Aside
had i taken my art seriously, i would have been a different person. i would have made everything from scratch: from scabs and paper, empty cans; empty windows, empty lives and baskets full of nothing but dew and pegs. i’d hang it all right there – on the … Continue reading →
i knew for a long while that the summer was over and now it really is. i only vaguely remember the way it began: pavements covered in blossom, lounging in the field under the stars, watching sun setting above our heads.
there was majorca.
there, in the evening, i scoured every shop for a memento to give to you. i found a wooden statue, obscurely sexual, sensuous, expressive: two figures entwined in an embrace, their sleek polished bodies holding each other. the male form bent round the female: side view of him, the woman – face on.
you didn’t like it very much and i can’t say i blame you: you had enough trouble reading a spy in the house of love. of all her men, the only one you remember is allan: the one she married, the father figure in her life. what of the others?
———- a blank.
can’t say i agree.
i had a dream of the english boy night before last: his birthday party conjured itself in a palace. i was with you of course. then, somehow i was speaking to him. back to you, fawning over the flowers Y’s girl had. and then a girl attendant handed me a huge box of those very flowers. scribbled on the box was “i love you”. from him.
still, those are only dreams. and i don’t mind that.
Posted in chapters of my life
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no response. my heart is the silence of the world sleeping.
i barely wrote about him: he never seemed to matter. you are my prince, patience incarnate. often all i need is that little piece of silent tenderness: i am simple but i change with the northerly wind.
all i seem to do is read and sleep: summer brings deep slumber to my senses and burning sun only makes itself felt on the nape of your neck. when my eyes see it, the gently tanned skin colour of sandalwood, an urge from deep within me wants to cradle it with the palms of my hands, feel its warmth as if through it i shall hold a ray of sunshine, all warm and sensual, taken from a book of mild erotica.
funny how when i felt it last, rejection felt like a consuming fire in every which one of my pores. now, it is a slight breeze tangling up my hair, soft sand in my eyes, thorny roses brushing against a scab: strangely seperate from me.
you think i can’t see the pain in your eyes. true, you hide it well, but i know you and i know that i told you that he mattered in more ways than one would care to. i’m sorry.
S is nothing; i am love.
it’s about aesthetics, feeling, about loving contour and form and not it straight lines … and i got too attached to you, S. funny that, i try to live without feeling.
no response. so we learn to fly.
Posted in chapters of my life
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yes, you are right, i should like to hide my head in the sand and pretend all that darkness is nothing but light shining through a filter tinted the colour of night. i should pretend last night never happened, i should pretend i am content here by your side in the leafy undergrowth of life where all i see are roots uprooted, dying in the sun. and would you blame me?
i could not sleep last night, thinking of the shining lights enveloping you, pillow over my head to drown out hurt. i wondered if i ought to watch a film, but that would be defeat. no, i would lay here and count your wrongs, my wrongs, the cracks in the ceiling of our hearts, thoughts, lives.
soon, soon, the artery would rupture and drown out the pain.
soon, soon.
i knew i couldn’t cut myself. what with? a knife? i could almost hear you saying don’t be silly in that tone of yours. and pills, what good would it do? only that i may die without salvation, without the knowledge of how to cling to love by the skin of your fingertips. or maybe i know that already.
and i can’t live with all that poison, not even just for tonight. i would fight but my limbs have gone to sleep and i am faced with a picture of you in the club, music pounding, drinks flowing, girls dancing.
and i realise i can’t say that there is anything missing. there is not.
Posted in chapters of my life
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you can have the whole of me in this field:
i pressed my soul into its loins
and beads of sweat still glisten
on the body learning to tango
in the outpour of rain.
i will surrender only here
so take care not to move even a strand of hair
from beneath the tree where i will lay through my whole life,
as if dying prematurely,
for this is home and i forbid you.
a day will come when spring will open me enough
for sun to shine
into the roots of the old cambridge tree
and open up
the rest of me.
—————————————————————-
i’ve been writing this poem for a while now and it feels forever unfinished. maybe that’s just me, always a word out, a syllable in. and then i give up and start something else. at the end of the day, however, i always come back to this. and the oldest tree in cambridge.
Posted in excerpts
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glittering soot on her eyelashes 
