I'm Moving!

Dear All,

Many thankyous for following me here (& if you have one of my old business cards, thankyou for looking me up!), but the time has come for me to move my blog onto something swankier, something more horrendously expensive, & something that will present my posts in an easier-to-use, more synchronistic way (to be all flowery about it). In other words, PLEASE FOLLOW ME HERE: The Importance of Being Carrie on Tumblr. You don't need a Tumblr account to visit - just click the link, it really is as simple as that.

   Love & Lined Paper,
 
       Carrie Aaron

Taking Stock

This (or the beginning of it: 'Come back,/Nothing is forgiven,/But my lifeboats have all blown up') wove its way into my head this afternoon. So I  gave it the benefit of the doubt & let it fold itself out. 

  

(A picture from all of three years ago, which seems an eternity.)

What is it about? What background information do you need for it to make any sense? Well... It's about the disjuncture between the present & the past. It's about an old (& sometimes - far too much of the time - fairly horrific) relationship I was in in my early twenties (it stretches as far back as five years ago, in the buildup to that catastrophicness) and (yet) is very much from the point-of-view of me now, over a year after it was terminated, looking back at it like a run over cat looks at the stretch of road on which it was run over. Is it a peon to a lost boyfriend, or a peon to the former half of my twenties? I'm not entirely sure. Both, perhaps. But writing it made me sad, & reading it makes me sad, so it's like a sort of dirge, I suppose. *shrugs*

Come back,

Nothing is forgiven,

But my lifeboats have all blown up

In a hundred storms in teacups

And the end

Seems like a sink at

The unplugging of the washing up –

Unclean! Unclean!

A filthy dream,

Wash it away

With UFO-beams.

Screams,

Unuttered in the day,

Come out at night to play like Poe’s

Conqueror Worm,

Remember when

We shouted it

Into the air?

The Barbican

Was beaten bronze

The darkness seemed

To rest upon

Like the water

Had melted down

From out of the night,

Plymouth Sound,

And the pushed my

Hands into my

Coatpockets hard

And tried to keep

My head as both

You and another

Man said you’d

Take me to bed

And all my future

Flashed before my

Eyes as I

Walked home alone

And laughed and talked

Into the air

About you,

You’re a

Fatal snare,

From here to there’s

A thousand years

And you are somewhere

I am here

And crying out

Years-older eyes

Under the same old

Sea-side skies

Reprise reprise,

A lullaby

That gets louder

As life goes by

To drown it out

To drown me in

My mind’s own merrygoround din,

And cry it out

And shout it out

And talk to you

As though you’re here

When you’re not here

You’ll never be,

Torn out of my

Great symphony

That has ended

Decades too soon,

Unless I crawl

Into death’s womb

So premature

That I would have

To bleed into

My boyfriend’s bath

And be found there

Amidst the paint

He’s smeared on all

The walls, my blood

Matching a shade

Of the wall’s blood,

Perhaps, when it

Is done and dried,

My life beside

Me like a towel

Draped on a chair,

To stay right there,

Abruptly stopped

As a fucked clock…

But I’m alive.

And I take stock.

Like the old brain

Of an old woman

Harking back

To hear the past

Because the present’s

Just a waiting

Room for where she’ll

Go at last. 

 

You (A Fragment)

You stalk nightmares and facebook feeds,
the sort of woman who agrees
with posts about benefits cheats
having enough - too much! - to eat.

You'd round them up and put them down,
given your way, go town to town
with a whip in your hand and drown
the witches, beat them black and brown.

You'd put them to work or to death,
take them all off their crystal meth,
and serve them right via wrong, the eff-
-ing wastes of skin and bones and breath.

You'd take away flat screen T.V.s
right left and centre, them that pleased
could work for them or feel the squeeze
of deserved famine and disease.

You'd tell them to get on their bikes
on the road to work, SCRAM!, the tykes,
and watch the ups and ups and spikes
of profit-graphs go take a hike

up North. You'd wall in North and South
today and tomorrow and mouth

librettos by Wagner and wave
fascist handgestures of the cave

as though the candle wasn't there
and switch off people's wireless air
and set and check and re-set snares
to catch the bludgers unawares.

Self-Unconsciousness (Go Away!)

Go Francis Bacon me, free me,
a static dervish on TV,
whirling around the centuries
like a pulp-vampire, a fucked clock.


Go mad, go sane, go in-between,
yo-yo between night-dreams, day-dreams,
and "doubting, dreaming dreams no mortal ever dared to dream 
before".*

Go Edgar Allan Poe me, he 
could deconstruct, reconstruct me 
into some new monstrosity
other than this, the current one.

Away! Bang new sounds from the drum
made of my skin, lung-hollowed, strum
new sounds from my guts and RED RUM
the ghost who lives in the machine. 

Away! Away 'til kingdom come,
don't like this, want another one, 
a rising, not a setting, sun
waiting it out for the repeat. 

 Away! curtain proscenium
glimpses of the tragedy Man 
between nether darknesses, scan
the data for anomalies. 

*Please Note: The basic consistency of the syllabic structure. 

The Importance of Being Visible: PoetryVlog1

On Writing As Considered As One Of The Fine Arts (with a nod to De Quincey)

First of all, THIS is what my reference to De Quincy is, well, referencing.

Second of all, THIS:

If you're going to write, then for heaven's sake read.
I know illiteracy is fashionable.
(Semi-literacy, then. The ability to pen one's own name, and to read The Daily Mail.) I concede
that endstoppping is - rather a lot of trouble

for not much if no-one can see the end-stopping
in question, and syllabic structures are invisible unless you pause oddly in-between lines.
BUT. There is no point not reading, and writing, and hoping
nobody will notice - they'll notice - which gnosis will go quite unnoticed by you. Opine

on a poem to its poet in terms less than glowing
and - well, you can imagine the oodles of fuss,
but don't and they'll write without reading not knowing
that there's an us and them and that they are not us.

P.S.
The above is a terrible poem. I know that it's a terrible poem. That is, if you hadn't noticed, THE WHOLE POINT. To give an example of the sort of thing that happens if one ignores (not subverts - ignores) the rules.
And there ARE rules.

Fame

Gosh! Thankyou, people!

The Importance of Being A Poet

I have, over the last couple of months, performed quite a lot - which is, of course, splendid. BUT. As my darling has pointed out to me, I am really more of a page poet than a performance poet. I never really intended to get into performance poetry. It just sort of happened to me. I performed at Plymouth's Chestnut Tree Cafe (now defunct, much-mourned) while I was doing my BA, sure, but everyone performs poetry while they're doing their BAs - it's mandatory. 

It all started when I attended a performance poetry workshop at The Nuffield Theatre (Southampton) some years ago. Why? Well, it was a poetry workshop, wasn't it? So that's why. I didn't perform that evening (the first 451) - I was too frightened. The next 451, however, was the scene of my first (post-BA) poetry performance. I remember that I had been preparing for it all day. I remember that I was wearing black. I remember feeling as though I was about to faint as this room of people, all of whom (I thought) must know a great deal more about poetry than I did, applauded me with apparent warmth and sincerity . A kind man made the effort of come up to me and tell me to keep writing, and to never give up. I promised him that I would and wouldn't. And nearly got on the wrong train home because I was so excited. 

And so it goes. I ended up at The Winchester Pub in Bournemouth, where The (now past-tense) Kool Kats Klub (possibly spelled as it was intended ) and (present-tense) Freeway Poets poetry nights built up my experience of performing. And I met Steve Biddle, who very wonderfully took me under his wing and introduced me to a number of people and places. 

My favorite performance so far has been my Archimides Screw Audience Choice slot at The Art House (Southampton) a couple of months ago. I gave it my all, absolutely refused to be insouciant about it, and felt pleasantly like a squeezed-out teabag at the end of it all. That is how things should be.

The thing is, though, performing, and preparing to perform, and traveling to perform, and learning and responding to the lessons that performing teaches one, takes time. Time that could be spent on writing - on sinking below the gaze of The Other (The Sauron's Eye, as I tend to think of it at my most jaded) into the subconscious (in the submarine of time and space and interpersonal invisibility) and BLOODY WELL WRITING. 

"What is to be done?" I will continue to perform. I wandered through the whole of school and college thoroughly expecting (and being expected) to go into acting - I can't give up performance that easily. The thing is (just as was the case with acting as well) I am better at writing (and writing about acting and writing about writing) than I am at performing what I write (and at acting). I am, and have always been, (while charismatic) very very gauche when placed in front of an audience (or placed in front of people in general). It is only when I am absolutely assured of being loved that I can relax (this is probably a neurosis) - which is both absurd and evolutionarily sensible (for who wants to be eaten by lions when fight or flight were alternative options?!?).

Also - I did say, didn't I, that I was going to write a novel? I distinctly remember, on the way home from school, at the age of 11, announcing that I was going to write a novel. And it isn't finished yet.

Purbeck Folk Festival 2013

DISCLAIMER

If you want to know about what anyone did apart from me, this is not the blog post to read. I don't remember. That's not how my memory works. I remember phrases, some of which are linked to faces, some few of which are linked to names. I remember liking things, I remember not liking things. I could, if I were to spend all day doing it, probably critique something by everyone with honesty & anecdotal amusingness, but this is not a private blog, & I'm definitely not going to be so gauche as to fling my (detailed) opinions of poems at people who never even asked for them. So - I shall skim over what other people did not because I wasn't listening, or I am uninterested in it, but because it simply isn't my place to remark on it, apart from in an entirely supportive "I rather liked that, old chap!" sort of a way apart from in private conversation.

The Friday

My flowey-cat-ears hairband (which you may remember from my supporting-of-Rob-Auton's-Yellow-Show-at-the-Art-House earlier this year) arrived just in time for the first heat of Purbeck Folk Festival Slam 2013, & performed Red Rum. The joy of having a sound system that enabled me to actually hear myself distinctly enough to modulate my voice, coupled with the adrenalin of having just traveled about a hundred miles at breakneck speed, combined to make for a surprisingly punchy rendition. I then acquired beer. 

A lady walked up to me, with that I'm-about-to-talk-to-you look. I know you, don't I? I thought. I know & I've forgotten & know you & I'm going to seem tremendously rude. "Hello!" I exclaimed, with vague recognition. "I liked your poem!" said the lady - or words to that effect. With my faith in my memory slightly bolstered, and my faith in my ability to read social cues (& respond accordingly) slightly antibolstered, I skipped away with the first of probably the most compliments of my work I've received of my work at any festival ever! *purrpurr*

 The Saturday

I made my way between two lines of Noel's beautiful bunting, & the poetry circle happened. It was a very little circle, but good things come in small sizes. A poet who reminded me, for reasons not-entirely-clear-to-me, of Peter Ackroyd, & dressed in rainbow (& whose name I rather frustratingly forget), read some engagingly detailed poems (my favorite of the festival). Much to my relief, Rianna Jane appeared, widening our circle into something other than the line it had been previously (circles being drawable within triangles and all). Then a lady with an interestingly-adorned stick joined us, and things got even more circular. All the while, we were quietly listened to by crocheters. Which was delightful.  

The Sunday

The second round of Purbeck Folk Festival Slam 2013 was a nailbiting affair. There were quite a lot of poets (I don't do numbers). Only 2 of us (I can count up to 2) would go through to the final round. As my darling was there, I performed the only poem I have yet written for him, 'I Love You'. It's more ... emotiony ... than most of my other poems, & that went down well. I balanced things out by performing 'Cyclopicam' (probably, I don't remember), which is about technologyparanoia (justified or otherwise).  

My favorite performance of the second round was a stonkingly Shakespearian poem from the point of view of Shylock by Justin Sellick. When brilliant acting & brilliant poetry collide, doubleplus brilliantry occurs.

There was a draw of some kind, so 3 poets were voted through to the 3rd round. One of those poets was me. The other 2 were Henry Rowe, with a heartwarmsome rappish autobiographipoem (& something else, since there were 2 poems each, but that's the one I remember), and Rianna Jane with her ever-popular 'Labels' poem (&, again, something else, but, again, - "squirrel!" - I can't remember everything).

I was absolutely astonished to be voted through. There were 16 poets to begin with. In purely statistical terms, the likelyhood of being voted through was ... remote. So ... I hyperventilated a little, & repaired to The Kings Arms for beer & thoughtgathering.

I considered it highly unlikely that I would win (I have never won). My thoughts (once gathered) were, therefore, these: 

There are tremendous soundsystems here. 

Which are the most sonorous of my poems?

Which of my poems would I most like to hear over that pa?

Also, THE FIRE STAGE (on which the final round of Purbeck Folk Festival Slam 2013 was performed) IS ENORMOUS! I'm scared. Which of my poems am I most confident about performing?

The most sonorous of my poems is 'Red Rum'. It is also the poem in which I have the most confidence. The poem in which I have the second most confidence (as a performance poem - as a page poem it is, in my view, a little ... holey) is 'I Love You'. Also, I wanted to perform that because my darling, to whom it is addressed, would be in the audience. (Yes - repeats. IknowIknowIknow - I loathe repeats. But lots of us did repeats, & I don't usually, & I probably won't again, so I'll let myself off. Just this once. She said, feelingly secretly - or not-so-secretly - mildly disgusted with herself for having given into this when-in-Rome-ing.) 

My second rendition of 'Red Rum' was ... oddly lacklustre. I found myself looking out at the people & wondering what they thought of it. That's not something I usually do. It was a pretty new experience for me. It's just that - THERE WERE SO DARN MANY OF THEM. & I didn't know if they were friends or foes yet. & they were being actually invited to judge me. With numbers. Which is always something I feel a little uncomfortable with in slams (& exams, & essays, & any other judging, number-assigning scenario). But slams are a good way of drawing people in to poetry. People like pseudogladatorial contests. They're exciting. & at least there was no question of me being eaten by lions. So I plodded on with what I was well aware was a poem not-terribly-in-keeping-with-the-mood-of-much-of-the-crowd, and tried to focus on its cadences, the sounds of it, its rhythms, for my own enjoyment if nothing else. My score for it was - unexcessive. I felt myself blanching, and tried to focus, tried to keep myself from zoning out. I'd been voted through, dammit, & I had every right to be there, & 'Red Rum' is a bloody good poem (though you might have performed it a bit more exuberantly), I told myself. Try harder next time. You can't expect to breeze through this. Don't be complacent. My second rendition of 'I Love You' went rather better. Not as well as it had the first time I'd performed it - I'd been less distracted by the stakes back then. More than anything in the world, I didn't want to come 3rd. Not again. I'd come 3rd too many times. It had all become a bit intense, like the monomania of a Philip K. Dick character, stomping through the universe INSISTING that something happen AGAINST ALL THE PROBABILITIES OF ALL THE FORCES OF EVERY NATURE THAT EXISTS IN ANY POSSIBLE WORLD. I took to the stage again. There was a moment at which I thought my voice might fly into the air & not come back, leaving me gaping like a bookish little goldfish, notbook clutched futiley in an ever-whitening hand. No. I had more gumption than that. I performed 'I Love You' with (most of) the conviction & emotional presentness a poem to my darling deserved. I had hoped the realness of its message, to someone actually out there, would make me & it more vivid this time, & I think it did. The audience (horrifyingly quiet for poor 'Red Rum') was ... more enthusiastic. It had thawed a bit. A couple more poems, & all might have been quite well. As it was, though, that was it. I came joint 2rd with Henry Rowe, and Rianna Jane (to whom my congratulations are due) won. Joint 2nd. My first 2nd (joint or otherwise) at any slam ever. Onwards and upwards. I am 26. I have, hopefully, many years of life, & many poetry slams, ahead of me. One day, due to the sheer statistics of the thing, I will win one of them. 2,000 monkeys, 7,654 typewriters...

We were given roses, us poets, which was just about one of the sweetest gestures in the world ever. Had I been Ernest Dowson, I would have eaten mine's petals. As it was, I asked it if my darling loved me, loved me not, loved me. It said he loved me. 

Many thankyous to Steve Biddle & the Freeway Circle of Poets for presenting me, & to Purbeck Folk Festival for having me.

FINIS

Cyclopicam

My webcam's watching me. Cyclopsian.
This is why I call it cyclopicam.
& "all the people" behind its screenglass
Are watching me. It is like 'Gogglebox'.
We are wired up, downloaded, if we are
Too ... interesting, for our own good, for our
Year of Our Lord Two Thousand & Thirteen
Is Nineteen Eighty Four plus Twenty Nine
& we've fallen into a paradigm
In which we are shrinkwrapped, zipfiled, if we
Cannot be headshrunk like our severed heads
Were taken in war, vetted, vatted, jars,
An underground like in The Time Machine
Harvested for The (God Save The Queen) Pound,
& ground into it, & for the pollen
That has & does & will clung cling & cling
To our inner legs. & Cyclopicam
(& the powers that be behind it's eye)
Stare out & stare me out & reel me in,
A gape with agape, disseminate-
-ing myself, my seed, my harvest, my wheat
Until I am a revenant made of chaff.
The Hills Have Eyes. My MacBook has an eye.
Beyond Good & Evil. (It's Nietzschean.)
(The people behind it aren't Nietzschean.
They're Oxymandias. They're kings of kings.
& what if they don't approve of the things
I say or do or think or dream or feel...)
My webcam's watching me. It's watching me
Like you watch football, a pot, or TV.
One day, when there's something interesting on,
Then Cyclopicam's eye will come to rest
On me. Be judge. Be jury. Execute.
I shall - we shall, be plucked out by the roots.

Common

The common land was cut up into squares.
Gridpapered in exchange for them. Enclosed.
Divided. Conquered. By the conquerers.
With pens, ink, tar & feathers, and the world
as maths-excercise-cake, & as consumed
by Marie Antoinettes in property.

Cut up, like relics, into property,
Into triangles, rectangles & squares,
for to be culled & for to be consumed,
wheels within wheels & hells in hells enclosed,
a lock-in long enough to lay the world
low as mills, as Satanic conquerors.

Will-o-the-wipsps, in crept the conquerors,
discovered, & turned into property.
Electric spread her net over the world,
which peered, gasping, out from between its squares,
&, wreathed in lightning, synapses enclosed
in plague, in cataracts, in scums, consumed

by teeth of flame - consumed, consumed, consumed.
Gran: prefab electrician. Conquerors
building their trenches in the sand. Enclosed
like borders. Herbaceous or property.
Claimed. People packed in flatpacked boxes. Squares.
How many of her wires in the world?

Wired. Local news & world news & ... the world.
Today & tomorrow. Cooked up. Consumed.
Under grills & in grids. The lines & squares.
The bears. Politicians & conquerors.
Beastbirds guarding their nest eggs. Property.
Banked & buried. & distilled. & enclosed.

Electric jungle. Unconcrete. Enclosed.
A world within a world within a world.
At war for pride. At war for property.
Consumed with jealousy while its consumed.
Downloads. Uploads. History. Conquerors.
The hearts & the minds ticking all the squares. 

Murder(ous/ing) Modernity

Draw a polyester veil
O'er tattered bodies, tattered souls,
Paint our faces, take our places, take our times, our lives & works too...
& "what do you do?" "what do you do?"
Spotlight, operating light - who
Do you think you are, shitshoed
Walker all overer of due
Respected tax-paying hardworking 2 up 2 down 4 point 2 childrened families,
Breeders,
Squeezers of the silver teats, & silver spoons, not bottem-feeders,
Shoppers in the afternoons,
& postmodern, pseudo-modern drop-outs -
"Play the game!"
Well what's your game?
I didn't play & I'm not playing, speak up & speak up again.
I'm (la la la la la) not listening,
But you have ways of making me listen.
The finaincal lynchmob & the Beta version debter's prison.
You owe me, O! you owe me, yes! what a deadly debt to pay
When you are muted from the mind's eye,
You're shut up & gone away.

The Streets

The concrete has been poured like a gray page,
Like a gray day turned on its head, sky ground.
The day is maximal, wage minimal,
Seconds tick tock by pound by pound by pound.

The tick tock is the meter keeping time,
The fucked clock stopped and there are no batteries.
”There are no”, translation, ”can’t afford”. Mime
Second hand tick tocks mind-forged eyes can’t see

With twitches like the tramp at Bretonside,
A human clock beneath mock-digital
Replacings of lined numbers side by side.
There was no turn, nothing so animal.

There was no turn, but listen to the growl
That whispers itself, a teeth-shut-tight howl.

The arrows point, open umbrella terms,
Curve round like heat-seeking-missiles, seek heat
Beaten out of broken hearts, broken herms,
Broken homes (if that term had meaning). Beat

Verse, beat up, down out, up in, Paris and
Londinium, proscenium, Shakespeare,
Ian an Iago smoking fags and
Blowing up his belly-balloon with beer.

He’s put stones in his shoes, but he can’t sink,
The lavic world has turned its heart to stone,
He waves and drowns and drowns himself in drink,
He waves and drowns and drinks, and drinks alone.

Enough. He’s a loser. He’s had enough.
Passes the buck. Gets his bird up the duff.

Mass-produced, there are toys to use as shrouds,
Shroud-collages to cover girls and boys,
(Hermaphrodites), nip buds and make them crowds.
Plastic pollen, playfully packaged ploys.

They move along from square to square to square.
The squares ”crack the whip(s) and” they ”step in time”.
They move along, there’s nothing to see there.
”Whipcrackaway.” Ridiculous. Sublime.

Mass-production produces machine-men.
Each morning they cage themselves. And they tweet.
Repeat. Repeat. Again. Again. Again.
Again. Again. Again. Repeat. Repeat.

These are the worker bees, and Ians spawn.
These are the Iagos. Hear lions yawn.

Drawing a condom-veil over the birth
Of hordes and hordes and hordes of little men,
Breaking the rules, the herms, the home, the hearth,
Instead of ”waters” again and again.

Where is the love? It’s in the space between
The two tongues flow and ebb and flow.
Surrounded by the cheeks, the lips, unseen.
”All ye know on earth”. ”All ye need to know”.

The wires say so-and-so loves so-and-so.
In such-and-such or such-and-such away.
Make them fuck off, wired voyeurs. make them go.
It’s all fucking, at the end of the day.

The will to life has tentacles in tongues.
When it don’t fill the wombs it fills the lungs.

Work Scum

Vile class-traiters who do not think it's fair
The workless don't work. While they're working. They're
Usually under-dressed, - educated
To think that way, controlled through their own heads.
Dole scum rise to the top, they think, becuase
Of some sort of strange lefty-loony clause
That sets them free to trample workers down
& mooch around at lunchtimes, drunk, in town,
While workers toil for everything that's good.
Just like unscummy, good citizens should.
But, ask yourselves - what does much work entail?
Making & selling crap. (Oh. Epic fail.)
While lager-swilling scum at least have time.
(& know that life's made of roses & wine.)

Energy

The lights are out. The lights are out. We are in the darkness.
Of man-made night. They use our fright. To fasten our harness.
The gods have flown. Out of their nests. Like unto birds they flew.
Wonder why you're not high? on life? Well, you know what to do.

Let darkness in. Let darkness in. If they won't leave you light
Just "keep on swimming" - godssakes don't go down without a fight.
The underworld awaits you & you're damned if you can't dive.
It's Mortal Combat, this is. Life: no-one gets out alive.

The Economy

The Economy

or 

homo economicus

Don't trust the homo economicus:
He is talking right out of his anus.
He makes me (& should make you) most anxious.

Don't trust the homo economicus:
His bloodymindedness is boisterous.
His brain is tiny, his ego bulbous.

Don't trust the homo economicus:
His wallet's elephantine - cumbrous.
The world's a stage. The world is his circus.

He is a fleur de mal. He's a crocus.

Hustings infiltrating every campus.
I would advise students to be cautious.
To reject his advances in chorus.
Refuse to give consent to coitus
(political or otherwise) conscious
of what's at stake. Emmigrate to Cyprus.
He is as trustworthy as a cactus.
He is as bitter as grapefruit. Citrus.
He wants to add your corpse to his corpus.
(He'll try, & all, however much you cuss.)
Would that he were careless as he's callous.

Don't trust the homo economicus:
He is as deadly as James Bond's discus.
He is an idiot - but he's dextrous.

Don't trust the homo economicus:
His finking's fucked, is brain is - fibrous.
He doesn't lack - but has too much - focus.
It were more fit to trust Doctor Faustus.
His heart ain't made of gold. It's more ... ferrous.
He wants to "get on", wants to"be famous".
But his brain's little more than a foetus
In a skull womb.
Trust Terence McKenna. & trust fungus.

Don't trust the homo economicus:
His gaze is empty, his speech gaseous.
What planet's he from? What is his genus?
The absurdity of it's just gorgeous.
His head is grimy. His head is gibbous.
He isn't great & he isn't gracious.
He isn't great. What he is is grievous. 

Don't trust the homo economicus:
Don't trust him, don't trust his hokey hocus.

Don't trust the homo economicus.
You're drowning, he's home dry on his isthmus.

Don't trust the homo economicus:
He is the ConDem. His is the Janus.
Down with the loan sharks, says I, says Jesus.
Imagine saying that out loud. Joyous.

Don't trust the homo economicus:
He is (most appositely) larcenous. 
Sharp-toothed as a wolf at a door. Lupus.
He is a ghostly bloodstain. The litmus.
His downfall will be lightning-fast, luscious.
Bear in mind he's infected. He's leprous.
The world beyond his barricade's lustrous.
Or his deep, dark & numbery locus. 

Don't trust the homo economicus:
If you are the plus, he is the minus.
May I suggest you get all mutinous?

Don't trust him, because the man is monstrous.

 He's a man. Just a man. He's no magus.
 He spews. He spews venom. He spews mucous.
Know that he will mince you in his modus.

Don't trust the homo economicus:
He's nonplussed & nonplussing. He's Nonplus.
He is noisome & he is noxious.
He makes me (& should make you too) nauseous. 
He makes me (& should make you) quite nervous.

Don't trust the homo economicus:
Your life. You or him - wherein the onus? 
Be the death march truncating his opus. 

Don't trust the homo economicus:
I know, I know, I know - he is parlous.
He is the minus & you are the plus.
Don't trust him, don't trust his hokey pocus.
He is a onemanband - let him percuss.
He'll deafen you. He will make you pious
re thing wrong things. & he is full of pus.
He'll take the solar out of your plexus.
He takes the pomp out of being pompous.
He is a - um, um, um - he's a ... phallus.
He is the minus & you are the plus.
He is chock full of holes. He is porous.
He is like gollum. He's like "my preciousssss".

Don't trust the homo economicus:
He rants more than I do. He is raucous.
He is raucous. He thinks he is righteous.
May I suggest an imminent rumpus? 
He is out of shape. He is a rhombus.
Let's put him out of joint. Have a ruckus.
His soul is dead, his - smile is rictus.

Don't trust the homo economicus:
He gets right up my nose, blocks my sinus.
(& is invertebrate & unspinous.)
Take up your pen! your pencil! your stylus!
Serenade him - your sarcasm sumptious.
So sumptuous that you produce a surplus.
His arguments are stonkingly specious.
So as its empty, his skull is spacious.
He is very sure of his own status.
I'm not. 

Don't trust the homo economicus:
Trenchant & terrible as The Typhus.

Don't trust the homo economicus:
He is from Mars. He isn't from Venus.

Don't trust the homo economicus:
If he's Good News then "I am the walrus". 

Don't trust the homo economicus:
Thank Christ he's too stupid to be zealous.

Salome Zero

The Electorate has a strange look to-night.

said the Prime Minister.

Has she not a strange look? 

She is like an thirsty woman who is seeking everywhere for fizzy drinks. 

She is obese too. 

She is quite obese. 

The nutritionists are seeking to cure her obesity, 

but she will not let them. 

She shows herself obese in the supermarkets. 

She reels through fizzy drinks aisles like a thirsty woman. . . . 

I am sure she is looking for fizzy drinks. 

Does she not reel like a thirsty woman? 

She is like a thirsty woman, 

is she not?

Ah! I have slipped! 

I have slipped in Coke! 

It is an ill omen. 

Wherefore is there Coke here? 

There be some who slay themselves. 

They are The Poor. 

The Poor are people of no cultivation. 

They are ridiculous people. 

I myself regard them as being perfectly ridiculous.

The Daily Mail has written a satire against them. 

I hear in the air something that is like the bursting of bubbles, 

like the bursting of vast bubbles. Do you not hear it?

It is just like the bursting of bubbles.

The Poor are sick to death

Pour me forth fluoridated water.

come drink a little fluoridated water with me. 

I have here fluoridated water that is exquisite. 

Dip into it thy little red lips, that I may drain the cup.

I am not thirsty, Prime Minister.

I have drunk Coke.

Bring me horses

come and eat horses with me. 

I love to see in a horse the mark of thy little teeth. 

Bite but a little of this horse that I may eat what is left.

I am not hungry, Prime Minister.

I have eaten ketamine.

Bid him be silent.

 Do not listen to his voice.

 This man is for ever hurling insults against you.

Carbonation is terrible; 

It breaketh in pieces the strong and the weak as a man breaks corn in a mortar.

The Prime Minister worketh true miracles. 

Thus, 

at a  coalition which took place in a little town of London, 

a town of some importance, 

He changed wine into water.

He was seen on a council estate talking with chavs.

Chavs do not exist.

see Owen Jones.

Chavs exist, but I do not believe that this Prime Minister has talked with them.

I will tax fizzy drinks.

It is thus that I will wipe out all obesity from the country, 

and that all approvably BMI-ed  shall learn not to imitate their abominations.

. . . but I cannot suffer the sound of the Prime Minister’s voice. 

I hate his voice. 

Command him to be silent.

She speaks like an obese woman.

It may be she is with child  with Coke.

What child is that,

The child of Coke?

Mammon.

Wherefore should I not drink Coke? 

The Prime Minister, 

who is lord of the world, 

The Prime Minister, 

who is lord of all things, 

loves me well. 

He has just sent me fluoridated water. 

Also he has promised me to tax the dolescum, 

who are my enemy. 

It may be that the taxes crucify them

He shall be seated on this throne. 

He shall be clothed in scarlet and purple. 

In his hand he shall bear a golden cup full of fluorinated water. 

And the glorious revolution shall smite him. 

BANG BANG BANG.

He shall be eaten of worms.

 

 

A Somewhat Less Crappy Big Poem About Thatcher

Still Hate Her

or

Rot Around the Clock

I hardly have to say who, do I? Her!
I hate her when my watch is four lined noughts.
The witching hour's appropriate. I slur
Her name in anger 'til sleep takes my thoughts,

&, when 1 takes the place of four,
I slay her like a dragon in my dreams
(as though I were a knight in days of yore,
& she the serpent). Fire-mouthed, she creams

out the smoked entrails of her fellow men,
Draconian but anthropomorphic.
She raises it up to her lips again.
2am human cigarette. It's sick.

& when the clock strikes 3, she is still there.

'Forevermore! Forevermore!' she croaks,

the bloody smoke wreathing around her hair,
fag-ash falling, the arms & legs of blokes

too non-u for her falling to the floor.
Blood-waxed parquet. Eleven bloody years
of a glass-ceilinged room devoid of doors.
& her. & her. & her. & her. It's 4.

It's 5. Years into her term. In Brighton.
& she is very nearly exploded.
(I wish I'd done it. Doesn't everyone?)
Thirty long years. Thirty. & now she's dead.

But is she? She's the dragon in my dreams.
The semen in my cola. (True story.)
It's 6. I'm asleep. & they hear my screams
in Calais. All over a dead Tory.

7 o clock, & I wake up in a sweat,
her succubus-ghost heavy on my heart.
A smoke. A coffee. I try to forget.
I can't forget. I don't know where to start.

It's 8. It's hate. It's 8, I mean. I hate
they way I am meant to be all polite
about her, now she's dead - contaminate
political with personal - it's shite.

It's 9, &, after coffee, comes the wine,
& reading in bed (try Tom Hodgkinson).
This is a protest. This is my time. Mine.
(Not quite what The Nameless One would have done.)

Ben chimes 10. I worry my little head
with BBC Parliament. OMG!
Glenda Jackson speaking ill of the dead.
(A politician! Representing me!)

It's 11. & she is in Heaven.
(or Hell. Or ... Somewhere. Or ... Nowhere.)
Why couldn't I be haunted by Bevin?
But no. It's her. It's her. & she's still there...

...still here. High noon. Cucumber sandwiches.
The sun at its zenith. Me not at mine.
Haunted by The High Priestess of Bitches
& the promise of a new paradigm

that's never delivered. 1. I shiver
like she (you know) is dancing on my grave.
She is, of course - all this shit-storm weather?
It rained from her Reign of Terror - it paved

the way for Tory Might is Right today
2 divide & conquer. Rich, poor - Class War:
the right-wing-rich, having a field day,
set the waged poor against the unwaged poor.

& (3) me? I sit on the sidelines, watch
the War & pen my poetry in Peace,
& hope the bobbies on the beat just botch
half of their lawkeeping - it takes the piss.

4 o clock - for the clock keeps ticking by
& Heraclitus put it better than

I ever could: these things pass, we get by.
Time's our man. He can't do it? No-one can!

It's 5 o clock, &, yes, I'm still alive
(& still in bed, still reading) & she's not
risen from the dead yet - & this, the dive
wherein I lie & read's free of her rot,

except in (6) spirit; I mean The News
the bastards blast at us (& charge us for!)
Look out for resurrections of her views
(as though they weren't quite bad enough before!)

7. Sins. 7. Saints. 7. Scroungers.

Biblical language co-opted by Them
for Their own ends. (Which were her ends.) Loungers
in lizardskin, they are - two-faced ConDems.

Back to work! Back to work! We are the boss!

The public servants said. & were not sacked.

We took your freedom. Sorry for your loss. 

Thin end of the wedge? Your brain is hacked.

It's 9 o clock. It's The Nine O Clock News.
We're mourning her, are we? O. O, I see.
Propaganda. Divide. Conquer. Confuse.
Convince me that's it's really only me

who doesn't mourn her loss. & now it's 10.
Epic paranoia holds sovereign sway.

I fear to sleep to dream of her again.

(I really wish she would just go away.) 

11. I'm sorry to say I'm still
obsessing re a dead politician -
I wish I could divert my thoughts at will,
She's outlived her mortal abolition.

A Crappy Little Sonnet About The Thatcher

I'm warming up to write something actually good - &, as I often do on such occasions, I've run off a little warmuppoem. Thus:

Shalt I Compare You To A Beast Who Brays?

Shalt I compare these to a beast who brays
for blood, blood, blood, cannibalisticly?
You're more complex, minotaur. Moral maze-
-s wrap round you. Round us. Politically.

You are a human being. A woman.
A thing of flesh & bones & blood & skin.
I can't see you quite like that, can I? Can
I peel of the Spitting mask & look in?

Behind the Iron Curtain? I'm trying.
But did you ever try, Mrs Thatcher?
To understand the dispossessed, dying 
losers whose lives you ran to capture?

A failed meeting of minds, I'm afraid, dear.
You are the holder for our hate this year.

 

Day 2 Of Trying To Write Something (Most) Every Day: Absurdist Fiction

Absurdist Fiction, Wikipedia says. Alrighty, then.


Doing Nothing

David stopped running. He's lost them, after all. &, if he hadn't lost them, there was no point running - they'd catch up with him eventually. Up ahead, past the loanshark's, was a park left over from when Tottengate Road had housed the unemployed upper-middle classes, as opposed to the unemployed lower-working classes, was a metal-fenced park - locked. Quite what had happened was unclear. Some sort of literal class war? An exodus? A flight path? Something. But that, David told himself, was not the point. The point was, in there, amidst the overgrown trees & the probable hypodermics, he would be safe. Safe meaning unseen. 'Damned cameras.' he said, under his breath. 'Everywhere. Except where it doesn't matter.'
   He climbed over the railings, the rusting paintwork (green over black over a sort of red) come away on his hands like a sort of sudden human lichen. 'Call off the fucking search. I'm gone. I'm gone.' A couple of fir trees oozed their chlorophyllstench out at him, but he nestled between them, allowed their fronds to close around him like the inert tentacles of a B Movie creature. & then something moved.
   'Mister? 'Ave you go' a ligh', Mister?'
   'What?'
   A small boy, in peculiarly disheveled school uniform, was sitting, cross-legged, nestled into the left-hand fir. 'I said, 'ave you go' a ligh'?''
   'Yes, yes, I know what you said. How old are you?'
   The boy shuffled, uncomfortably. 'I only said...'
   'Yes, I know. But you're too young to smoke.'
   'Bu' I do, though, so...' He trundled into a disappointed silence. 'Me Ma' knows I do.'
   'Well, yes, but...' He felt around in his pocket. Felt the cold metal of his lighter. Threw it across.
   'Fuckin' 'ell, mate. That's well bling.' said the boy, turning the silver lighter around in his hands. 'You must be loaded.'
   'I get by. Now, light your cigarette & give me my lighter back.'
   'Keep your 'air on, mate. You're well jittery.' He lit his cigarette, pre-rolled & produced from his shirt pocket. Tossed the lighter back. 'Are you a drug dealer?' He took a lung of smoke. 'Cause, if you are...'
   'I'm not.' David said, sharply. 'For God's sake.'
   'Is this a drug deal, yeah? 'Cause I can sling me 'ook...'
   'It's not, OK? It's really, really not.'
   'I wouldn't have told on you. I ain't no grass.' the boy said, & smoked his cigarette. 'I'm Tom, by the way. Tommy. What's your name?'
   David paused. 'I'm ... David. It's very nice to meet you, Tommy.'
   'Yeah. & who are you hiding from, if you're not a -'
   'Who are you hiding from, Tommy? Your school? Your parents?'
   'Nah. Bobby Flashman said he'd kick my ass, so...'
   'Can't you tell a-'
   'Nah. I'm not telling. I ain't no grass.'
   David laughed. 'There was another Flashman. In a book. Tom Brown's-'
   'School Days. I know, I know. I've read it, man'
   'You've...'
   'I'm not illiterate, man.'
    'Well, no, of course not, I suppose I just presumed that it might not be, well, quite your thing...'
   'No need to get all flustered, yo. I know what I look like. But I'm not, yeah?'
   They sat in silence for a couple of minutes.
   'So who the fuck are you?'
   David paused, took a cigarette out of the cigarette case he secretly kept in his jacket pocket, and said 'I am - I was - the Prime Minister.'
   Tommy laughed. 'I see. So you're, like, off your nut. That's OK, man. I had an aunt what was off her nut-'
    'No, really. I am. Was. You seem like a well-informed kid - don't you recognise me? From off the T.V.?'
   Tommy looked at the ground. 'We ain't got one. T.V licensing people... You know...'
   'What?'
   'They took it.'
   'Your mother didn't pay her bill?'
   'No-one does, yo? What planet are you from?'
   David frowned. 'Someone must, though, Tommy. I mean, if no-one paid the license fee, there'd be no money to pay for the programs, would there?'
   'Well, yeah, rich people do, maybe. No-one else does.'
   David lit his cigarette & drew some of it into his tarry lungs. 'Well, it's not my problem anymore, Tommy. It's not my job anymore. You heard it here first. I quit. Actually, I'm kind of on the run.'
   'Alright.' said Tommy, & smoked some more of his cigarette.