I saw that spot again tonight, the place of stained sadness.
It’s isolated, but you can see it from the road, yet you could be lying there for days and no-one need find you.
I wonder, if I was murdered, would anyone miss me? How many days before the report - missing, missing?
Perhaps I’ll murder me and find out. Drag my body to the field and into the pond lush with trees and bushes - leaves to hide my shame - and wait and watch to see my world change.
See the days pass slowly, the grave visited only by herons, and I peer at the sun and the fields and the road.
My bus still passes, five minutes late – the same, without me on it. Strange, another nobody takes my seat then.
Now, here comes that tall man – walks his dog - I pray they won’t find me; arrest me, and bury me.
But they must do, because I’m back here - on the bus - watching my cemetery zoom by, listening to bittersweet songs, happysad that I’m alive.
Friday 22 February 2008
Thursday 21 February 2008
Old man
He sighed as he lost his grip on the earth. The shaking of his arm caused the grains to flow like mercury, away.
He was an old man now, but he was younger than he had thought he would be when he defined himself as such.
Somewhere a bird was tweeting. His hearing had grown so poor that he could not locate the offending noise. It may as well have been a garbled vomiting frog perched in the branches of the pear tree at the bottom of his overgrown garden.
He wheeled round and tried to locate the mocking bird. What soil he still held he tried to hurl at a bush that might have hid the noisemonger.
He threw the sandy ground like a girl. Nothing new could grow here now. Sometimes it felt like he had a timeshare on his legs.
Currently he was living in his legs. He could walk and turn, but he couldn't use his arm muscles unless he gave up habitation of his lower limbs.
He remembered the spade and bent to retrieve it. Back spasmed, black chasms possessed his eyes. He stood straightish and the chasms became pools.
As the saltwater rolled onto his lips he felt again able to scream. The starlings scattered as he bellowed.
The black demon cloud had entered the birds as if commanded by Christ. Perhaps they would all fly into the engine of a plane?
He turned and trudged back towards the house.
He would bury his wife another day.
He was an old man now, but he was younger than he had thought he would be when he defined himself as such.
Somewhere a bird was tweeting. His hearing had grown so poor that he could not locate the offending noise. It may as well have been a garbled vomiting frog perched in the branches of the pear tree at the bottom of his overgrown garden.
He wheeled round and tried to locate the mocking bird. What soil he still held he tried to hurl at a bush that might have hid the noisemonger.
He threw the sandy ground like a girl. Nothing new could grow here now. Sometimes it felt like he had a timeshare on his legs.
Currently he was living in his legs. He could walk and turn, but he couldn't use his arm muscles unless he gave up habitation of his lower limbs.
He remembered the spade and bent to retrieve it. Back spasmed, black chasms possessed his eyes. He stood straightish and the chasms became pools.
As the saltwater rolled onto his lips he felt again able to scream. The starlings scattered as he bellowed.
The black demon cloud had entered the birds as if commanded by Christ. Perhaps they would all fly into the engine of a plane?
He turned and trudged back towards the house.
He would bury his wife another day.
Wednesday 20 February 2008
Further under the desk
Last week it was all getting too much for me, so I crawled under my desk during a particularly difficult phone call and hid.
As I sat under the desk I looked out at many pairs of female legs, gathering around my chair. I put my hands over my ears so that I couldn't hear them stamping anymore. I turned my head and stared at the wall's edge to the left of the desk and amazedly fixed upon a thick black hole that was torn there.
On the floor, at the edge of hole, were strewn several brown banana skins and, upon reaching inside, I felt that a tunnel or narrow passage of some sort sloped gently downwards below the offices next door.
One hand, then the other, had made a firm enough landing behind the wall that my body decided to clamber in after them.
As the stamping from outside the hole faded I felt around the body of this warm tunnel and realised the heat trapped within it. All areas of the walls felt tolerably warm, just cosy really when limited to travel on hands and knees, and there was a sweet smell of ripe fruit in the air.
Occasionally, on my decent, a hand would encounter a cool squishy substance. At first, thinking it was the ghastly guano of some lower cave-dwelling bat, I recoiled in horror. But on further sniffing I realised it was merely the soft flesh of one beautiful banana.
After ten minutes of travelling thusly, the tunnel flattened out and expanded so that a man my size could rise to a stoop, his back brushing the roof of this new cavern. Remembering the mobile phone in my back pocket I produced a minimal torchlight with which I could inspect my surroundings. I was surprised to see that this magical cave had been decorated - covered from top to toe in banana skins.
The inside of the skins were facing outwards so that the eloquent feel of botanic velvet was yours if you’d only reach towards it.
I immediately dropped to my knees and rolled around in sheer abandon. Such joy did I feel at the touch of this beloved fruit, that I scarcely allowed my brain to consider just what force of will, which amazing mind, had furnished such a cave.
I strove on for another hundred metres or so. From the dim light of my LED display, I understood that a final conquering wall lay just a few feet in front of me, ending my exploration.
Dropping to my knees in frustration that my strange pot-holing experience had proven fruitless, I was amazed to find myself prostrate before a small altar, not two feet high. There, upon the rough stone surface of the altar was the naked flesh of a perfectly ripe banana. Shining my phone around the walls I gasped in horror to see a fresh yellow skin hanging loathsomely from a butcher’s hook. Stickers of every colour covered the back wall, stickers containing only the words of various countries. In a swift scan I noticed the names Brazil, Costa Rica, Bolivia, Panama, Cameroon - these are all I can recall and some of these names were repeated tens of times. What power, what significance these places had I know not, but surely they are at the heart of this twisted cult?
Flicking my weak lantern back to the banana I noticed it had been slit with a sharp implement from head to toe, as if to be opened up maliciously at a later date. The purpose and result of this almost inconceivable ritual I could not fathom, nor did I try to.
I shrieked and left the room as fast as I might travel. As the passage became a tunnel once more I clattered my head and dropped on my face. My phone fell into the darkness behind me – I heard it sliding back into the abyss – but I, my head swimming, crawled on, on towards the narrowest, vaguest promise of light that was locked in my vision high above.
On bursting eventually from that hellish hole, like a baby full grown, I screamed and shook and passed out. I awoke in the first aid room, a cold flannel on my forehead, the stench of bananas now gone, replaced by antiseptic and disinfectant.
What morbid practices unfold beneath this office building, I’m glad I cannot tell for sure, but I’ll never feel safe now for they have a part of me – they have my mobile!
And one thing’s for sure, I’m never going to answer my damn telephone again.
As I sat under the desk I looked out at many pairs of female legs, gathering around my chair. I put my hands over my ears so that I couldn't hear them stamping anymore. I turned my head and stared at the wall's edge to the left of the desk and amazedly fixed upon a thick black hole that was torn there.
On the floor, at the edge of hole, were strewn several brown banana skins and, upon reaching inside, I felt that a tunnel or narrow passage of some sort sloped gently downwards below the offices next door.
One hand, then the other, had made a firm enough landing behind the wall that my body decided to clamber in after them.
As the stamping from outside the hole faded I felt around the body of this warm tunnel and realised the heat trapped within it. All areas of the walls felt tolerably warm, just cosy really when limited to travel on hands and knees, and there was a sweet smell of ripe fruit in the air.
Occasionally, on my decent, a hand would encounter a cool squishy substance. At first, thinking it was the ghastly guano of some lower cave-dwelling bat, I recoiled in horror. But on further sniffing I realised it was merely the soft flesh of one beautiful banana.
After ten minutes of travelling thusly, the tunnel flattened out and expanded so that a man my size could rise to a stoop, his back brushing the roof of this new cavern. Remembering the mobile phone in my back pocket I produced a minimal torchlight with which I could inspect my surroundings. I was surprised to see that this magical cave had been decorated - covered from top to toe in banana skins.
The inside of the skins were facing outwards so that the eloquent feel of botanic velvet was yours if you’d only reach towards it.
I immediately dropped to my knees and rolled around in sheer abandon. Such joy did I feel at the touch of this beloved fruit, that I scarcely allowed my brain to consider just what force of will, which amazing mind, had furnished such a cave.
I strove on for another hundred metres or so. From the dim light of my LED display, I understood that a final conquering wall lay just a few feet in front of me, ending my exploration.
Dropping to my knees in frustration that my strange pot-holing experience had proven fruitless, I was amazed to find myself prostrate before a small altar, not two feet high. There, upon the rough stone surface of the altar was the naked flesh of a perfectly ripe banana. Shining my phone around the walls I gasped in horror to see a fresh yellow skin hanging loathsomely from a butcher’s hook. Stickers of every colour covered the back wall, stickers containing only the words of various countries. In a swift scan I noticed the names Brazil, Costa Rica, Bolivia, Panama, Cameroon - these are all I can recall and some of these names were repeated tens of times. What power, what significance these places had I know not, but surely they are at the heart of this twisted cult?
Flicking my weak lantern back to the banana I noticed it had been slit with a sharp implement from head to toe, as if to be opened up maliciously at a later date. The purpose and result of this almost inconceivable ritual I could not fathom, nor did I try to.
I shrieked and left the room as fast as I might travel. As the passage became a tunnel once more I clattered my head and dropped on my face. My phone fell into the darkness behind me – I heard it sliding back into the abyss – but I, my head swimming, crawled on, on towards the narrowest, vaguest promise of light that was locked in my vision high above.
On bursting eventually from that hellish hole, like a baby full grown, I screamed and shook and passed out. I awoke in the first aid room, a cold flannel on my forehead, the stench of bananas now gone, replaced by antiseptic and disinfectant.
What morbid practices unfold beneath this office building, I’m glad I cannot tell for sure, but I’ll never feel safe now for they have a part of me – they have my mobile!
And one thing’s for sure, I’m never going to answer my damn telephone again.
Tuesday 19 February 2008
Gabriela y serpentia
A great serpent swept across the room. Gabriela, in a mess, balled up on a couch, never saw the creature approaching - its very body like the arc of an axe, flowing in to her.
Her life was one huge improvised sound - a near cacophony of strange buzzes and handsome clapping. In her hand, the ragged tissue of a broken heart - which looked much like the soggy tissue of a winter cold.
Cold and sheer as the tiled surface of the woman’s flat, the snake filed its body away silently in the dark cave beneath the couch. It tasted the air with shimmering tongue and surveyed the entire room.
“Room service,” called a man who knocked shallowly upon the door to her room. She looked up but didn’t raise her voice to answer. After half a minute he came in.
Interrupting the calm of the snake were the whirring wheels of a silver trolley wafting delightful aromas and leaving a stain of flavour in its wake. The serpent’s head weaved, but it seemed to sense inanimacy from the trolley and merely shifted and coiled further its body, out of view of whoever moved it.
Italicised numerals, percentages, best before dates and trademarked names filled Gabriela’s mind. The mind of a constant jumbler, a gibberer, a contrasting rationalist.
Listening hard was the creature buried below. It heard everything said by the man delivering the food to the women above; and though it understood nothing of words and languages, the intonations surely made more sense to the snake than to the woman.
Ominously, for Gabriela, the man restocking her minibar had grey hair and a fake smile. This was just the type of man she loved and she attempted to stand up and go to this man and demand that he love her back.
Backwards shot the snake as a high heel clacked against the perfect floor. Another foot landed, and the snake darted for it, biting down hard to puncture the leather.
The room vibrated as Gabriela’s lusts sank to her feet and she sagged sterilely back on to the couch. The man laughed as he shut the fridge, smiling words unintelligible to woman or serpent, before shutting forever the door to room 22A.
Her life was one huge improvised sound - a near cacophony of strange buzzes and handsome clapping. In her hand, the ragged tissue of a broken heart - which looked much like the soggy tissue of a winter cold.
Cold and sheer as the tiled surface of the woman’s flat, the snake filed its body away silently in the dark cave beneath the couch. It tasted the air with shimmering tongue and surveyed the entire room.
“Room service,” called a man who knocked shallowly upon the door to her room. She looked up but didn’t raise her voice to answer. After half a minute he came in.
Interrupting the calm of the snake were the whirring wheels of a silver trolley wafting delightful aromas and leaving a stain of flavour in its wake. The serpent’s head weaved, but it seemed to sense inanimacy from the trolley and merely shifted and coiled further its body, out of view of whoever moved it.
Italicised numerals, percentages, best before dates and trademarked names filled Gabriela’s mind. The mind of a constant jumbler, a gibberer, a contrasting rationalist.
Listening hard was the creature buried below. It heard everything said by the man delivering the food to the women above; and though it understood nothing of words and languages, the intonations surely made more sense to the snake than to the woman.
Ominously, for Gabriela, the man restocking her minibar had grey hair and a fake smile. This was just the type of man she loved and she attempted to stand up and go to this man and demand that he love her back.
Backwards shot the snake as a high heel clacked against the perfect floor. Another foot landed, and the snake darted for it, biting down hard to puncture the leather.
The room vibrated as Gabriela’s lusts sank to her feet and she sagged sterilely back on to the couch. The man laughed as he shut the fridge, smiling words unintelligible to woman or serpent, before shutting forever the door to room 22A.
Monday 18 February 2008
When the moon was lost
Remember that day when David Bellamy lost the moon?
It was only a few years back, he was in charge of it for the requisite week (everyone is in charge of the moon for a week of their life, I did it when I was seven) and Prince Charles commissioned a film to mark the event.
Anyway, while they were filming, the damn thing just dissapeared. I mean it literally fucked off for biscuits. No-one could understand it. This was happening on live TV.
Was it the end of the world? Some said so.
During the phenomenon I fancied I saw bats gathering at the windows. Seething eyes questing for an entrance to my flat and then to my innerds.
It wasn't to be, though. The moon returned, as we always knew it would.
I think we like to fear the worst. It had just been some strange eclipse caused by the cosmic wake of a gigantic passing interdimensional mammalian.
In the morning I went for an early stroll, before the council swept the streets. I had to step carefully over the rigid carcasses of several thousand dead bats.
It was only a few years back, he was in charge of it for the requisite week (everyone is in charge of the moon for a week of their life, I did it when I was seven) and Prince Charles commissioned a film to mark the event.
Anyway, while they were filming, the damn thing just dissapeared. I mean it literally fucked off for biscuits. No-one could understand it. This was happening on live TV.
Was it the end of the world? Some said so.
During the phenomenon I fancied I saw bats gathering at the windows. Seething eyes questing for an entrance to my flat and then to my innerds.
It wasn't to be, though. The moon returned, as we always knew it would.
I think we like to fear the worst. It had just been some strange eclipse caused by the cosmic wake of a gigantic passing interdimensional mammalian.
In the morning I went for an early stroll, before the council swept the streets. I had to step carefully over the rigid carcasses of several thousand dead bats.
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