Monday 22 March 2010
The shape of things to come?
Not only reduced to buying a copy of Elle, but because of nail biting boredom, a long wait for my train and a lack of tobacco for my nicotine craving lungs am also reduced to reading it from cover to cover including the plastic surgery adverts in the back. It always amuses me that a magazine claiming to empower women, and containing heartwarming articles telling us to love our curves/wonky noses/droopy bosoms (delete as appropriate) likes to sell its advertising pages to the cosmetic surgery market keen to cash in on altering these very imperfections we are supposed to love. In a poem by Denise Levertov she highlights this dichotomy with the wonderful last line 'and with what frivolity we have pared them [our dreams] like toenails, clipped them like ends of split hair' In this post-modernist fall out of doing whats right for you, a collective feminist ethos cannot stand the ground to comment on this irony, instead falling into the trap of stating that it is ok for woman to have plastic surgery as long as it is for themselves and their own self esteem. We are incapable of resisting the gloss of these adverts, the inherent message that to hate our bodies and wish to change them by going under the surgeons knife is an acceptable method to feel happier in our own skin. Society seems to have lost the ability to see beauty, when we look with the aesthetic eye ( and that is not a critical eye), and the same is true of viewing other peoples creative output; we can begin to revel in the tiny variations which make up the unique beauty of humanity.
Brick Lane Babe
You would have been so beautiful,
my baby, with skin of Kashmiri cream,
and eyes of glaring green intensity
My exotic Indian babe
I knew that moment,
he let the tug of love
loose within me
that this was a doomed affair,
You, a tiny bundle of atoms
would not uncurl a fist at the sun.
Your father was a man of three continents
Broken apart by their past.
under an arduous weight of
existence
he could neither choose you or me
so you were not born
i walked away
from the torrid heat of love
I let your grip on my womb be torn asunder
broke the union
of mother and child
felt you slip
Into the recesses of my mind
Only these scents of spice
As i walk down brick lane
can call your memory back
In my ghostly motherhood
i hold your fat little hands
and let your grandmother oil your head
and give Allah praise for your birth
Only Asia's unwavering heat,
this aridness,
can awaken these dreams of you......
my baby, with skin of Kashmiri cream,
and eyes of glaring green intensity
My exotic Indian babe
I knew that moment,
he let the tug of love
loose within me
that this was a doomed affair,
You, a tiny bundle of atoms
would not uncurl a fist at the sun.
Your father was a man of three continents
Broken apart by their past.
under an arduous weight of
existence
he could neither choose you or me
so you were not born
i walked away
from the torrid heat of love
I let your grip on my womb be torn asunder
broke the union
of mother and child
felt you slip
Into the recesses of my mind
Only these scents of spice
As i walk down brick lane
can call your memory back
In my ghostly motherhood
i hold your fat little hands
and let your grandmother oil your head
and give Allah praise for your birth
Only Asia's unwavering heat,
this aridness,
can awaken these dreams of you......
St Pancreas
Watching wine bottles,
gently swaying,
through steamed glass
in wavering heat-
The tang of red wine
lays heavy on langerous lips
which try to remember
the taste of bourbon and tobacco
which hung upon yours-
A taste was all i had
a mere sliver of saliva
flesh probing flesh
velvety smooth over liquid heat
fleeting yet remembered-
I need to return to that kiss
as moment in time
fracture it
seal it again
with everything that has now come to pass-
To imbue it with meaning now
to imprint it deep
and change the course
that history laid at our feet.
gently swaying,
through steamed glass
in wavering heat-
The tang of red wine
lays heavy on langerous lips
which try to remember
the taste of bourbon and tobacco
which hung upon yours-
A taste was all i had
a mere sliver of saliva
flesh probing flesh
velvety smooth over liquid heat
fleeting yet remembered-
I need to return to that kiss
as moment in time
fracture it
seal it again
with everything that has now come to pass-
To imbue it with meaning now
to imprint it deep
and change the course
that history laid at our feet.
Saturday 13 March 2010
Flood
Sunlight filtering through your hair,
was how my dawn arrived.
It was a strange way to awake
My chin in the crook of your neck
And daybreak a haze of chestnut brown.
Stranger still,
it had wrapped round my mouth
So that i came up like a drowner
gasping for air.
It was as if you were all a flood
Your waters overwhelming me
And it was then i understood
That you and i were doomed
And in you i had already drowned
Lost at sea, never to be found.
was how my dawn arrived.
It was a strange way to awake
My chin in the crook of your neck
And daybreak a haze of chestnut brown.
Stranger still,
it had wrapped round my mouth
So that i came up like a drowner
gasping for air.
It was as if you were all a flood
Your waters overwhelming me
And it was then i understood
That you and i were doomed
And in you i had already drowned
Lost at sea, never to be found.
On 12 inch
This whirling mind at 2000rpm,
spinning in vivid techni-colour,
Is wearisome sometimes,
In it's giddying speed,
However i need constant propulsion
to allow me to re cooperate
I want to be on a journey again
in a moving vehicle
wheels spinning under me
Travel and movement
not of my minds making.
As needle turns gently in its groove,
this music slows the soul
to a constant 33rpm
And fluidity can be finally restored.
spinning in vivid techni-colour,
Is wearisome sometimes,
In it's giddying speed,
However i need constant propulsion
to allow me to re cooperate
I want to be on a journey again
in a moving vehicle
wheels spinning under me
Travel and movement
not of my minds making.
As needle turns gently in its groove,
this music slows the soul
to a constant 33rpm
And fluidity can be finally restored.
Friday 12 March 2010
Ratawicka 104
Warsaw rain,
and a wind whipped up in my hair.
In clouds of smoke,
i travel now,
through metal clanging doorways,
i step out of this skin.
In this dust filled space,
thick with the sound of another era,
i am the foreigner now.
In burnt light
our heads are haloed,
like the saints that watch from the walls.
Steam arises as hands wash like a child,
this head of mine.
Cradled close
Madonna has not held
even the head of Christ,
with such delicacy.
I take off my clothes,
let the straps slide off shoulders,
feel the soft silk of skin on skin,
Waiting for the thrust of flesh into flesh,
in the cobwebs of night.
No longer a desert,
which we failed to traverse across,
but an intermingling,
an ocean with tumultuous waves.
Arms and limbs entwined,
sleep still evades,
heart thunders a tattoo into the night,
one cannot soar without falling...
and a wind whipped up in my hair.
In clouds of smoke,
i travel now,
through metal clanging doorways,
i step out of this skin.
In this dust filled space,
thick with the sound of another era,
i am the foreigner now.
In burnt light
our heads are haloed,
like the saints that watch from the walls.
Steam arises as hands wash like a child,
this head of mine.
Cradled close
Madonna has not held
even the head of Christ,
with such delicacy.
I take off my clothes,
let the straps slide off shoulders,
feel the soft silk of skin on skin,
Waiting for the thrust of flesh into flesh,
in the cobwebs of night.
No longer a desert,
which we failed to traverse across,
but an intermingling,
an ocean with tumultuous waves.
Arms and limbs entwined,
sleep still evades,
heart thunders a tattoo into the night,
one cannot soar without falling...
Our shadowed present
There are no great gestures left, no-originality in the grandiose, the magnificent. All virtue and value have slipped together. Nothing is true, nothing is fresh. So i shall take my place within these small gestures, the little details, those which are ignored. I can only express the expanse within the minutia. i can only find meaning in this feather touch, the way the rain makes your hair curl, the way the smoke catches and plumes- Only in the smallest detail can i find it.
Henry hoover
This smiling plastic face
With its smug parody
Of 50's housewives',
uncontrollable joy,
At new domestic appliances,
Looks leeringly at me.
incongruous it may appear
Languishing in the dark cupboard
But each night it puts more spite
into its grin
Ready to greet me the next day
with renewed venom
It is conspiring with the dusters,
plotting a coup with the mop
as co conspirators
They secretively ridicule me
Well i say,
'ill shut the door on you
An never clean no more!'
With its smug parody
Of 50's housewives',
uncontrollable joy,
At new domestic appliances,
Looks leeringly at me.
incongruous it may appear
Languishing in the dark cupboard
But each night it puts more spite
into its grin
Ready to greet me the next day
with renewed venom
It is conspiring with the dusters,
plotting a coup with the mop
as co conspirators
They secretively ridicule me
Well i say,
'ill shut the door on you
An never clean no more!'
Glastonbury
A hand is watched by eye,
turning over in crystallised light.
Flung skyward in expressive delight,
then groped
with passionate force.
Feet follow each other,
through this plenitude of grasses.
Hill climbed,
breath shortened,
eye to eye we shall not meet.
Yet hip to hip we fall back ward
Into a sepia past.
Limbs of entanglement
remembering
this cavernous depth
you never fell into before.
A canopy of laced green
limits the vista.
Dawn cannot break,
our tussle holds it back.
Dispassionately now
here on this precipice,
as I watch you from the bottom;
you fail to see with eyes
which still cannot help
but adore the empty air.
This air cools the skin
and the mind,
as the grass tickles the spine
Flung back in redemptive pleasure
emotions sweep up and over,
as bodies expire within each other.
All this is past,
all is gone,
crushed to dirt and indescribable things.
turning over in crystallised light.
Flung skyward in expressive delight,
then groped
with passionate force.
Feet follow each other,
through this plenitude of grasses.
Hill climbed,
breath shortened,
eye to eye we shall not meet.
Yet hip to hip we fall back ward
Into a sepia past.
Limbs of entanglement
remembering
this cavernous depth
you never fell into before.
A canopy of laced green
limits the vista.
Dawn cannot break,
our tussle holds it back.
Dispassionately now
here on this precipice,
as I watch you from the bottom;
you fail to see with eyes
which still cannot help
but adore the empty air.
This air cools the skin
and the mind,
as the grass tickles the spine
Flung back in redemptive pleasure
emotions sweep up and over,
as bodies expire within each other.
All this is past,
all is gone,
crushed to dirt and indescribable things.
bed head!
I've been lying in repose all morning trying to disentangle myself from the constricting bed clothes of sleep and wading through the different layers of consciousness. The wind has been circling the house all night malevolently like a panther, it rolls and tumbles, scratching at the door. Why drag myself upwards, why should i take myself outside and fling my atoms to the wind? It would buffet me and bluster me with its icy forthright fingers, nothing would give me respite or shelter.
However i wonder if this safe existence hiding away in this darkened, warm room, is not simply another form of bondage! We like to call the chains that bind us, constrictions which the inauspicious stars endowed upon us, because it is too raw too difficult to acknowledge that perhaps we have been complicit in shackling ourselves, that is too sado-masochistic ! But we are the ones whom deduce from perception our state in the world, and is it not clear that perception is a human faculty which is open to interpretation as well? I could lift these limbs of mine into action and very often i force them to be fluid to follow the impulses the synapse reactions in my brain. However there is not a clear enough reason in my existence for this constant propulsion this constant gypsy unease which makes me uncomfortable in any situation that lies dormant and unmoving.
I fear a lack of progression but remain somewhat entombed within it. I need to be fully awakened from this slow decay of my brain and body. I am here lying awaiting the sharp knife which will plunge into me, the sharpness leaving me so cleanly severed from all that has come to pass, the bonfire of the vanities which erases all the rhetoric all the parody and falseness all the imitations all the times i have to bury my real expressive self under pretences of normality.
However i wonder if this safe existence hiding away in this darkened, warm room, is not simply another form of bondage! We like to call the chains that bind us, constrictions which the inauspicious stars endowed upon us, because it is too raw too difficult to acknowledge that perhaps we have been complicit in shackling ourselves, that is too sado-masochistic ! But we are the ones whom deduce from perception our state in the world, and is it not clear that perception is a human faculty which is open to interpretation as well? I could lift these limbs of mine into action and very often i force them to be fluid to follow the impulses the synapse reactions in my brain. However there is not a clear enough reason in my existence for this constant propulsion this constant gypsy unease which makes me uncomfortable in any situation that lies dormant and unmoving.
I fear a lack of progression but remain somewhat entombed within it. I need to be fully awakened from this slow decay of my brain and body. I am here lying awaiting the sharp knife which will plunge into me, the sharpness leaving me so cleanly severed from all that has come to pass, the bonfire of the vanities which erases all the rhetoric all the parody and falseness all the imitations all the times i have to bury my real expressive self under pretences of normality.
Eclectic images
Last night i managed finally to get myself into the darkest depths of east London, to a warehouse in bow for the esoteric and eclectic event known as The Living Room. Hosting a selection of performances in the basement room of this old industrial unit, guests are invited to crowd in amongst the mish mash of furniture and kitsch artifacts to watch the new, exciting and sometimes down right weird perform. From storytelling hoop la dancers and performance poets, to blues and ragtime acoustic guitar sets there is something for everyone over the course of the evening.With a bar selling cheap cider and a quaint tea party offering tea and cakes on a fantastic array of china you can sup to your hearts content, smoking indoors is also allowed. Also presented in the warehouse spaces in the complex is the sculpture exhibition of Charlie Gates, titled Something Stranger featuring her unique take on sculpture which includes elements of do it yourself taxidermy and surrealism as well as a clear fondness for the perverse and macabre. The night runs on every other thursday from 8 till late so if your in the mood for an eastern adventure check it out
Breaking/dismantling
Dawn Chorus.
Pink sunrise with argumentative children,
Whom i have to wake and dress,
Opening shutters to let in the morn
And jangling the keys down corridors
Clatter and chatter
Occasionally pierced with a full throated
'Fuck you, you fucking knob jockey'
As doors slam and showers rush.
Breathless trips traipsed up and downstairs,
God these smokers lungs are tight.
No fag till morning work is done,
And with five kick off's and a hair pull before toast
Amongst the china and voices
'Tis gonna be a long ol' day!'
Passed from care to education,
responsibility finished,
Its time for cigarette,
At back of the woodshed,
Ripe with the musk of damp earth
And Virginia green foliage
Contemplative inhaling
Eyes and thoughts
see round corners
and
Espy the carcass of discarded furniture
And visions flood
dusted down and made anew
Of flowers upon and books within
A zealous headteacher is all
'out with the old and in with the new',
So skip is full of antiques,
i can't say no to old furniture,
Destined for the bonfire.
And its heave - ho of cabinet,
Into car, woody arse out of the boot,
like hitchers thumb.
Precarious drive through
murky malevolent pines
till the wrestle with wood begins again
Sweated hefting, sledge hammer bashing
Of the old sofa which has to move over to make room
-breaking its spine
Whilst my ex-lover
the day's muscle for hire
looks on in jest
Its out with the old and in with the new for me too
This sofa where we first fucked-
I take to pieces in minutes
Each blow of hammer a release on this hot terse day
We struggle upstairs with walnut weightiness
And breathless with exertion
When all is in place
Sit back to smoke and contemplate
Our labours
Cryptic conversations in the garden,
A bugbear of attraction playing on my lips,
But a summer shower cools this lust
And its to work i must return.
I watch you leave,
And drive across the chase
my mind recalling
the taut line of leg
as it once moved
across crumpled bedsheets
Cornering too fast on slick tarmac,
This rusted car fails yet again
As lorry dominates the road
And i sit and wait for impact
Time seems illusory
and the world beautific.
Shards of glass momentarily catch the afternoon sun
obliteration is a million little reflections
beautiful and golden in this millisecond!
So quickly things can be destroyed
yet are slow and cumbersome to replace.
Pink sunrise with argumentative children,
Whom i have to wake and dress,
Opening shutters to let in the morn
And jangling the keys down corridors
Clatter and chatter
Occasionally pierced with a full throated
'Fuck you, you fucking knob jockey'
As doors slam and showers rush.
Breathless trips traipsed up and downstairs,
God these smokers lungs are tight.
No fag till morning work is done,
And with five kick off's and a hair pull before toast
Amongst the china and voices
'Tis gonna be a long ol' day!'
Passed from care to education,
responsibility finished,
Its time for cigarette,
At back of the woodshed,
Ripe with the musk of damp earth
And Virginia green foliage
Contemplative inhaling
Eyes and thoughts
see round corners
and
Espy the carcass of discarded furniture
And visions flood
dusted down and made anew
Of flowers upon and books within
A zealous headteacher is all
'out with the old and in with the new',
So skip is full of antiques,
i can't say no to old furniture,
Destined for the bonfire.
And its heave - ho of cabinet,
Into car, woody arse out of the boot,
like hitchers thumb.
Precarious drive through
murky malevolent pines
till the wrestle with wood begins again
Sweated hefting, sledge hammer bashing
Of the old sofa which has to move over to make room
-breaking its spine
Whilst my ex-lover
the day's muscle for hire
looks on in jest
Its out with the old and in with the new for me too
This sofa where we first fucked-
I take to pieces in minutes
Each blow of hammer a release on this hot terse day
We struggle upstairs with walnut weightiness
And breathless with exertion
When all is in place
Sit back to smoke and contemplate
Our labours
Cryptic conversations in the garden,
A bugbear of attraction playing on my lips,
But a summer shower cools this lust
And its to work i must return.
I watch you leave,
And drive across the chase
my mind recalling
the taut line of leg
as it once moved
across crumpled bedsheets
Cornering too fast on slick tarmac,
This rusted car fails yet again
As lorry dominates the road
And i sit and wait for impact
Time seems illusory
and the world beautific.
Shards of glass momentarily catch the afternoon sun
obliteration is a million little reflections
beautiful and golden in this millisecond!
So quickly things can be destroyed
yet are slow and cumbersome to replace.
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