stupid

 people are stupid     that’s my defence     external forces      motivate my actions      I’m one of the masses       singularly  thick      collectively crazy       I don’t sweat it    I drown my sorrows       you won’t catch me      with native intelligence      and you can’t pin me down      with your phony logic     I’ll keep the council     of my blind      and foolish heart    I say we press on    and dance with the devil      he has credentials    that ensure his success    we don’t have to think      we just have to follow      we don’t have to march      while he makes us run

frankenstein

 there’s an air of quiet death about this house     there are ghosts in every corner     there are shadows      there are doubts      I’m being scrutinised by the inner eye     I’m naked and alone      with nowhere left to hide    I murdered you     to resurrect you once more    in the laboratory of my mind      you’re a stain that still needs scrubbing     in the life I left behind      I buried you deep     and hid the shovel     but you’re back again      and causing trouble       it’s a curse to have a conscience       I thought that we were quits     I don’t need to hear you crying     I counted every tear you shed    don’t make me relive this shit    just get the fuck away from here      get out of my fucking head

let me be

 day breaks bleak and hard    my head is fit to burst     I hate waking up in the cells     I’m nobody’s hero now      I can’t account for myself      but I know that I’m still beautiful      in a ragamuffin way    I listen to my heart    I let it speak for me      there’s no mistake in nature     and there’s no mistaking me      I’ve broken many laws      in my efforts to break free     so lock me up again     throw away the key    break me on the wheel     or fuck off and let me be

shrouds

 tell me brothers and sisters       how well do you sleep?     do you lie down gently with acquiescent lambs?      or run in terror with ravenous wolves?      do you follow secret paths known only to your heart?      are the thoughts that await you there a burden to your mind?     because we abhor what we fear      and we fear what we don’t understand       that’s ok    just don’t think about it       avert your gaze     hide your eyes     bury your fear somewhere deep inside     where it will learn your secrets as it festers in the dark     the lord of death knows each of us by name    he nestles in our sheets as we sleep      and we walk with the ghosts and spectres he sends to haunt our dreams       

we’ve been to some dark places      that’s the topography of life    this world is made of fear and death    there is love of course    but that’s just on the surface     deep down we are motivated by fear     and our greatest fear is death     but if we give it no name      perhaps it will go away       like a bad dream    or a spell of rain     it’s three in the morning     we’re wrestling angels and losing again     but we’ll keep up the pretence as long as we can      there are burdens enough with the coming of day       we’ll shake off our shrouds as we roll out of bed      in the land of the living there’s just no room for the dead

archaeology

poor boy was a loner    poor boy was a shadow     he’d been banished from the tribe       because he had this one weird gimmick     you could say it was his calling      poor boy used to dig up ghosts       he found ghosts everywhere      and people didn’t like it       the ghosts didn’t like it        poor boy didn’t like it either        but he was obsessed with his ghosts        he was so obsessed he became a ghost too      and gradually faded away       soon to be forgotten     but I’ve seen him  by the canal      and on the viaduct too         in the company of ghosts    in the melancholic gloom

 

bipolar distemper

 the blunt edge of depression     rolls across my portion of the sky     it’s gonna rain again    nobody can gauge when or why    somebody help me     I’m coming undone       we all have secret sorrows       I’ve had enough of mine     I woke up into a nightmare      I might never sleep again    some have wounds that do not show       but they bleed     they bleed from the soul    I’m not helpless – I’m hopeless      they call it suicidal ideation    my life is a burning building     I may have to jump     it’s burn or dive      there is a terror beyond falling    the choices here are stark   

bipolar distemper is a side effect of living      and living is a disease with one cure     and one cure alone    I won’t cry in public     I won’t rend my clothes       I’ll weep on the inside    I’ll weep from my soul      there’s no comfort to be had    no magic pills    my soul carries more scars    than living tissue   this is not sadness       sadness will pass like the common cold     this is cancer     a cancer of the soul      I feel so ashamed        to carry this burden     I’ve done something wrong     something so huge   I can’t even comprehend it      the devil has hold of my soul     and from where I sit now       he’s welcome to it

 

the devil

they say it takes one to know one    that the devil knows his friends    and I’m not ready to repent    I’m not through sinning yet       I don’t care what people say    I don’t care what they think     if I pour the poison    I can bear the shame     I’ve often been the villain     in other people’s schemes     but now I set the agenda      we’ll see where that leads      I might play the devil      I might just steal his clothes     I’d rather play the devil    than someone you don’t know     it can take a little evil    to get your business fixed     but they say the devil is worldly wise     and he knows all the tricks

alligator tears

when I was young       in my summer season     I tarried with junkies, thieves, and other lepers       I took the drugs they brought me       and used the words they taught me       those words are old now       teach me some new ones     or leave now in silence       don’t stain my solitude       with worthless gestures         there’s not much time left      and I’m busy writing eulogies

my best years are past     but I wouldn’t buy them back       the past is a curse     that still beats inside me      I’m not complaining       merely observing      if you catch me weeping        don’t be concerned      now and again     I’m struck with nostalgia     it’s a vicarious vice     for people my age     my erstwhile companions have all crossed over     their ghosts tell stories that play on my mind

stronger

 I made you    my seed gave you life      flesh of my flesh     you belong  to me      you’re a chip off the old block       but I’ll be old and grey         before you get the better of me        you’ve gotten too big for your boots      coming on all high and mighty       you need some bringing down boy       get your feet back on the ground      you’ll feel the back of my hand          it’s the only thing you understand      there’s only one god in this house       and while you’re under my roof      I will be obeyed       and I will be adored      because everything I do     I do it for you     one day you’ll thank me      for making you stronger         one day you’ll thank me      for making you stronger

war again

 all words have failed us     so we turn to the violence boiling in our hearts       we’re talking war again       our words are crimson     with the justification of blood      an eye for an eye       the blindness of lust     but we will have justice       we shall wreak revenge       we shall kill in the name of humanity        vouchsafe our security   through the shedding of blood     we must defend our lives      and love the bloody sword      the only good enemy      is a dead one      they’re not even human    number them with their murdered children       their hearts are  breaking now      god grant them peace       when this madness is done

 

sorrow falls like rain

 

you can’t betray your enemies   you can only betray your friends   and when you stick the knife in  that’s when the friendship ends   there’s no betrayal without trust    there’s no hatred without love   I didn’t think about betrayal   I thought only of my lust   but I try not to look behind me     where I see only ashes and dust

now my joy has gone   but my sadness lingers on   it’s a sadness I have earned   and regret that I have learned    my heart is twisted black    because I know there’s no way back    I murdered the love we shared  and destroyed the life we’d built   I’d rather I had died   than shoulder all this guilt

sorrow falls like rain   washing hope down the drain    no-one ever told me    that grief would feel this way    I drink not to forget   but to keep the pain at bay   no amount of booze    can make it go away   I drink until I’m numb   but the sadness stays the same   for time and time again   my anguish and my shame   will chase me through the shadows   but my sorrow will remain

leaden

 

the margins are minuscule    in this cruel season       it’s hard enough to raise a buck    never mind a smile     I sing with the crows     and bathe in the dark     cold fibre is scant reward     for all the bareback adventures     and romantic misdemeanours     that blot my copy book     (kudos to the phallus imperator)

my chapped lips      and  caffeine smile     reveal there’s fear in my monkey     his silver tongue and leaden heels      have me hobbled in the blocks    those softer metals conduct static       directly to the brain pan      and my blood’s impurities      leave a tell-tale stain on the inside  but there’s no point in concealment     no-one gives a fuck what’s written there anyway

oxydation

countless measures of synthetic junk      have arranged my psyche as euphorically drunk    I experiment with words and their rhythmic possibility      and I’m all wired up with a new found mobility    I take inspiration from needle and spoon      to dance with the devil and howl at the moon

I found my ease in an exotic narcotic    a new alchemy that’s darkly  hypnotic      I mix my medicine with booze and snake oil     and then cook it all up in aluminium foil      I study my dreaming at my own leisure   with a bitter concoction that I’ve learned to treasure     and I savour its taste as the ultimate pleasure  

but my little boat is slowly submerging     as the beast from the deep  is likewise emerging      I need his poison the way I need air    but he promises bounty that just isn’t there     he dangles his riches  just beyond reach     and holds fast to my flesh     like a blood engorged leech

grave expectations

 

I should develop myself a positive hustle     forge some new gimmick     and take it a million miles away from confinement and isolation    yeah    I’m shaking off the leg irons that shape my footprints into the too familiar patterns of helplessness and despair

fetch me a doctor to inoculate my spirit    I’m crashing out of this jail    before new variants of old killers nail my lid shut    I’ve seen those monsters     they were six miles high     and loaded with terminal velocity    they have my name and post code etched in memory     there’s no negotiating with their dark intentions    they’ll seize my lungs and pump me dry    it’s a matter of time    and time is limited by nature  I want to live    if only for the moment    I want to live like I’ll never die

 

 

monsters

 

someone just walked across my grave       maybe they poured a libation on my stone     maybe they just stamped the dirt down     I have to manage my infestation     perhaps I need to up my dose     I hear blades being sharpened    did they find me?    how did they find me?      plots are being hatched that will never reach fruition       these are the  conspirators of an idiot nation        familiar monsters with blood in their eyes

it’s unwise to get foolish at this stage of play    but I have big feet    and clumsy ambitions       all my mirrors vacillate between repulsion and adoration       there’s little there that’s of comfort to me     so I avert my eyes    when I get low      I get high      all I seek is equilibrium     a place to lay my head      and some respite from the monsters

but  it’s not the monsters that offend me    it’s the people who make them       the monsters aren’t  so scary      if you speak the lingo       but their masters possess a murderous reflex and sharp teeth     they have shark like ferocity      and no feelings at all        

Fleabag

 

I’ve seen your bubonic lymph nodes     and your ripper smile   you’ve gone fleabag      and I won’t touch your unclean things       not at these rates       so ring your parish bell     and  roll out your dead         we’ll cart them off to the knacker’s yard        just don’t touch their skin      you’ll catch the dread apprehension from a dead man’s skin

and don’t you lay in a dead man’s bed     there are critters nestled there between those  sheets     that  will bleed you dry    and fill your lungs with broken glass    that’s a gasping wheezing death      a fish out of water    drowning in air    

flesh of my flesh     flowering corruption     what malignant monsters lurk within?      I got the saint vitus itch from a reckless encounter      at an afternoon séance        my death has been scheduled       for a month on sunday   I was lucky to get the slot     it’s their busiest time

listen to the Creature EP

rubber knives

to whom it may concern    two can play at your game    don’t tread on my stones    I’m only setting my papers in order    because you murdered me   with innuendo     accusations     and bitter lies    call the waiter   there are vermin in my soup   

you tapped my wires     rifled my drawers   and embezzled my contents   just for the malice in it    you took my anguish and fashioned it into nails    then you pinioned me on charges     no-one had ever heard of    but don’t cry baby    you were only doing your job     and I was only doing mine

my bones are heavy    from your excuses    you saw an opportunity     the same size as your boots      so you weighed in    I might have done the same  myself      if I was a cunt    your new friends had hard junk faces    wrinkled dead like burst balloons     scary in their pit bull nightmares      full of toothless bite and spit    weeping from an excess of white lightning  

theirs is the zombie flesh rising    some say it tastes like chicken    but everybody knows it’s pork    I’d zap ‘em all straight in the fucking brain pan  rattle their sensitivities    the alky villains who stole my coat     looked just like you do     lonesome    confused      and in search of a decent fit

COVID blue

 

COVID 19 was the catalyst that painted us blue   if you weren’t crazy before you sure are now   when I look outside    I see nothing    when I look inside    I see less    I’m on emotional lockdown   all is blank   and suffocating   my happiness is long overdue     another bus that won’t be coming soon

schizophrenic pandemic aggression   may hold us in a confinement beyond physical arrest   some minds will corrode with the loss of personal liberty    others might grow morbid and lonely    but I banquet on my own thoughts    and sing like a caged bird

oh lordy   don’t cut me no slack   I’m making no applications   for beneficiary status     I require no validation    from abstract strangers   or fawning supplicants    lead me not to redemption    but deliver me from   the tender mercies   of holy rollers   and curtain twitching   superintendent   do gooders

I’m your regular egoist   who recognises the limitations   circumscribed by charity   and I know that   sometimes you have to cut a sucker loose   before he drags you down   these are the days of pestilence and woe   my kettle’s on the boil    and my cup is overflowing   with final demands and hate mail   but you won’t catch me    counting any beads   I’d rather risk insolvency   than go on bended knees

listen to the Creature EP

soledad

I have an itch   I need to scratch    but it’s beyond my reach    it’s on the inside   where the piranha shoal    and old wounds fester    in the inky black    it’s dark outside    but it’s darker in     the night claws it’s way     into my room    with tedious certainty    my lights are lit   and curtains drawn    my barricades   against it all

the weight of gloom    e x p a n d i n g    invades my skin    filling me with darkness   and  I’m small     and all alone    so very far from home     here at the edge of the world    there is silence  in my bones    this world provides no nourishment    for those who feel alone

is all life lonely   and lacking purpose   despite the masks that we all wear?   that prospect is appalling   loneliness is the most terrible poverty   sex has always been my consolation    when I can’t have love      but that’s no use now    because I’m all alone   and now there is a great big hole   where she used to be     and I have fallen in    and can’t climb out   

can you feel too much?   or feel in the wrong way?   is every man an island on a cruel and lonely sea?    loneliness is so human   and it scares the shit out of me   the way it burrows into you    leaves a mark on your soul   we can never outgrow loneliness   and no-one can fill that space   the best you can do    is do for yourself   fuck everybody else

 

hear the Creature EP