UNEXPECTED DAY:

Yesterday’s sunrise was pure liquid gold, the Big Mother must’ve
pulled it out of ‘special reserve’ just for us, to retrieve us from
the depths we’d sunk in the night before. Shielding our eyes we drove
into the light, laughing, such was it’s impossible beauty, Miyazaki
couldn’t have imagined it better. Every train out of Essex was crazy.
The surrealists had been at the schedule in the night. I sat on the
line talking art & American visas with a neighbour. We laughed,
at least we’d picked a carriage with heating. We stopped, we started
& somewhere down the line got turfed out into a bemused commuter
crowd as rail staff passed between us handing out reclaim forms
like famers feeding maze to dazed chickens.

“Do I know you?”
“Yeah, I catch the train a lot”

Got into the city just in time, watching it slip into the red.
Down into the underground, practiced & fast through familiar holes,
seeing the twisted map unfold in my head, hoping I’d hit all the
connections. Bumped into a angel, disguised as a mate, disguised as
an arctic explorer. Just the eyes & mouth, smiling. Just enough time
to hug & acknowledge the beauty of coincidence.Then running, back
down another hole, me & the rabbit up escalators, breathless.
Hit the pavement just as the phone found signal, just as the call
I was expecting came.

“Hello? Karl? Are you ready for your interview with Lauren?”

Gasping, breathless, squeezing words out between gulps of air,
ejecting plumes of water vapour.

“Could you give me one minute, I need to find somewhere quiet?”

A door across the street, run. Mount the stairs in strides of twos,
vision turning psychedelic. An office, smiles, but no time for
greetings. Drop the bag, shed the jacket, the gloves, the scarf.
Find the notes I made in preparation, so the brain won’t have to
think. Flop back onto a sofa, hand raised, requesting silence as a
glass of water is pressed into the other & we go on air.

“High Karl, thanks for coming on the show…”

(K)