Ocean 2009.

Like wandering the streets at 7pm,
Looking for breakfast in this bustled city.
People in business suits walking along side folk with their heads shaved on bikes.
Who else could create such thoughts within me?
Sitting beside it, or glancing over steep walls into the water.
Records you can see through the lake and streams of grass for us to lie,
Summer wasps in the air,
And lack of obligation for our adolescent stares.
Slowly giving ourselves the summer out,
And slowly we begin to show ourselves the lives we want.
Somehow tearing us apart at our joined hands like pulling paper from its rings.
The letters I wrote you and your right hand in mine.
I see your careless mouth but your thoughtful eyes turn over the scenery,
Just as though you never did see it.
Within your head you think you'd spend day after day with me,
But within the miles between us we could spend a dozen other lives.
And don't you fear missing that?
Cold to think I may leave you, yet missing,
and miss,
Are two very different words.
Explanations you just didn't want to hear over a cup of coffee in the cafe on a rainy autumn afternoon.
Trains that don't take me all the way to where you live,
And buses that run me off the beach sides.
Standing on the pebbles, undetectable in the darkness of the summer night,
Each one as damp as the ocean that threw itself upon them.
And my shoes wearing thin and through them, bare legs and a horror dress,
And my darling in his suit.
Watching what he can see of me darting about the ocean side, down by the burnt out pier.
Safe in the knowledge my feet are still on the ground as the pebbles are forced into one another.

Oh of all the other lives we could be leading,
The different clothes we could be wearing and the people we might know,
The jobs we may slave at and the social we may partake;
But tonight, that night, in the past we, you and I, stood together on a breezy well-known beach.
And we knelt in the stones,
Each of those a part of the mountain that held us up.
And the ocean collapsing black upon itself, the stars overtaken by floating fires.
Shadowed faces almost as haunting as the skeleton that emerged from the sea.
No horizon or cut in our skyline,
Just constant darkness at our feet.
The black that continued rolling threateningly toward us, then pulling out softly as if a tease eternal.

Perhaps sleep should come? I wondered almost as much as Trevor's wife did the keys.
Rolling images and music that no longer is made nor sold.
Footsteps between us on the pathways of a seaside town,
And our bodies beside walls of religious B&Bs.
Not wanting to part the us that was between every one else.

Tonight I see summer breezes I once detested that remind me of moments I once missed.
Meaningless teenage romances and conspiracies,
And faces I no longer care to see nor fears I no longer emulate so powerfully.
You came into a life that messed itself up and attempted straightening out a few kinks,
Before falling for them.

I came across this piece dated 11th August 2009. It is not a love story.

Salt and Sand.

As of late, I have caged that washed-out summer feeling, and once again it is encasing my emotions. Death has reared it's claw to another familiar face and voice and distracted with the masses elsewhere. It's being disgusting at the moment, I am not sure why, not that any are, but I feel it too common a place.
A friend, not so wise - it must be said, once said to me after the death of a very close loved one to us both;
''How old are you now? 19? -Here, he shook his head, fiddling with his thinly rolled cigarette- It's all down here from here, one after the other now''.
Of course, he was referring to deaths. It was a terrifying thing to hear, no doubt. But I remained calm, and responded only with a tilt of my still mind, a glance at him that he did not return, and the idle fiddling of the gift from her who had passed in my hands.
I have not been in that living room for quite some time, but then, it was exactly as she had left and decorated it.

Much of this, many of these thoughts, have provoked nostalgic, dry, white thoughts of the East end streets. The common, natural, and ever flowing longing for returning 'home' has returned. I see the crowded buses without faces, the tube journeys and the summer heat between Dagenham east and Barking. The cool tease of the tiled floor of Chadwell heath station, the dusty dry streets just outside of his home. The suspicious eye of the shopkeeper as I buy a countless amount of Jamaican Hardo Bread, listening to the likes of Amy Winehouse on my i-pod. The cracked, white cool of his kitchen floor, the strange and unidentifiably comforting scent of his then home. His final home.

The sky here at present is muggy, it is grey and lightless, thankfully, but the heat still rests at the door.
It is a home, that is for sure, but I find it rather difficult to connect these two places. It is not the first time that I have felt like seperate people, that I have been torn right in half for want of one place and need of another.
My life is pleasant, magical and astounding now, oh the thought that ran through me just weeks ago;
'It's my turn now, to live my life'.
My heart screamed out and turned in my chest, I have more than one home, how fortunate I am. But the people, those within those homes now, what do they scream?

And yes, I am having my summer block. Writing is difficult to structure, thoughts will not meet my lips with ease and my skin is tightening beneath the glare, but still I am here and to try. This rolling upset, this longing, these photographs, yes, they will always breathe down the back of my neck strangely alluring and soothing...
But what I have before me, oh what I have.. There are not words for the astoundment. I have not a way, yet, to describe how fortunate I feel. How scared that my lips tremble a smile. It is true, some people have it handed to them upon a plate, and squander it mercilessly. But at the moment, I feel like the only one. I grip this beautiful thing in my hands like the sand on my so-missed seaside, discovering silver shells and shimmering pebbles as the grains fall.
Water collapses at my feet.

Yes, I do miss you all, but I am aware that your lives are a little too advanced to be missing me too.
Moving photographs so I can see the waves, a stone heart beats softly into the sand.
I'll never know another day like the one that my uncle and I sat, getting rather off it on Rose from plastic cups, upon the seaside. Oh the pebbles and the sand, we waited for something that never did come about, throwing rocks at a coconut on the water's edge. It was our sunny evening.
The train back, the scent of sand and salt, tearing faces from the news papers and putting them upon others.
My hair was claret and blue, yours, of course, was slap-head. And we did.
'Your wondering now, what to do, now you know, this is the end'.
Taking notice of my music, reminding me of yours. You truly wanted to know me.
Oh how distracted we all were.
And then, there were the nights. How voices still run through the memory, the smell of whiskey and wine. The sight of Jack bottles in the bin outside, the constant damp of the garden. Amy wording the back ground, dices rolled and how I always managed to 'get the glam questions'.

It has grown cooler, the nights will begin to leak in earlier now. I ask the winter, the winter I have confessed my Love to, to treat me well this year. To be kind.

The Young Rambler.

The creatures that lie in the beds here,
Are the ones that once donned my bedroom walls.
I need not fear the monsters here,
For I did reside before them,
My deepest fear equipped masculinity,
It was caped in woes older than me.
When my years begin to gather,
I have written and I have witnessed the matter.

Make this true, within this natter,
I have got these things inside of me.
Rest child's eyes, and lie in the cool of stone.
The damp and the dry,
The aching, the fingers that pry,
My window was never a safeguard,
My humming nervous system did flail.


Damned away from the sun,
The same old monsters run.
As a child, I knew they would come,
During enjoyment, they waited with heaving chest and narrowed claw.

Rotted teeth and gaps in gum,
The glorious creatures shadowed.
The earth from my garden wrapped around each thumb,
Each claw, each tear in ancient, leather skin.

Is it the quiet of night that doth draw the worry,
Aware, was I, that my skeleton led within me.
Had mere younger years seen but enough?
They lurched in their places, even inhaling they bring a dull hiss.

And could my childhood ears have perked,
I pictured them at the window,
Even knowing they lived within the walls.
Still do they crawl at my hair, do they whisper at innocence.

'Oh what on earth is even holding you together?!'
And hear I, only, the response;
'Oh what is it that puts the colour in your skin?'.

-
- Notes to this piece;
Even as I speak the light dims and flickers, as if riding on my pulse. When will these demons leave me? The bell rang only once as I spoke 'The monsters were always faceless in the barn of my childhood home'.

Rain on car windows, memoir.

So the boiler bloke is here. It is vaguely awkward. I mean, a situation where you walk in and for some reason open the tea cup cupboard is always a winner. My blank gaze did him no confidence after this, and I recommended I show him where the boiler actually was.
I suppose it's in the job description some where - Walk in, open cupboard, find boiler. He does seem pretty simple. Conversation died at 'Well here's the boiler, move any thing if need be, I'll be downstairs'. In fact it did.
Up and down the stairs he goes, not a word, just expressionless glances of a man doing what a man does to survive.
I wish and pray (in my own athiestish way) that I should never have the misfortune to look so very impassionate in my life. Dear lord, i just wrote that as impassionation. My fingers are aching to write and I have been denying this freeing pleasure of rambling, and so they taunt me with words that I am rather sure do not exsist. Although that one seems as though it may.

I had a night of restless tire, just last. It was unsettling but calm and quiet. I felt not like eating, not like drinking, vaguely sickly and bodily tired. Each muscle felt as those bruised do. My eyes heavy and dry, my lips parted and dumb. And yet, sleep would not come.
Instead, as I threw down the games controller and laid my head upon familiar pillow, I recieved slow flash backs and peculiar memory. Fearful days. The music I hid within. The bands on my wrists of which i fiddled with. The white sun shining in, acting as a comfort blanket to all else. And myself, cold with fear on otherwise delightful spring afternoons.
One evening, after school, the memory portrays. Mother, and my then-stepdad wordlessly mentioned that we were going to a resturant, not far, but a drive none the less. I had seated myself in the back, both earphones in, coated in teenage angst, listening to this;
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VhiwRhPS1O0

The motorway was dusty and dry, the plants skimming its edges were dull and lack-lustre for spring, the washed out sun giving them a limp appearance as the cars swept them lazily in succession. Mother and 'him' chatted rather idly, but dispassionate, all ordinaire. Not like a couple in love, not at all. A couple left, that's what they portrayed.
A resturant meal with your now-family should be something of or like pleasant. Sweet, quiet, a treat. They tried speaking to me, I am aware, although there were taunts there were also comments of schooling and friendships. Light and disintersted. As they sat opposite me, my form lingering to the left of the table as if ready to make an exit, I felt as one might when being at a job interview. I kept my head down, tucked my hands in and out of my red, cotton jacket, and fiddled with the spikes adorning my arms.

The resturant was family oriented, warm and welcoming. Picture and feel this.
The oranges and reds of a plush carpet, very much like your typical Harvester. The ivory and creams of simple walls, parted by occasional beams and wooden detailing, all polished to appear older than the fibre glass they likely are. Hints of gold in the detailing, photos of farmland and bowls of fruit, soft in stroke and copied in print. A fireplace out of sight to me, not burning, but maintaining the character of the room.
The white light of an afternoon sun slipped in through the low windows, adorned in heavy red and golden curtains, it lay upon the shimmering cutlery and circular polished stained tables lazily. It gave each glass it's own source of light, aching my eyes and giving the overall effect of clean. Of sanitary. Of safety.
Not like the drear and brown of the glass mugs we had used in the house we had not long escaped from.
Only two years before this had public places given me sanctum. I felt safe in them, with other people around, other people who probably had, in my eyes, warm homes, sweet pets, and a light that stayed on all night. But not I, for home was fear in simplicity.

This day of which I speak, i gave up. But torn was my young self, and very young I was. I had not broken into a sweat, but I felt that similar trickle, cool and threatening, slip down my spine. That fear that caught in my throat when an image ran across my mind, and for time and time i could not shake it's irrational shaking of my wellbeing.
Too afraid to see tomorrow, and yet too afraid also to die. Each, for me, seemed to bring the same unknown, the same loathing and cul-de-sac path to follow. I felt it cruel that I should have only the two as a choice. And running from either was not an option, for run, we already had. This was my destiny.
Oh how warm a light could have seemed, shining back from where I had ran from.
And yet i knew that even there, the lights were out at night.
I looked to the little public that had gathered in this resturant the same night as us. I remember none of them, as few as there were, i remember no faces, no gender, no races. Only jealousy.
Might I have a mind as blank as yours? I assumed as I looked to them, eyes wide with hopelessness. You with clean slate, may I not live simply and happily as you!
From the age of 10, I often wished myself amnesia. We would go on many a long car journey at that age, back and forth, hiding, running, through the night and early dawn. I would either lie beneath a sheet in the back of the rickety van amongst 'his' tools, or slumber in the back of a car well tracked. The rain would pound at the car, or the clear sky was breath heavily upon the windows. And I would wish, with all my might and adolescent wonder, I would pray to an unknown force that tomorrow, I may wake without memory.
I made no hold backs, no 'let me just remember this or that', just simple and utter 'I don't want it any more'.
Of course, this irrationality was pathetic, and young of I, and had I forgotten the memories I cherish I would not forgive myself inwardly, of course, however, I may have had my wish granted, and never have known of such a thing ever exsisting, only the memory of asking for it to happen in the first place.

A journey late into the night, 2 or 3 in the morning, to the east and then back again, or vice versa. I awoke in the back seat, and much like a childhood memory of a nightmare once had, I burst into tears. I cried and simply cried, and my mother in the front seat responded just as she had in the Nightmare memory;
Harsh words and misunderstanding. I made up an excuse, just as I had done as a 4 year old, and told her not of the things I had seen.

And I never did.

A small piece based on an Apocolyptic Zombie dream I had last night.
As it was written, as of yet, no changes.


The sun was shining in the hazy, refreshing way that it only could in the winter as I left the pub that day. And I do have to admit, I felt as if leaving The Kings Horse pub was to be my mistake of the day, for it had been good to me the two years I had worked there, even if most fellow staff hadn't been. It had kept me warm in the winter, and equally as warm in the summer, introduced me to many life friends and needed aquaintances, and told me stories of the likes I never would have dreamt of knowing. I lacked tan from missing sunlight due to it's hours, and my eyes were now permnantly sensitive to sunlight.
The decision wasn't there. I had to simply leave, a life was some how still on the outside, and from a general acknowledgement of life skill, I had to move on. I couldn't hide in a pub forever, especially not The Kings Horse, my Love/Hate and over again boozer.
The cobbled pathway down the hill was quiet, I wasn't sure what time of day it was, but it was certainly very early. It was a picturesque day, damp still lining areas of the road, a bitterly cool bright sun illuminating a glare to which i winced. I kept up my limp, and thought ironically of never having another 'lock-in' again, but my face showed no expression, and i tilted my head.
I could hear a mumbling of people, as i slumped down the Victorian Steps that lead to the main road, and I knew it had begun. They were clear as day, only I was not sure if they were close, and whilst I was nervous, I had an genuine comforting feeling that this was how it was now.
The usual sound of traffic was simply not there, not a whisper of a cars breaks let alone acceleration at a traffic light. The murmurs continued, and at the steps end a few stragglers of early morning people slid by. I couldn't see any faces, the suns glare aided me in making no eye contact.
I crossed, squinting, aware that had I been able to take them in, some of these people were probably just like me.

A dull mist led upon the river that ran through the City, travelled quietly along side me as I walked, dragging my foot. Tendrils of it began to run up the walls before softly cascading back down into themselves again, and seagulls croaking could be heard between the surrounding murmurs.
Somewhere a bin crashed to the ground and a loud murmur slowly faded out. I made no response as stragglers passed me.

I turned to follow the girl in the red hooded jumper, i partially regret that decision. She was being dragged along by a small dog, stumbling also, but she had a bag. I was aware she was like me, and I was going no where in particular.
"You're not very good at this, are you" she said in a low, achey tone, as if she hadn't spoken since she had woken up.
The door to the flats gave a quiet thud as it closed, but was over taken by the sound of running outside, and a small crash, and so went unheard by the stragglers. We creaked up the stairs, a window up high let in the hazed sunlight, a wave of dust surrounding us like glitter.
"It's all we have, here" She spoke again, as she turned to me at the top of the stairs, inserting a key and beckoning me in. Her dog took the invite and ran inside accordingly. He was the only one acting normal.
Silence went on in her flat, the murmurs outside, again all that was there. It was bright, and airy, and I'm sure had i cared to look, the view from here of the river was probably lovely. We sat in her hallway, doors on most sides of us, it was slightly cluttered with objects I didn't care to take in, and the dog fussed me.
"We'll just get by" she smiled seriously. "I'll sort you something to eat. Have you come from others?"
I shook my head, although there were a couple of us left at the pub, I recalled locking the cellar and making my decision to leave.
"Well that's just better I suppose, more simplistic, the less to worry about". We were sat on the floor, and she was going through the bag she had had on her person outside.
She began to speak, of what i believe was about a room mate of hers, whom I'm not sure was living here any more, for whatever reason. My eyes went to the window, a reflection of light from the river aided the sound of some one running as a blur went through it. I shivered.
"Do you want to stay?" My eyes flicked back to the girl, she had a look of innocence now, as if she hadn't had company for a while and was beginning to feel it.
"Tell me about you're flat mate" I asked quietly with a smile. And as she spoke I sensed a movement behind her. She didn't watch me as she spoke, a newly released fear riding over her that I failed to pick up on too strongly. Two doors behind her were propped open, both seemed to have obstructions near the door, that seemed to be a bed and a cot.
The movement again, this time i focused my eyes beyond the girl.
Wrapped in a duvet, a rounded, flesh like shape rolled back slightly. The light coming in from behind it made it difficult to see the detail of the sphere, as did the blue rug around it.
And then it slid open. As it did, the one in the room next door moved also. Smaller, and lower in the cot, but it too looked at me.
"I made the right choice, being here alone... There were several occasions where she left the door open..." the girl went on.
I felt as though I could hear it, the sound of the sphere through the door looking at me. It's flesh fell bacward, and the pupil of the eye adjusted, and I was aware it could see me much more clearly than I could it.
"You've seen?" She suddenly asked with a pale blunt voice. "They came not long after those did.." She looked to the window again. She had no indication that she feared me knowing what she had here. Her dark eyes were as colourless as they had been in the street.
She was good, good out there and in here, she had forgotten what expression could be all together.

Twelve Pounds and life would go on, I visited my father not long later and continued to be irrational in my choosing. I had always enjoyed the sea, and a good friend of mine now lived that way. In a secluded area of the seaside by the rocks, I hired a small boat, and awaited the tide to come in and she and I spoke. There were men on the beach, and none were acting. They did not ask for money, although hiring the boats was most certainly their old business.
Since then, the sea has shon silver.

Oh gosh, nothing's meaning any thing.
Here, round again. Circles in the clubs again.
Turning on my feet once more,
to songs I've never heard before.
And still wishing for a mike and something painful.
To enter a room and make you want to cry.
So sliding hands did nothing any more.
A year and a half and an over the mark.
Lips much too bitter and grips not so tight.


How could I not? When there's a cliche attached to every thing said.
Coming third was never best.
But i clung to the number, claiming it's luck,
Until i rolled over, thirtieth.

Just like clinging to rails on the underground,
And the turn rolls the heads of every drone onboard to Victoria.
Each end of each Metro page wilting like a rose dying fast,
Each eye widening as a book leans away from them.
The black outside.
Underside.

Taking my own pen to other people's paper seemed a way to put it out.
Feeling as though every thing should be written,
as not to forget any details in future.
But what am i saving them for exactly ?
No one really wants to hear them,
just to respond with their own opinion.



~

Bits.

Did she run away again.
Making so much 'little effort' that the walls ached from all that approached,
intense in waiting.
Could've carried out three different notes,
but she stuck on the latter of things.
Perhaps raised voices of aged women scared her.
Perhaps tea wasn't just 'sweet enough'
And dreams of emotions she'd felt before, but visually
did thrive through the nights the heating was left on.
Moments like bitter felt, wordless greeting cards
and Momentums such as clean, round pots of moisturizer
and lactoste milk.
I recalled the smell of the wood by the fridge,
as a child sneaking chocolate from it's noisily accessible depths,
But kinder faces shon over.

She wondered where to go,
but only once already on the train.
The leaves driving past on the trees at her booth's window,
swished into one such as a paint pallette tilting,
And with it her head lulled,
and a passing stranger called for 'any one who was a doctor'
And her eyes felt so dry, cracking open, so raw.
Her throat was a blister of a direct route to the depths of her insides.
But pale warmth, the fridge as the child left out in the sun.
Losing will, the dull white of the room around her gave a metal clunk of a sigh from it's walls.
She only looked as far as the post at the end of this metal framed bed,
and he writhed one de-frosted hand beneath the scratch of tight cotton spread.
The door blended in with the walls in this room,
and she settled upon calling it Ivory,
not cream.

Oh look at that, said the creak in the wall.
And a birds shadow skipped over the room,
The bones in her neck, attaching her head
scathed percutaneously.
The sun was grey today, and the trees were a canvas just done,
but the houses outside, shon different oranges, brick-a-brack sweet
and council fresh.

Homely, she lifted the blanket from tuck. Swayed her dress along with legs around and down from the bed.
Such pretty shoes, her broken toes fit wonderfully.
Did she already know?
Hearing the wireless in the other room.

A glance, a shudder, a complete freeze within her stomach,
did bring empathy to disco rooms.
'You've inspired me'
And not long later, half the bottle was full.
Optimistic girls in tights and waistband-dresses
Such ways did the boys pop their collars that the combe did protude from the sleeve.

But what do i think ?!
What do i think?
I kept recalling the fridge until some one gasped
a claim of not knowing what i think,
but questioning me once more with my own output.


Conversation. Small talk appears to be creeping up, and luring beside us. I hate it when it reaches that point due to physcical contact.

subtle.

No it isn't a week since any thing,
and i can't tie the wrist today,
and the cat on the back of my hand look just like misplaced veins.
And breath.
Second time round never happened for darlin',
he said 'Sugar, I should've came over'.
No one's ever good enough.
If you are still bones, then your hands are currently around my neck.

I tried to cut loose strands of hair, that hung out of line
but they wept sourly,
and the metal of the scissors began to ache in my hand.
Worse still,
the sun began to shoot rays through the bathroom window,
i felt my skin wretch as it thirstily drank down all that i had deprived it of,
since becoming one for the moon.
The hands on my neck loosened, but held
And my eyes suddenly shot a clearer view.
I delved the scissors into the mirror, and the strands leaped in fright,
I scraped my palm and fist across it's shattered surface,
and held my face to it's mirror's chest.
Somehow my eye's stayed open
And the mirror looked at my shattered self,
and judged upon words i had only yet thought.

God why did he come here,
i knew he was downstairs,
I heard his mug hit the table, i heard his keys scrape the counter.
Any more minutes, and he'd be at the door.
Any more hours, I'm sure he'd be demanding less.
At the kitchen table, my mug was too hot, but i clasped it with wide, subtle eyes.
At the door, the straps on my shoes just too tight
But he smiled at dull pain so much more than my fright.
So i turned to the window of the front door,
my reflection intact.
Marks on my skin, showed that of the bathroom,
before he could see what a mess I'd left on his tiles,
I whispered a few words, and left him a note.
Revealing to him,
That i should burn before choke.