Apples

after forty days     and forty nights    I got paroled     on my doctor’s advice      adam was waiting for me      eve was too     we scoffed our forbidden apples with relish      our moment of enlightenment    reeked of corruption      I learned to laugh    I learned to cry      I learned to live for the moment without inhibition

there were many things we never saw      but the moonstone hung in the soft blue       and we saw her face for sure      she was a howling moon      but your friends don’t care how you get your pleasure    they’re just glad you do     sometimes people make us human again       sometimes they just get in the way       

hunters and collectors   try to pin you down   pronounce you weirdo    loner   misanthrope     because people fear difference       and they let it be known       without grace or subtlety      they got me close range      point blank      tagged and bagged      I don’t belong and I never did      that’s something for a poor boy to weigh up      as he raids another orchard

I don’t like to romanticise my sickness     but all the great ones passed this way      reconciled to the difference machine       drunk on rotten apples     brave enough to dream     I dreamed I was dreaming and couldn’t wake up      now would be the time      to give myself a shake       before the wrong side of the bed conspires against me    

they tell me that there is nothing to lose  in the abandonment of self      but no man can give himself away     I heard that in a song      the red haired girl from babylon said I had no soul    I asked her    

what is a soul?

something you don’t have    she replied

poor boy had no dough     he paid his debts with one weighed ounce of solid soul       it was a good trade     or so it seemed      I don’t recall ever missing      something I’ve never seen

I often luxuriate in bouts of dread introspection     eve says I’m bound by my imagination    or lack of     she says if I don’t change I’ll spend my life wallowing in self pity      until the judas goat guns me down      but I’m too old to change       I’m set fast in a pattern      that descends to the abattoir 

 

 

Scarred

He always wore long sleeves, even in the hot weather. Those who noticed speculated that he might be a junkie. The truth was that he was embarrassed by his arms – the pale inner flesh was criss-crossed with scars. He felt that these betrayed his weakness that they showed him up as a self indulgent hysteric. They were made many years before, but were as livid as they ever were – great white gashes that ran across and down his arms like highways.

His self inflicted scars were constant reminders of the boy that he once was – full of sadness and self loathing. Some were punishment scars; others were genuine attempts to end his life. He often felt that his old arms no longer fitted the man he had become – the defect cicatrices were the property of a young man, a young man who had in fact died a long time ago.

He had often tried to forget his youthful manic slashings. His arms would not let him. He had tried to tell himself that the scars were in fact the signs of struggle – a struggle he had won. Had he not prevailed over adversity? Was he not still alive and kicking? It was true. Like the gnarled old bark of an ancient tree his scars were a sign of triumph, but how do you convey that to others? He kept his sleeves rolled down – dreading the looks he received if ever his naked arms were exposed.

Making love with a new partner was a particular minefield. They invariably asked him about the scars – then would begin a lengthy discussion and an inevitable distance – his sanity suspect from there on in. But there was one girl who asked no questions. She kissed his scars and held him close for the longest time. At first he was mortified, but the gesture was so pure it melted his heart. No words were ever spoken of his disfiguring wounds. He felt like the man he wanted to be – she gave him that. Yes, she gave him that and it was precious.

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Scientific Management

deep in the art of confusion   the dissonance between the chord struck    and the note heard    rings awkward in the ear    thoughts come thick as bricks   truculent or tractable   empire blocks of concrete and jelly    some are solid gold and easily held    while others are trojan horses   disgorging disgraceful minions  into the defenceless mind    we inhabit thought in the land of contradiction  what’s in you is around you   what’s around you is only comprehended    through the scrutiny of mirrors

 when I was a young man   I declared my emancipation   with lightning bolts and free speech    and I believed that I was free   because I had no chains and made no claim on others    but the price of that freedom was solitude   I later realised that freedom was only the name of my cage     and that I  had constructed a prison of my thoughts  an intricate lattice of values and recompense    the instruments of scientific management

 

Mescalito

The first hit of the day gives me that edge – a soft fuzzy boundary that cushions me from the agents of chaos. I’m surrounded by idiocy and brute ignorance. I have my blues for breakfast and wonder who they will kill today. They are rounding up all the queers and taking them to the bus depot. They are rolling bums in the alley ways and sacrificing school kids in the classrooms. We are all marked out for adjustment – it’s your innocence that condemns you, not your guilt. After all, everyone shares in the guilt.

I don’t belong here – I never belonged anywhere, but this town ain’t big enough to deviate in – I can barely turn a phrase that isn’t weighed and rejected as madness, or vanity. While wounded congregations pray for consolation I watch the cactus god tear open the sky and angels come pouring out as snowflake confetti to melt like whispers on the ground. Heaven is empty; there will be no resurrection, no day of judgement. There is no final authority – just unending stupidity.

I have my blues for breakfast and cacti for my supper. I walk with Mescalito who tells me that the actions which define us are often difficult to understand, but there is nothing unnatural in this or any other world.

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Manacled

it was bad patter
well out of order
and a bitter repast
for blackened eyes
and broken teeth

I was a pollutant
and filthy to the core
a bi curious creature
and apostle of magical thinking
young enough to hunger still
old enough to know better

those razor edged memories
slash through the 3 am
in procession triumphal
for they have conquered sleep
one day I’ll go straight
but I’ll never sleep again

crack giants
in suicide squadrons
loom large where dreams
once haunted my bedclothes
the chains my forebears fashioned
are branded into my flesh
wrought iron keepsakes
of love meted out
between the blows
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