remission

sunday was surprisingly alright
i managed to read my stuff without wetting myself or throwing up so all in all a good job.

today i got £500 from my mother for my birthday
it's all getting saved for sensible things like rent next year.
boo i want to be nice things and splurge

going london on the 18th for birthday treat
first class train, five star hotel - both free
going to the tate, some PR meeting thing, Harrods and the markets

can't wait to be 18 at long bloody last
though kind of feeling like it will end up beingf awful because some people won't care

and can't really sort anything out cause everyone is fighting.
screw it i'm just going to pick up presents and go drinking on my own.

come on australian application, be finished
'and all the lovers with no time for me'

not always, just life

Whilst you are reading this
someone collects a pension, child support.
Someone queues for greasy McDonalds,
a heart attack in the hospital bed.
A teen takes their first sip
of syrupy, sugar alcopop, an old man
raises a glass and drinks whiskey
to fallen comrades. Baby drinks milk
from a sippy cup.
Every second, mothers try to pursuade
young ones to eat their greens, mothers
try to pursuade their daughters to eat
anything.
A man thrusts glass in another's face,
a caterpillar escapes from a cocoon and
flutters on stained glass wings,
a believer kneels to pray.
In that split second just then, dogs
chase after the hare, frantic businessmen
chase buses. Red pens trace lines,
lines across a mirror face. People fall,
get up, babies and grown men learn to walk.
Nurses inject morphine, people inject morphine,
needles pierce purple veins for every condition.
The grip of a newborn wrapped around dad's finger
slack hand of a grandma surrounded my family.
Fingertips press on computer keys, violin strings
the lips of lovers. Intellectuals read 'The Cherry Orchard'
blossoms gather in piles on street corners,
Chinatown smells of seaweed and spicy soup.
Life is always going on, regardless of you.




i am nowhere near as good as brian bartlett
but this is my attempt at brian bartlett.
one day i will be a good writer
the kind that people talk about at art galleries and buy my books and get sad that i'm wasting my life living in myself and drinking
occasionally i'll come out and give interviews and look blue
and people will rave and it won't be as good as they say but it will be good.

suggestions/alterations/improvements welcome.

medusa

i feel beautiful and sad and stunning and completely unloved.
as if running after the hare and every step makes it harder to keep up
and the other dogs are disappearing over the hillside.

my hand is bruised and bleeding and swollen and i can't write
if i can't write i can't live.
thus fulfilling the criteria as given by rainer maria rilke

in my dreams i can only run like an animal. on two legs it feels like running through treacle but on all fours i'm like a big cat and streak across land faster than light.
what that means i don't know

read the poem 'always' by brian bartlett
this week i am supposed to write a poem inspired by that one by about west leeds
i'll post it up soon, it's about caterpillars and pensions and mcdonalds.
the mentor at the residency gives us good things to read: etgar keret, rilke, martin stannard.

road to hell

ah we're all so anonymous
i wouldn't want you reading this, anyone so cover the tracks
last night i freaked out
and got lost in heaton chapel, but only for five minutes
then i remembered the way and found a bus stop.

people never turn out like you want them to be
it's shuffling and ring of fire card games with strong measurements of alcohol
then someone stole the other pill and we turned charlotte's room upside down

now i need to write properly
without getting distracted by beartato at www.nedroid.com