The Naive (Part 1 of 2)

January 28, 2012

Returning to the, the mind frame of the winner
Experiment this instant; no such thing as a sinner.
Here in my company, pills, beers, fizzy tablets and
Marijuana: party time has come; the man with sand
Is not required. Time to trip and forget
Stress. The boss is gone; I’m glad I met
My dealer when I did, my eye feel like crystals –
Being on the South Coast… No fear of pistols!
Feel the music, the bass is your heartbeat.
You know what happens next: move your feet
To the arousing rhythm: self-consciousness
Is futile, as long as you maintain consciousness.
You don’t like the buzz? Man, that’s a-OK –
Jut as long as you light my joint: don’t get in my way.
Drugs, not just the preserve of the massively rich –
Nope — for me and you, when all we want is a switch
From the same old: had this conversation so many
Times, so I’m gonna change it up by spending some penny.
Worth every one, my body throbs, inhibitions go –
You’re celebate, a virgin, inexperienced, I know.
I’m not pushing this stuff, just letting the flow
Of my warm brain explore new ideas, so to your mind I throw
Them — chemicals, you see, are all that your
Brain understands! So a few more can’t hurt poor
You — fuck depression, try this hallucinogen:
It’s as crazy as what I let go from this pen.

The Confident One (poem)

January 27, 2012

My veins are alight — passionate vehemence
Ignited, the tongue of the flame quivers,
Shakes, dances and hates. So let heat commence –
Taken for granted, I will combust… No more shivers
Now: total destruction ensues. Took me at face
Value… I used to cry here; instead I’ll explode –
So, so, alone, I feel like a disgusted new race.
I’m declaring war: the fuel you are sets me down this road
At breakneck pace. Frozen winter landscape
Where I did hibernate; a graveyard now, where trees
Are tombs. How the sun does scorch, and rape,
Pilages, defiles… I am the fire — whose goal’s to freeze
Unappreciation, to layer a cake of ash. Stand where
You are, just accept my promise: fate does not exist.
Take existential liberty and love how many years spare
You’ve got! All the blood that once spilt from your wrist;
New red will take its place. Take account
Of the wisdom you have: but search always for more:
You’ll never know what you need, when hate could mount
Your being, everso fast… Remember what you’re living for.
So do not take all for granted,
As my pen on paper cannot always be planted…

The Donor (short story)

January 27, 2012

Hello, beautiful. I don’t know if you remember what I look like. In all honesty, I don’t have a great capacity for remembering what changes in appearance I went through during that time, either. Some things have not changed though: people say I have brooding, chestnut-colour eyes, with messy hair of the same tone. I have only light stubble – I didn’t shave much during that stage of my life either, though I cannot seem to grow a beard.

During all those years I was very confused. I expect you are feeling the same, now. Why do I refer to you as beautiful? Not because of face-value features – though of course you are a pretty, youthful and vibrant girl who I adore – but your spirit. To me, you are as good as human life can get. As I write this with a tear rolling down my cheek, I smile so simply and in such an untainted manner that I realise now is the best day of my entire life.

You are, of course, probably crying now, also. Not because of these words, but because you are reminded of stinging memories of your past. Shortness of breath – that feeling that your body is giving up on you, destroying itself from the inside out… That is what has, in the most obscure of ways, given my life meaning. Please: do not stop reading. I will explain everything to you. I can only imagine the pain you had to go through. Of course, I saw you, lying unconscious and being carried into an ambulance for one of hundreds of times, with a glazed look on your face, as still as when you were two gametes in different human beings. Every time I saw this I wished you could see me. I wanted you to know how I felt your pain. I was there for you in your darkest times, when you were so close to perishing that even the paramedics gave up hope. But I knew you would survive. Read the rest of this entry »

Lady Justice (short story)

January 26, 2012

That wound we call affection. How at times we are intoxicated by its painkilling qualities: the pure strength and passion of its nectar soothes the heartbreak which has filled our lives up to that point. But, of course, this high cannot last forever. When it has gone we are left reeling, with both body and mind crying out for more – but it’s no easy thing to procure. True affection is the child of compatibility, luck, timing and the right mindset.

What I’ve learnt over the past year is, even if you’ve got most of these necessary components, the alchemy from these into attachment is never a smooth and stable process. Above all, certainty is a description never rightly applied to human co-existence.

Who am I? I have a name, if that helps. I don’t think it does, however, so I’m not going to reveal it. Physically, I am whatever you are attracted to. (Whether this affects how you feel about me during the following events reveals more about you than me, I believe.) My eyes are your favourite colour in the most stunning shade: I have the most incredible piercing gaze. I am a young man, I can tell you that much. Attribute to me the generic features of my sex, if you wish: I try my utmost to place respect, compassion and human rights before my sex drive. That being said, I am human and by definition make mistakes. Lots of them. Of my personality, I can hardly surmise: whatever I am and however I change will become apparent through the following tale.

How does it all begin? Not with my birth; I find this superfluous to the point. You may assume that I have been brought up well, in the English manner (whatever that represents for you), with the same peaks and troughs in childhood as the average child. My family is neither particularly wealthy nor particularly poverty-stricken. I fit, from outside appearances, into the very definition of average. Whether I am any more or less important than any other individual is completely up to you. As far as society is concerned, I am just another token who can become a tax-payer or crime statistic: what does mathematics care of my personality? To its stoic eye, even Euclid was any other man. Only in the thoughts of man does my philosophical being matter. Read the rest of this entry »

Fade — Part 1 (Poem)

January 26, 2012

To borrow time, that’s why I came –
I’ve nowhere to run, no-one to blame…
You’re killing and you’re hurting,
So with suicide I’m flirting:
It’s pitch black, all around me.
I’m begging, I’m crying: just free
The man, how could he have cancer?
I came alone and any sacrifice, for an answer
To how long we all have left…
As right now I’m empty, I’m bereft
Of all the smiles that I deserve –
He’s the one who’s ill, but it’s my nerve
That’s truly offended:
From humans I am descended,
And I can’t stand and watch this
Slow extraction, before I can even miss
His presence; I have to watch him fade,
After all the memories he and I have made.
Death — death, answer me, please –
I’m alone and I’m broken, I’m on my knees.
He took such care and pride
In health, so why should you side
With extinction, and pull him away?
What do I have to do, what do I have to say?
Every emotion, I thought, had its place…
So I’ll keep my strength, just in case:
But how can I escape tragedy
When death’s pagentry
Is so final, so cold, so brutal –
The very end, you wan to mute all
Future events. I want to scream
At what I deem
Ridiculous. But here is the thing,
Which really multiplies that sting:
Life will carry on, without a second’s pause.
When one is closed, infinite doors
Open: but behind them lie more memories
With which I take with unrestricted ease,
Only to have my friends and loves
Stolen from me, just like fragile doves
Shot down and ruined, without remorse –
Where can I hide, where can I run? When this course
Of life, it brings me head-first into heartbreak;
Just how can I these tragedies take?

I’m going to be writing a number of pieces on my opinion on the decriminalisation of narcotics, most specifically on the legalisation of Cannabis, in a variety of mediums: from a literary perspective; from personal experience; from a political standpoint; from an angry standpoint, and others: all backed up by science, of course.

For now, I thoroughly recommend this link and commend Sir Richard Branson for speaking the truth. Luckily, he won’t get the sack like Prof. David Nutt who also spoke common sense. Definitely worth a read.

Allow me to indulge in cliches for a moment.

Today was the perfect example of a day threatening to spoil what has been a sensational week, but which, thanks to resolve, has become another excellent set of memories. And so, I’m afraid, cliches best fit the situation. Here are a few of the awful things which work well: ‘I fell, but I got back up‘; I came ‘back from the brink‘; I thoroughly ‘would not give up‘; I ‘looked into oblivion‘ but did not jump.

Horrible. Disgusting. Putrid. Read the rest of this entry »

Ally (poem)

January 25, 2012

It’s short and sometimes sweet:
Doesn’t happen often, but when we meet,
Who could stop us? Two-person army,
Truly unstoppable — the only way to calm me
Is to see your face, to know I’m not alone…
The purpose of this is to let it be known:
When you insult my being, it ain’t just
Me who’ll retaliate: no, my partner here will bust
A hole, three times your shot and
He won’t miss: you may be sand
Hidden in a desert; but we are the wind
Who’ll never lose. So we’ll keep you pinned
To the floor, where you and dirt reside –
Our battle tactics to each other we confide…
This verse is simple and that’s the point.
No hidden meaning, just oil to grease the joint,
That holds us together, to unite
For the inevitable: to withstand your fight,
To endure the pain, then we’ll make you pay:
‘Cause carpe diem, baby: we always seize the day.

Days (short story)

January 25, 2012

Sterile morgue, precise necessity – this is where my story begins. Does this set the tone, or is it merely one of the many aspects of the journey?

The hospital in which the morgue lies is where I spent the majority of the day. How many ways can a hospital inspire emotion? The joy of success – the heart bypass that brings the patient life. The lessons learned – the heavy smoker who has one last chance to stop the cancer spreading.

I saw and heard all of a hospital’s events on that spring day. The humidity felt special – there was a tension in the air; every minute felt important. This made the pleasant times exceptional: a kiss from my husband made my heart pound. A tall tropical drink was an explosion of ecstasy in the form of mango and pineapple. In the Tate Modern, a particular Picasso painting left me dumbfounded. Read the rest of this entry »

Mystery is the great attraction.

People love nothing more than to understand and to take pleasure in spreading knowledge – and in the retelling, to massage their ego. Consequently, in cracking the unknown, there are two main approaches: to become frustrated and to ignore the mystery (or accept that one is incapable of comprehending it) or to redouble one’s efforts and make it one’s personal mission to understand. Knowledge attains the position of victory.

I never would have described myself as ‘mysterious’: I gained that label from others – a particular group of people who are close to me, intrigued by me, but are not so close to as to pierce into the consciousness behind the supposed ‘mystery’. For various reasons, those who are not close to me take less interested in me and/or regard me with contempt – a mutual relationship. Of course, the persona of mystery means people want to ‘crack’ you. They want to be the first person to do so, to really crack you. Like discovering a new element on the periodic table, they want to uncover your true nature. As I said, mysteriousness adds much attractiveness: even at your least confident, at your most dejected, people are still intrigued. Why are you depressed? What profound worries burden you? In many ways this can help alleviate the melancholy: people showing interest – care – can help lift all but the darkest of clouds.

The problem is that the reverse is true: when you are at your most comfortable; happy – the simplest, most straightforward emotion — that is when the mystery gets in the way. It becomes a burden in itself. Mystery, to me, is black. Dark. A semantic smog which hides your white-hot ambitions, intentions and feelings. It becomes a barrier between you and the rest of the world. Within: clarity. To the outside: obfuscation. Mystery.
Read the rest of this entry »