crying. arthur humping my leg for his own comfort. made the bed, turned the channel on the tv back to its original 865 (the poker channel), thought about how sad this man must be, but caught a glimpse of him and his mother framed in silver on the table in the corridor and thought at least he has people, kissed the mutt goodbye, keys under the pot, remembered the chair on the front door, back in, arthur stays silent this time, remove the chair, dog, kiss, silver frame, a biscuit from the kitchen, spot a tea stain by the sink, leave it, keys, pot, fence, the street, back.

the little things

to each man his own universe. and to each universe a man, on his own. it doesn't have as much of a ring to it as it first did when it crept into my head; rattling the little bell that hangs from just a little above the door: upside-down it sorta looks a little like a light bulb. ownership is separation. is that what i'm trying to say? is that what i was trying to think? the monk from yesterday would think ownership is love, but would say god is love, and so it is that we think ourselves gods to that which we own. i did my mate(let's call him willy)'s big issue peddling today. i needed a little cash and after a little talk he became convinced he needed a little rest. go up to wolves and see your parents willy. how long has it been? your old lady must miss you. no, i'm not saying they'll take you back in, but a day with your little one, and some of your mom's cooking. that would be nice for a little rest, yeah? the boy hates me but there is trust. so, 20 magazines, 50/50 split on the money, goodbye, see you tonight by the place. and so the hordes drive at me, past me, bumping and cursing and pulling their children closer and saying good morning, nah mate, no thanks. and each lonely individual looks at you with a different face. but the angelic demon underneath is the same. once you get past the masks of pity, of rage and disgust, the smiling faces on the faces of the strangely dressed teenagers, the indifferent pursed lips on the faces of the ashamed businessmen, and you exchange your thank yous and sorrys and you scream out yet another sales pitch, do a little jig on your toes for the waif girl in a teenyweeny red dress, bow, as if exiting a stage, as she flies by, turn to the next man who's lighting a cigarette but failing, and you offer him a match but he refuses, knowing he'll have to pay more for that match than he would have bargained for. if in the split second they look at you and you look back, your eyes meet; you sense the loneliness. and you sense it with every morsel of life that makes you, you. a quick chill that burns your skin and eyes and leaves suddenly, drawing the window shut behind it. but you feel too the wind blowing in your baggy trousers and inflating them for just a moment, like a balloon. and your pockets rise with them, empty, penniless. so the next prospect comes along, and you accost him, more vigourously, holding the damn sleeved "last one" so close to his face the muscles round his nose tighten suddenly into some momentary attempt at anger. and you wonder if everybody else is just like you. waiting for nothing but the next meal, the next fuck, and the next moment of blissful sleep. and every other act, a necessary evil. a universe outside to which we venture, but always in our bubbles. in our own universes. £17 wasn't a bad haul. willy came back with a black and blue eye, old man don't like it too much when i pop round. i'd say sorry, invite him out to the park for a drink and some bread, but with pockets heavy and the ship steady, once again i'm back in my own world. the next meal found, perhaps a fuck off big luce who's always round the park on a friday night (note to self: must remember clinic, free condoms), and with the sky so clear and the wind dropping, some sleep, sound and sailing away beyond the bells and the light bulbs, to the deep green valleys and tall conquered mountains of dreams. good night.

some warmth, and a game of fives

spent some time in a church today. must have been in that place for 5 hours at least. saint michael on moor street, same road the train station is on. haven't been on a train in what feels like years. but it's actually only been months. april this year. took one up to edinburgh. when you smell like piss and shit most of the time, spending 5 hours in a train toilet skipping tickets isn't all that bad. it was a clear spring night when that old industrial leviathan pulled into edinburgh. thought i'd never see my backpack again after the conductor chased me through the station screaming wild obscenities through his nose as if i'd stolen his silly red uniform. lucky the train arrived real late, about 11, no police in the steel palace of edinburgh waverley. came back in the morning, feeling some natural heat for the first time in months, and found my old green and black companion slumped in a corner of the lostandfound. an abandoned crippled dog, no legs, just waiting for the comfort of his master's weary back. o, the sun, the sun. the earth so vast, at least half of it bathing in apollo's gift. and there i was, seeking shelter from the knife-edged cold of haunted birmingham. in a fucking church. the man in the robe, monk or brother (not sure the difference), smiling kindly at me. his mouth twitching so his upper lip rose to his nostrils. each time the smile breaking into a grimace for about half a second. he could smell all the places he guessed i had been, all the holes he was sure i had filled. and he hated the stench of the vulgar luxuries that had been stolen from him by his empty vows. his semi-earnest wish to see me saved fed him with blind persistence though. through his mind, a path, my path, riddled with needles and brown spoons and worn rubber bands, torn condoms, dead girlfriends who had wasted their final breath in a haze of toxic smoke, friends and family who had tried to take me into their hearts and homes yet failed miserably, their plans collapsing into a half-hearted sigh of pity and relief. and at the end of the path he offered me the hand of jesus. in my mind i saw a zombie with a gash in each hand and foot, maggots filling the pink gap in his side. in the corner of my eye, the coffee machine. he fetched me 5 cups in all. some biscuits, a paper bowl of carrot soup. heaven, like food you are, food you are heaven, heavenly gifts, we thank thee, oh and what other drivel, but oh food, warm food. and a roof, and a padded chair, some comfort. i have been there before, and i will go again so long as there is soup and coffee and biscuits. and they will save me again and again. poor brother, monk. there is a nun there i hunger for, but she knows my game so she keeps away. i have spent entire nights with her by my favourite spot on the canal, down near moseley. torn off her habit with my teeth, and by each stroke shifting the mud beneath her pale hairy buttocks, until she screams jehovah! backwards in some ancient sacred tongue. but all the time she was sound asleep in her tiny beige room in the convent up in selly oak. and my hand would always fill in for a hole, but never fill the hole (<- sorry for the cheap trick). so brother, monk, farewell, until again i come to gulp another dose of salvation. i've changed him, he must have thought. the cold night air is so much more acceptable than its daytime harbinger. you expect it. there is no hunger for the sun when the moon so blatantly insists on making a content madman of us all. the whole lot. the handsome families buying each other things i will only ever possess in a newspaper i will later use for a bed. the teenagers seeking refuge from their angst in their parents' pockets. the old woman selling the myth of dark, brooding germany in a tall beer glass: the entire frankfurt christmas market all but a gruesome orgy of usury and consensual mind-rape. victoria square, your fat whore of a patron standing proudly above her satire of an empire, in bronze gone green as if the garbage man keeps forgetting to haul her away to the dump. the library, so grey and ugly. but what a warm welcome these silent perverts and sad librarians offer in their scurrying eyes when hours have been spent in the company of the iciest statue in this whole town. o brother, o monk, a train to anywhere but here.

an introduction. hello

so, here i am. the library cold and humid as usual. its birmingham, england. and late november is dull, the dullest month of all. the pagan festivals of october have passed. i watched the indians in bright orange and red make the most of what remains of ancient diwali. that was some time a little over a month ago. i thought of anjuli, the girl i defiled as a teenager in the public toilet at handsworth park. every indian i saw on diwali seemed to have the same lamenting eyes she had, huge and uninvolved with the outside. then came halloween. the teenage girls in the witch and demon and vampire outfits, snow white legs bare, part hidden behind the black fishnets, the wind lashing, the whispering rain tempting me to grab one and show her the delights of the street. that was on broad street, the centre of all the devil's acceptable works in this city; there are other places. some smiled at me, but always with disgust. to the rest i was invisible; they either chose this blindness or the alcohol chose it for them. i robbed a packet of celebrations chocolates from the sainsbury's on broad street. i felt young again. i remembered jack, my older brother, the two of us trick-or-treating many many years in the past. the caramel-filled ones went down well with the cider i had from the previous night. a week later i found myself in any empty, warm garage in the south of town, edgbaston. the house seemed empty as well but i didn't want to risk being found. so i lay some cardboard in a corner and had an early night. the fireworks telling my sleeping mind secrets of a world parallel to my own. its a wealthy area. i had a friend from there once. but what friends i had, have all forgotten me by now. the family setting is both comforting and upsetting. but that night, the sound of the fireworks made that neighbourhood feel like home. i have a dog. but he's not really mine. i'll explain later. i have an old hiking bag full of clothes. its torn in places but it serves its many purposes well; i like to think it makes me look respectable, that my shabby appearance is due to my many years of traveling, not desperation and bare bones poverty. i like to think that the bag gives people space in their mind's eye to see me as more than i am. a homeless man who has lost almost everything. i have a library card. an hour on the computers every day. and access to all the many worlds that i never took interest in as a boy. and i have a woman. she lives in paris. it's no lie. and sometimes she writes me by email, but more often i write to her, long laments and groanful longing letters that must sicken her to the stomach. and i have my guitar. this is me, and soon you'll learn more.