Wednesday, November 24, 2010

fourth

and sometimes it is the absence of sorrow.
weavers. spinning, casting, spinning, spinning.
streams of colours that entwine silken tombs.
empty tombs. waiting colours. and rain.
almost always it is the absence. it is swift.
swift to come, swift to go, swift to change.
metamorphose into beauty. change. sorrow. change. lustre.
change. absence. again it is the absence.
it flies. on wings of molten stone. frozen - and fluid -
silken birdsong. change. chatter. change. words.
heard, sung, said, shouted, screamed, thought.
change. sorrow. change. beauty. change absence.
it's not colours. not just yet. but something close to.
it's not thought. not just yet. but something close to.
it's not beauty. not just yet. but something close to.
swift to catch. swift to hold. swift to let go.
almost always. the absence of sorrow. the sorrow of absence.
not both. but quite. almost never. only ever.
change. now. change. then. change. flutesong.
it's always that. the absence of sorrow.

sorrow.

Sunday, November 07, 2010

Let’s Be Morbid: A Tale of Deathbed Conversations. Scene One.

To open, a wild circus show – a few elephants trumpeting in the background. A large bucket – did I say large, I meant gianormous, 4 feet tall, and only so that people can still reach in – of chicken wings downstage right, a tent overhead, and some confetti aimlessly floating around in the air.

A really short man, with a top hat half as tall as he is, steps off a show stool upstage left. The only other character on stage is a young awkward man with a lion mask lifted off his face, sharpening a couple of really long pencils downstage centre.

Man-in-the-Top-Hat: Leo, aren’t you done with those yet?

Leo: Almost, Vince. You know Di likes them to be extra sharp.

Vince: (sighing) And extra crispy.

Leo: What’re you talking about? Her chicken wings?

Vince: Nothing.

He takes off his top hat. He’s bald underneath.

Vince: I’m not going to be seeing Di tonight.

Leo stops sharpening the pencils.

Vince: And I need you to help me help Di understand.

Leo: Are you leaving us?

Vince comes up to Leo and takes the pencils off him and starts sharpening them himself.

Leo: Are you?

Vince: Leo. I’ve been trying not to. For a really long time. But the dreams are getting to me.

Leo: I thought you were seeing a shrink. We thought you were seeing a shrink.

Vince: You don’t understand Leo. I told you that because I didn’t want you two to freak out. Especially Di.

Leo: You lied? You lied about the shrink?

Vince: No I didn’t lie about the shrink. I am seeing a shrink. Heck, I still will be. That’s the reason I have to do this. I can’t take the dreams anymore.

Leo: I can’t understand this. You know I can’t understand this. I have no idea what you’re talking about. You know I have no idea what you’re talking about. Di won’t like this. You know Di won’t like this.

Vince: Shh. I’m sorry.

Leo: What are we going to do?

Vince: I’m sorry.

The pencil breaks. Vince kneels down to pick up the broken lead. Leo pulls his mask off his head.

Leo: Vince, what are we going to do?

Vince: You keep Di happy. The pencils and the chicken wings, that’s all she’s ever needed. My big well fed artist.

Leo: That’s not going to be enough, Leo. That was never enough. She’s going to be upset when you don’t turn up tonight. You remember how upset she can be?

There is a loud trumpet outside.

Leo: You remember what she did when you missed her birthday? Remember that birthday?

Vince: I remember that birthday, Leo.

Leo: You remember the circus tent after that birthday?

Vince: I remember the circus tent.

Leo: Well then, Vince, you can explain all this to Di, yourself.

Vince: I can’t, Leo.

Leo: Well I don’t even understand it so I can’t. And I can’t deal with another trampled circus tent, and you won’t even be there, and I still can’t understand why. So you can explain to Di.

Vince: I can’t.

Leo silently picks up the large pencils and breaks them in half.

Leo: You can explain to her why her pencils are broken as well.

Vince: Leo, I’m leaving the two of you because I’m going to die here. (pause) I didn’t want to tell you, because I didn’t want to freak you out. Like I said. I’m not killing myself. I’m just killing myself here. I can’t take the dreams anymore. The dreams about you and Di. They just make no sense.

Leo: You didn’t tell us you’ve been dreaming about us.

Vince: Because I didn’t know you were a dream…

Leo: I don’t understand. You know I don’t understand –

Vince: …at first. Then I started seeing the shrink. He did some hypnotism mumbo-jumbo. And I found out I’d been dreaming about you and Di every night. Similar dreams. And I did things wrong when I was awake. Messed up stuff. My job. My wife. My paper-shredder. Because I kept confusing which was real…

Leo: What are you saying? You know I don’t understand what you’re saying –

Vince: and which was a dream. You and Di. Only a dream. A dream that made me keep messing stuff up. My job. My wife. My pin-ball machine. So he said to me, the shrink said… snap out of it. You decide which one’s more important. Your dream or this world. And snap out of it….

Leo: What the hell are you talking about? You know I can’t tell what you’re talking about –

Vince: …snap out, wake up. End it. So I decided I would. Because you know I’ve really been messing stuff up. My job. My wife. My butterfly collection.

Leo: But you saw the shrink. I went with you. I went with you to see the shrink. It was a few days ago. He had an orange overcoat and sang Bugs Bunny songs under the streetlight. I was there when you met him.

Vince: No, you’re putting stories in my head. Don’t fight it. You’re a dream. You and Di. You don’t know it but you are, and I’m sorry. And it’s too late now. I’ve set everything up. I hired the buxom ballerina troupe to kidnap the safety net for tonight’s show. Just before my swan dive. It’s not going to be there. So I can’t back out now. I’m sorry. You’ll have to explain to Di. I’m sorry. You’ll have to tell her why I won’t move after I fall through the false water bucket. You’ll have to tell her why I won’t answer when she trumpets for me – won’t get her her pencils for her part of the show. Why it’ll be you standing with her chicken wings instead of me, while she sketches the audience and then bows for her applause. Why it’ll be you instead of me leading her back into her tent at night and kissing her goodbye. Why it’ll be you instead of me waking her up every morning from tomorrow with her apricot flavoured sponge bath and my old ladder.

Leo: You saw the shrink with me, Vince.

Vince: No, that’s not true. I didn’t see the shrink here. I saw him when I was awake. Singing Daffy Duck songs…

Leo: Under an orange streetlight. You remember it now, don’t you? He told you – he told you it was all a dream. That you were dreaming about them every night. A job. A wife. Some strange box-things. And you were messing things up real bad. My health. Di’s breakfast. The pirouette before your swan dive. And he told you you needed to snap out of it. Because this was real. And that was the dream.

Vince: No. He said I’d confuse things. That I needed to …

Leo: Stay focused. You remember it now, right? That you had to put those medicine things in your glass of water at night so that you’d die there, in your dream, and escape, and never have to...

Vince: Go back again.

The circus in the background goes away, and the two of them are standing under the light of an orange streetlight.

Leo: Did you do that, Vince? Did you remember to do that in your dream last night?

Vince: I don’t remember.

Leo: If you love Di, then I think you’ll have remembered.

Vince: No. I remember. The orange man said I needed to choose. You said I needed to choose which was the real thing – and which was the dream. And once I chose, I knew what I needed to do.

Leo: For Di’s sake, you chose the right thing. I’m sure you chose the right thing, didn’t you?

Vince: I’m telling you, Leo, the net’s gone. The safety net. Whether you like it or not, it’s much too late. I’m dying tonight. The show’s just about to begin.

The elephants trumpet again. A muffled applause is heard somewhere in the distance.

Leo: Do you love Di, Vince?

There is a pause.

Vince: I didn’t chose.

Leo: Do you love her?

Vince: Yes.

Leo: Then it really is goodbye. I’m sorry.

Vince: I don’t want to die.

Leo: I’m sorry.

Vince: I only wanted to stop dreaming.

Leo: I’m sorry.

Vince: You’ll tell Di I love her.

Leo: I’m sorry. I will.

Vince: Then I’ll see you around.

He puts his hat back on. The background is a filled circus tent, with people cheering from below.

Vince does a sprint, pirouettes and then takes off in the start of a swan dive. An elephant trumpets from somewhere. The lights fade out. Curtain.

Thursday, October 14, 2010

Under His Thumb

second installment of Mr. Jack. So read that first.

The quaint little inn-sign swung gently in the mild mountain breeze. A pair of stiletto heeled leather boots, hardly recognizable in their effort to look non-anachronistic, rested lightly over dainty lettering that spelt ‘The New Carabas’. The cottage was on a cliff-top, overlooking an extremely rocky coast – with no other sign of human existence anywhere in sight – unless you happened to look over the cliff and down at the sliver of a beach, which was spotted with tourists all year round. A young goat tethered to the window shutters looked quizzically at me as I flattened my hair in front of the tinted pane, before walking in.

Two seconds. That’s all I took to adjust to the darkness inside. Unfortunately, that’s all he took to react to my entrance, reach under the counter, pull his knife out, leap over the counter, lock my hands together in a tight squeeze behind me and press the blade sharp against my neck.

Another two seconds passed as both of us assessed the situation. The room was small – with wooden panels and a wooden ledge, a continuation of the counter, which ran along the length of three walls. Pushed against this ledge were a number of roughly hewn stools. Two soft yellow bulbs hung from the ceiling at two ends of the counter.

“You don’t look like a Catherine – who are you?” The raspy words were hissed into my ear, as wet and hot as the blade against my neck was dry and cold.

Catherine. Carabas. The stilettos. Of course. Of course I wouldn’t be the only one on this job.

“Likewise, mate. Although I haven’t seen much of you – but you don’t sound like a Catherine either.”

I was standing right next to the door, in front of the ledge – a slight movement, and my shin brushed against the hard leg of a stool just behind me – where my attacker’s legs were supposed to have been.

The edge of the blade cut into my skin, bringing a thin line of blood welling up to meet the sharp metal.

“No jokes – who are you?”

I kicked up hard against the stool behind. It toppled forward, sending its occupant off balance – and his knife wielding hand forward – away from my neck. Simultaneously, I butted my head back against what I assumed was his face, dodged under his arm and spun around – my hands grasped tightly around his arms this time, as he reeled back and fell on his bottom on the ledge.

A tiny man, about half my height, with a small bald patch on the top of his head and a hair cut that would make any barber cry. And, most importantly, clasped around a mean looking short blade: a right thumb that was exactly as long as his fore finger.

“Tom.” I smiled, wrenching his knife out of his grasp. “Your reputation precedes you. I haven’t had the pleasure – but no time’s too late for a hallo.”

His eyes traveled down to my belt. “Taylor,” he spat. “What are you doing here?”

“Surely you’ve guessed. Shouldn’t be too far from what you’re doing, I suppose. Where there’s smoke there’s fire – and where there’re goat shaped holes in the universe…”

Tom tried to make a dash for the door – but my foot came in the way. I knelt down closer, as he lay sprawled on the floor. “… There’s usually a Tom spiriting them away to the Big Guys for a cut. That animal outside – is she yours?”

Tom squirmed. If he hadn’t been slicing away at my throat a while ago, I’d have felt quite sorry for him at this point.

“Or, seeing as her pink collar says: ‘I’m Maribel, please return me to Clara Doris, 128 Palm Lane,’ – is she not?”

Livestock. Back in the old days, the main problem we used to have with giants, ogres and your other average countryside villain was that they kept stealing our livestock – and since they were always much bigger and stronger than us, they kept getting away with it, too. Big creatures have big appetites – and these big creatures had no idea about investing in their own animal farms.

That was a thousand years ago. Today, most hungry owners of toppling columns of gold have learnt to thrive on their own cattle farms. There’s even an old ‘acquaintance’ of mine in Kentucky who’s tried his hand with poultry. Most giants and ogres I’ve met were only waiting for a small scare to send them investing their gold in honest places – and by honest I don’t mean the shadowy grey honesty of today’s cattle or poultry farming. But some others never learn. And in my experience, it’s only a matter of time before a few innocent goats become all the livestock in the entire district – and then, when there are no four-legged creatures left to satiate the hunger, proceed to becoming the people populating that district. If there’s anything that can eat the world up faster than we can – it’s them.

Tom, I’ve heard, started off in this business very soon after he couldn’t find any more kings to butter up and impress enough to pay for his keep. The rich giants and ogres with their hoards of magic treasure caught his eye as soon as it had blinked away from the empty throne of monarchy. And being a small and slick guy – rumored to have got out unscathed from the digestive systems of a few big fish – he knew exactly which cranny of the grand scheme of things he should slip himself into. And believe it or not – when he tried this cranny out for size – it fit perfectly. In a giant-scaled plan to fill ogre-sized appetites, there could be no better thumb-sized position for a man like Tom than the one that arranged for the sudden and discreet transportation of disappearing farm animals.

“Well?” I asked again. “Are you going to tell me why you were lying in wait for Catherine?”

Tom, current custodian of Maribel Doris, 128, Palm Lane, eased himself up against the door with a wary eye on the knife in my hand.

“I wasn’t lying in wait for her – I was waiting for her. Like she told me to. ‘The New Carabas, the cottage on the cliff top, 9 in the morning, Wednesday. Come alone and I’ll make it worth your while – Catherine.’”

He reached into his pocket under my watchful eye (and the knife’s attentive twinkle) and drew out a small chit of paper. I scanned the handwriting – no familiar loops or crosses, which made me doubly certain that it really was from Catherine.

“Judging from your reaction when you met me, and the fact that the only weapon you carried in here was your knife – you’ve never met Catherine.”

Tom glared at me sullenly. “Should I have brought a machine gun?”

“You brought Maribel – I’m sure you and I both know she was your bargaining chip. What did you have in mind? Maribel in return for money?”

“What else? It’s me we’re talking about. Like you said, my reputation precedes me.”

I scanned his face. “Nope – you’re not as stupid as all that. Dragging your only bargaining chip to an anonymous proposition. You’ve been in this scam for a long time. You have information to offer – and you wanted to see whether you’d get more from Catherine than your current income from whoever you’re working for right now. Or whether you could get both ends of the deal, if what they say about you is indeed true. Maribel’s only the carrot dangling on the edge of the stick. There’s a story at the other end of that stick – a story you’re going to tell me.”

“Or what?” Well, he tried to put it in a raspy voice. But the shifting gaze that lingered on the knife was far from convincing.

I pocketed the knife. “Well, Tom, I’m in the mood for being generous. Let’s say I’m after your boss’ loot. And I really could use an inside man on the job. You help me and I’ll give you a generous share of what I earn.”

“How generous?”

“You’re not really in a position to negotiate – but I’ll gift wrap it for you. Five per cent.”

Tom’s tongue shot out to lick his chapped lips. “Five per cent. And I get to slip off with Maribel right now.”

“Without, Tom. I think Clara Doris is waiting for her right now, don’t you? And only after you’ve told me some more about your employer.”

“I don’t know who he is –”

The knife slipped back out of my pocket.

“I swear – look, I was approached by this man on my personal number.” I raised my brows. “My cell phone number – I circulated it through the industry a couple of years ago. I’ve freelanced all over the continent. I swear – you can check up on me. This is how I work now. The man calls me, tells me the name of this village and four others, I tell him my fees and he gives me a drop off address. That’s all I know.”

“And the drop off address?”

“It’s about twenty miles away down the coastline. An abandoned lighthouse that gets cut off from the mainland at high tide – some tourists drowned there a few months ago, and the place has been shut since then. At least, the papers said they drowned.”

Tom flashed me a far from innocent grin. “That was all before I came down here to offer my services, you see. A guy will get hungry. He must be pretty ugly to not want to show his face at all. I’ve never seen him – but he leaves a cheque for me in the letterbox and I have to go collect it just before the tide starts coming in. That’s so I have to hurry back, you see. So that I can’t catch sight of him.”

“And Catherine? Where does she come into this?”

“She opened this inn this week – number of customers: nil. I checked her up after I got this note stuffed into my coat when I got it back from the dry cleaners. I don’t know anything about her – except that she bought this place cheap off a lottery winner who’s somewhere in the Maldives right now. And she’s alone.”

He narrowed his eyes slyly. “But you seem to know her pretty well?”

I had a sudden vision of an extremely well tailored suit of lavender silk.

“Old friend,” I smiled.

Tom was beginning to look a little shifty eyed. “I’ll just return the goat to Palm Lane now, then?”

I stood up. “Keep the goat. We’ll need her at high tide one of these days. This place is an inn, right? I’ll need someplace to stay while you find out what happened to Catherine. And remember the five per cent before you think of doing anything funny.”

I held out my hand. He didn’t deliberate too long before accepting it and helping himself up. Five per cent. As he disappeared down the rough path that led away from the cottage, I wondered how much he hadn’t told me. He must know a bit more about the stranger in the abandoned lighthouse than what he’d let on if he was satisfied with a mere five per cent. And if Tom was satisfied with a mere five per cent, it made you wonder what he knew about the magnitude of the full hundred.

Tuesday, August 24, 2010

Rote and His Talking Mirror #17

"whoosh. whoooosh."
"i thought we were trying to sleep."
"that was nine days ago."
"no it wasn't - i can see your calender on your wall to the right of your harpsichord."
"well i can see yours to the left of yours and yours says 21."
"turn around, you strange projection of your strange projection of some strange suppressed part of your subconsciousness - your calender says 12. and what's more - it says 12 Aug, unlike mine - which just says guA 21 - and only if you think your '2's and your 'g's are written backwards!"
"you missed out the 'u's."
"it's a goddamned sans-serif, Rote."
"whoosh. whooosh."
"oh - ignoring me now, are we?"
"i though we were trying to sleep??"
"damn you."

Rote and His Talking Mirror #23

"i know who you are. you're that person with those strange things you call opinions that you tell yourself are hidden deep in your head - but they're spewing out all over the place. i can see them oozing out of your ears. hah! there - there! look at that particularly fat looking specimen that's casting a lens of an extremely unattractive colour over your eye. i know you. you're bubbling and bursting with them - you can't contain them. quiver now, like a dead jelly, pink and glorified - that's what you do. you think i can't see through you - i don't have to. you're bursting at the seems. i despise you. i despise you with your judgmental eyes and cautious tongue. you think you're safe - you think you try? you don't know shit. you don't feel shit. you don't. you think that's dirt and muck under your fingernails? it's raw flesh. and it stinks. it stinks of FREAKING opinions and FREAKING rubbish that's all stacked up to the rim in that feel-good brain of yours, dressed as you trying. don't you think you can fool me."

"fool you, Rote? tell me something, when you describe this vibrant imagery of the pink jelly that's so lovely in you're head, are you at all aware that we share the same features. if i'm a jelly, with or without my so called burden of heavy opinions - so are you, with your own larger than life opinion of who i am. what do you think you look like to me? a dish of slimy porridge? that's simmered down and curled up satisfied - you're a goddamned jelly as much as i am - and what's more, you KNOW it. what are you doing - what do you think you're doing? slapping a kitten into left-over laundry? i'm not scared by your i'm-too-scared-to-say-bad-words. oh hell i'm not. and if you think you're fooling yourself by letting your tongue run loose and do all the screaming - just take a second look at what you're screaming at. just take a second look at that goddamned mirror and decide if it's doing you any good despising your own reflection."

Friday, July 02, 2010

Twitch

Who screamed? The piper screamed.
You couldn't hear it and neither did I.
Between the tip of a white edged nail
And ridged skin - you can't hear it cry.
Who moved? And crawled... and twitched.
Red. Red. Red. You can't see the red.
It isn't fun - not if I say so -
But if you listen really well, it's something well-fed.
Who's trembling? Who's not really there?
It was - it was - but it's not. Not now.
Silent and still - and undeniably killed.
Well-fed, and empty, and wondering how.


Wednesday, April 21, 2010

Packing for the Summer


It’s a night for sepia stars

Smiling softly their twinkle-less smiles

For the brink of a season – printed paper-boats

Bottles and bottles of homemade preserve

Newspaper and taxis and crumbled tickets

Where we were – and where we’ll stay.

Goodnight faces, the curtains still whisper;

It’s a night for remembering – we’re happiest today.

Follow the cold star, the bright star, the still star

The waters are pouring, the dusk and the day

Sneakers and cartons and bright yellow flowers

Geometric magic – and the rest have to stay.

Huge purple cases with nametags – and scribbles

Stamps and stamps and signature ink.

Journeys are ribbons – and journeys are nametags

And journeys are brinks – and they’re here to stay

The wrapped and the packed and the sent away bagged

The stored and the floored and the above-the-front-doored

Some things are happy – and some things just fine

And some things best kept between two frozen lines

But the most that could happen with fried-egg scorched sunsets

Are the things that have left – not the things that have stayed.

They come back greeting – in the thick of our meeting –

The sunsets are fried eggs and the bags are unpacked

The lines that were frozen melt softly and gently

Into two little pigtails – and they tumble back.

Into still framed smiles – some twinkle-less smiles

When we move ahead leaving sepia behind

And the stars are the ones that’ll stay here forever

And we – very quietly – have left them behind.

Sunday, March 07, 2010

prison paintings



hack. hack. hack.

they're called fixed dimensions.

you can't hack. hack. hack.

into the insides of this skull and make it bigger.

and i've been dying to get out.

i'm brilliant at this.

spraying the grey matter with coloured swirls of chaotic imagery.

i've always been brilliant at this.

running around the insides of this brain with my paintbrush of emotive visions.

creativity. i'm a genius.

but a genius gets bored

with fixed dimensions.

hack. hack. hack.

there's not room enough for me within bone and scalp.

there's not room enough for me within tight walled in stories of beautiful colours and images.

Ugly. bright. bright. ugly. beautiful.

No. Not enough room.

There's a way out.

Hack. Hack. Hack.

And I've carved another one.

Layers and layers of breathtaking sculptures in this skull.

A gallery of the most beautiful images you've ever imagined.

This brain's ever imagined.

All me.

And all spaced

Within fixed dimensions.

Hack. Hack. Hack.


http://prisonpaintings.blogspot.com/