Sucker (a cyberspace-only poem for AMT)

That kid's lollypop
Is the same size
As its skull.

For the record
The skull is not:
Red
Pink
Yellow
Green or
Blue.

Have you ever
Had that nightmare
Where you teeth
Break out?

Not just falling
Or coming loose,
But snapping,
Crunching,
Actually bitten
Out with the
Full force
Of your jaw?

Remember this when things seem too much

The garden smells of piss.
Did you hear the voices?
They were coming
From over the fence
Which places them square
In the woods.
Definitely teenagers,
Drinking talking loudly,
Asking each other questions,
Trying to hint at sex
Without dropping their guard
Or let the ones who they’re into
Know just how much
They’re into them.
Maybe they want to swap,
It feels like they’re living something
That I never had
But I’m probably wrong,
I just didn’t realise I had it
When it did.
I’m tired and unreliable,
My feet feel damp and
The sky keeps doing impressions
Of this dream I had where
Nothing happens but the
House still fills with dread.
I hear cartoon laughter, canned,
Voice not yet broken.
Gravel and stitches
Intercept this before
I arrive at the sorts of
Conclusions that cause
Nights to end with sudden
Starts.

Dark

The old man crumbles back
Into the debris of his living room,
Plastic glasses stained with scotch,
Flaked skin,
His clothes looking baggier,
More and more with each new day.
It’s morning but it’s still dark outside.

There are days that feel as hollow as emptied out skulls

The rain is making what are starting to look like
Watery spider webs all over the clothes line,
Drops spreading out in rushed but meticulous patterns,
Spreading out and pushing their way along the blue nylon.
There’s a slight breeze, I know because I can see the plants
In the borders wobbling around a little,
But it isn’t strong enough to shift the long metal prongs
Of the frame holding up the spider webs;
Maybe it jostles a tiny bit?
Diagonal to that are some trees in the woods that
Back onto our garden, hang
They’re all tall, hard to make out which is which from here.
I can also make out the balcony that sticks out from this big house
Right at the foot of the woods,
A hairdresser used to live there but he had a heart attack,
His wife might still there, but I couldn’t tell you for sure.
She’d have a different view of the trees from there.
There are lakes but neither of us can make them out from here.

Some Nico videos

A pledge

It feels like it would be easier
If we could just leave things as they are
Pause them at the exact moment
That I got my hands on you,
And my dick inside you
And then just make everything stop.
The end could be just a summing up
Like when words appear at the end of films,
And wrap things up
And let people know what happened
To the characters,
It tends to happen a lot
When a film is based on real life,
And when that life isn’t over yet,
When it’s impossible to complete a story
With any finality, or with any certainty.
It feels like an easier option than me
Ever having to tell you that I’m afraid
Of you letting me go, afraid of having
To fall back on my own –
Maybe I’m a coward,
Maybe I think uncertainty could be a pledge.

The red haired one looks like she'd scream

The red haired one looks like she’d scream. A lot.
Drive for about an hour without stopping.
Something special about blocking out the sound of the motorway
With this mix CD that I rescued from the mess,
Heavy orchestral style screaming which matches
The search that we’re currently trying not to romanticise
For fear of scaring one another off, for fear of I dunno
Actually caring??? Or admitting that we do.

We’re driving at night because it feels closer
To the wish that we both had as kids –
That we could become invisible –
It was a big deal the first time that that came up
In conversation;
We ended up holding each other and not
Being able to come up with anything that
Would have … you know.

Stop near a train station that reminds you of summer holidays
Spent with your grandparents.
I ask something just so that I can hear to you talk,
I’d started getting paranoid because the last twenty minutes
Since the CD stopped playing
Felt like someone’s hands were round my neck.

The red head is still on both our minds.
It’s weird but I think she might be starting to feel
A little like the invisibility thing.

Summer rectangles

The way that the rear view mirror frames her eyes makes them look like they’re part of some amazing modern art exhibition – the sort that make people feel alive and achey, throbbing. Her hair is pushed to one side. The sun keeps leaving flashes of summer on her fringe. He guesses that it will probably be surpassed – because she’s constantly excelling herself when it comes to how hot she looks – but he’s convinced that so far, this is the most beautiful that he’s ever seen her. He thinks about undressing her. He imagines that painting, photograph, work of art, moving from the frame and turning to look at him – the small rectangle that it exists as at the moment, extending into a full body, a face that he can pull closer, something to become part of. Summer never felt this special before.

Etched

Nick looked up from his diet coke and wished that he was still drinking. His friends were wasted. One friend in particular – was dancing and looking at him – beckoning him to come over and Nick presumed, put his hands on their body. Every day Nick had to convince himself that he was not in love with his friend. Every day he failed. Televisions in the pub whirled low rent graphics around and flashed up adverts for meal deals. When his friend went back to the bar he left. On the way home he tried to block out the world with his headphones. Every song became a soundtrack to things that had never happened but were etched in his memory.

Alain Robbe-Grillet

Hopes

1.
Taken from below; blurred.

2.
Obviously blown up. Face down into a pillow, face obscured, gold chain round neck.

3.
Messy brown hair. Shower scene. Just about make out someone else’s hand reaching out onto his shoulder.

4.
Stripy wallpaper, acne healing, drinking white wine.

5.
Bed made out like flowers.

6.
Looks like it’s staged in a kitchen; white cupboards. Looking down away from the person holding his head.

7.
Bent over bathroom sink. Evian bottle. Shirt pulled up.

8.
Attention grabber.

9.
Doesn’t look like fun.

10.
Forced into a ball, pushed into chair face first.

11.
Confused about who is meant to be doing what. Face of someone who should be doing something else.

12.
Lying down on grass. Bleach job gone orange. Looks genuinely upset, as opposed to bored.

13.
Sliding out of shot.

14.
My favourite. Something to do with the chest and shoulders.

15.
Fuck. I have to stop this.

You know me

Felt you undo the top few buttons of my shirt
My eyes are closed at this point my
Breathing isn’t returning to normal any time soon
Your finger nails into my chest
I’d wanted my hands all over you since I first
Saw you this morning a dream before standing
With you it’s the first time that I actually place
Myself square at the centre
Of masturbation fantasies
Usually I’m a bystander
But you bring me in
YOU draw ME in
Hmmm, dunno if you know how crazy that is
Or how special it is to finally feel like I can let myself
Be there without diluting whatever it is that I
Usually only care enough to peek in at
I so rarely cum from blowjobs
But yeah seeing that it’s you
Well I’ve told you this so maybe it shouldn’t
Be droned on
Let me grip your body
Let me pull myself inside you

The end of the world

It’s Daniel’s birthday and he’s been thinking a lot about the end of the world. He’s been thinking so much about it that he drew a picture. The picture is scribbled in crayon, lots of red, yellow, orange trim; fire. Daniel takes a pair of scissors and places each blade on either side of one his lone milk teeth. He squeezes – both hands on the handles – as hard as he can, the scissors slip, nick his gum sharply and he drops them on the floor. The tooth he was aiming to remove is unharmed but a watery stream of blood is dripping from the inside of his mouth. Daniel unlocks the gate the sets a clear division between his family’s front lawn and the rest of the street. A dazed stumble forwards and he looks at the sky. Thirty years later he can’t distinguish whether this memory is half dreamt or something that really happened.

8 songs by Autechre

“I’m coming home to you with my own blood in my mouth”: A celebration of the music of The Mountain Goats*

*An essay that I originally wrote for a day over at DC's:

The internet makes certain things easier – I was going to have a stab at 2003 – but Google told me that it was actually 20th January 2004. I’d not been having the best of times. The September previous I’d been kicked out of university. I’d made arrangements to start at a new Uni, but I had to wait a semester before I could start on my new course – an informal “cooling off period” apparently. I’d spent that time drinking everyday and getting myself in dumb, confusing situations. I couldn’t write. I felt lonely.

I’d never imagined John Peel not being there. I didn’t listen to every single one of his shows, but I’d check in fairly regularly. Quite often I’d scramble round in a tatty cardboard box filled with worn out cassettes that I kept under my bed and try to find one that I didn’t mind taping over. I’d pop it in my stereo and try to record anything interesting that I hadn’t heard before. I’d keep the cassette cued up and just as the song would start I’d start recording. If the song didn’t grab my attention I’d press stop and get the cassette back in place, ready for the next song – in case that would be the one. It was a strange way of doing it – it would have been easier to have just left the tape running for the whole show. I didn’t mind though – because I trusted John Peel – he’d been responsible for me finding out about a ton of amazing bands during my teenage years already.

I heard a few things that caught my ear. But nothing completely amazing. Then a new song started. Some clangy, lofi, country-esque guitars being strummed along to a big steady beat. It sounded ok. But it didn’t feel like it was going to save my soul from oblivion, so my finger hovered over the stop button. Then I heard the voice.

It sounded like a million things at once – manic, shaking, sad, urgent, untrained, perfect, desperate, triumphant – those are just eight – but yeah – there were so many more.

The song seemed to be about a group of wasters stuck in a house that they were all afraid to get out of. It sounded like the characters were all really close, but stuck together, rather than hanging out by choice – they sounded trapped, they sounded paranoid, they sounded like they were out of options. Then a really simple piano part entered the song (at 2:26 if anyone reading this wants to hear the exact moment that my heart fell to pieces) – it was just one note played over and over again in the background. And the singer – the guy with the voice­ – sang a line that sounded like it came from one of the greatest novels or poems that I’d never read:

“If anybody comes to see me – tell them they just missed me by a minute. If anybody comes into our room while we’re asleep – I hope they incinerate everybody in it.”

I sat on the floor of my bedroom, slumped back against the bed and cried.

I got the feeling that the people in the song – the tweakers – were doomed, but in a way I think I’d just been saved.

You can listen to the song here.

About a week later a friend gave me a handful of CDs to review for him music website. One of them was We Shall All Be Healed, and that song – the one with the lyrics that had blown the back of my skull off a few days before, was on there. It was fate.

I remember listening to the album all the way through and thinking “This is special”. I knew that I’d discovered a band that was going to be with me for the long haul. I started scurrying through their history – I discovered that John had already put out a ton of albums, that The Mountain Goats had been around for a while – from boombox recorded self released cassettes to the more recent stuff that had found them signed to 4AD Records. I realised that John Darnielle was one of the greatest lyricists that I had ever heard. In the short space that the average song provides, he was able to create characters and situations that felt so real that they pain and their confusion was so palpable that at times it was just too much. He would write albums about dead friends, couples who were heading for divorce, abusive stepfathers, people looking to be saved.

When it comes to music, or any art for that matter – you know – the good stuff – it’s hard to articulate just why something is so important to you. I guess that’s why it’s art, because it goes above and beyond what normal ideas or rational thought processes can explain. Something either gets you or it doesn’t. The Mountain Goats get me. They get me every single time.

Thomas

Flames dying out

***A burning football boot in dry woods.
***A note about why they hate people but love Satan.
***Someone who can’t keep his face straight.
***Constant cuts.
***The guy behind the camera not impressed with the giggling.
***Wincing at his friend’s ejaculation.
***Screwed up face.
***No way to finish things properly.

;) and expectation (for Chris Goode and Mike18)

He never usually gets to have this much fun
Usually he’s paired with an equally boyish looking Russian
Who looks just as amused/bored/disconnected/asleep
As he does

This time he’s actually placed in bed with someone
That makes the blood rush to his dick
Without someone giving him blue tablets
Or fluffing away at his bottom half

He’s finally rutting
blind
and manic

Lou Reed

dream about betsee

I had this really horrible dream
I’d been given a clue
A name: Betsee
The name was almost like something but not quite
Something to do with my dad
Some house – big old bricks
Used to be in TV show about fostered kids
Betsee was a transsexual
But a sick one
A dying one
I remember a blur of screaming at my dad in the dream
Asking him who Betsee was
Turns out they’d been fucking
Turns out they were both infected
Turns out they were both dying
Turns out they were both lonely
The dream smelt of death
Woke up and took till late afternoon to be able to make this list of bullet points
To make shake some feeling of stuff that you’re sometimes not meant to know about

My Word Cloud

OK so I was probably a little bored. I wanted to add something colourful to the blog so I made a Word Cloud (at wordle.net). The little gadget on their website asks you to insert a bunch of text (I used a mini extract from my novel) and then when you click the button, your text gets randomized and put into this neat little word cloud. Random post, I know, but hey ho. TM x

It's exactly a year ago today that my mother died. I don't know how today will feel. I feel lost. Last night my dad was drunk, aggressive, shouting, out of it. I want just a day to myself when I can try and worry about how I feel, and about how I'm grieving. I just don't get the chance. If these sporadic personal posts on here make it sound like things are just locked in some endlessly repeating loop then I guess that's because things are.

Thick yellow paint

Thick yellow paint rubbed across fleshy astonishing stomachs
Tattoo of stripes red and blue rimmed forearm
Pictured elbow deep in some random park queer
Tried to see his cock till we were disturbed
My friend said the funniest thing about a rocknrollsinger
About him being obvious disturbed and I felt cheesy for agreeing

Remember a grandmother referring to comics and magazines
As “books”

Ripped off cuticles
Ripped up magenta paint
Goose bumps and scratched shivers

Can you think about spending that long away from
Anybody you know and not feel that the air is at a thousand
Yards and that the snow feels laced with polystyrene

Don’t put time limits on this
Don’t tell me what time this happened
Don’t let me know what went on when I wasn’t there

Ok so if death doesn’t scare you
Then I might as well be some clichéd
Piano crescendo that never even
Touched the sides before you forgot
What was supposed to happen to us

5 forthcoming albums that I've been getting antsy about

The Mountain Goats - The Life of the World to Come

I love the fact that John Darnielle just doesn't seem to have an off button. The Mountain Goats consistantly put out heartbreaking albums (last years Heretic Pride is so dear to me due to the time I spent with it while my mother was dying, as are previous albums that kept me company at other less than great moments), and JD is always writing about black metal and boxing over at his awesome Last Plane to Jakarta blog (see the links section). I know that this album will make me feel good.

Jim O'Rourke - The Visitor

Jim O'Rourke is maybe my favourite musician. His approach to music has even influenced the way that I have approached certain pieces of writing. Now, I guess there never really seems to be a shortage of O'Rourke releases out there, but this is one that has been a long time coming. It's the first brand new work in ages (a lot of the time O'Rourke releases tend to be taken from some seemingly bottomless archive of older recordings and experiments that have been stockpiled over the years), and The Visitor is also the first new O'Rourke release on Drag City for a good few years. It's been talked up as being more in the vein of Bad Timing than his more "out there" compositions - although saying that does make me feel like I'm being slightly reductive, because to be honest some of O'Rourke's most "radio friendly" (there I go again - ugh) stuff actually employs far more "experimental" (I'll stop soon!) techniques than the records of drone and minimalist stuff. I now hate myself for some of what I just wrote - but hey - I gave myself one paragraph. I'm pissing my pants in anticipation for The Visitor - 'nuff said.



Weezer - Raditude

Okay so the last Weezer album wasn't my favourite by far, but I continually live in hope. In fact, The Red Album did fascinate me in a lot of ways - and even the songs that I really couldn't stomach did get my brain mulling over certain things. But hey - I dunno, I have a very high level of respect for Rivers and his songwriting brain. But yeah - this time I'm hoping for an album that gets me high on its tunes rather than the meta-narrative hodge podge of misunderstood academic and cultural semiotics that it sets off in my fuzzy brain. Ideally I'd like the album to do both. I like the first single but it's very hard to tell where this one is gonna go .... I'm waiting and biting my nails ...

Fuck Buttons - Tarot Sport

Fuck Buttons seem to have a lot of detractors and I'm totally sure why. I guess they seemed to be everywhere for a while. Maybe they just had a run of slightly under-par shows or something, because a lot of criticism that I've heard from friends seems to be based on when they played live. I thought the first album was great though - very special - and I wrote a lot while I listened to it. So I'm pretty excited about this forthcoming sucker. Can't wait.

Grinderman - ????

I've put this one last because it's the album that I know the least about. All I know is that Grinderman have been working on a new album and it will be released at some point in the not too far off future. Frustrating as not knowing anything else is, that'll do me for now.

Assorted photographs I took in Paris, part 2

Assorted photographs that I took in Paris, part 1.