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?