WHAT HAPPENED TO THE THING?:

Distracted by the freeze & fish n chips.

(K)

SUCCULENT DELIVERY:

Going round & around in rehearsal, Essex backwater, cables,
radios, lights, action. Machines on wheels, prepare to roll
around the world.

(K)

PARTY IN THE HEAD OF A 4AM COUCH SURFER:

Dreamed of snakes oozing out of every crack in a multi-coloured
cartoon country. A place with a name where everyone is happy,
playing with the slithering things like pets. Had enough of that,
woke myself up.

Moved to the sofa.

Dreamed of a different Technicolor country, somewhere I’ve been,
contrast turned up a little past ‘normal’. Smiling people,
but more laid back. A place where desert sand meets the sea.
Where towering red stone rocks absorb the worst of the sun’s rays
reflecting them reduced to a comfortable glow. Radiant faces
stroll between cacti, taking it for granted they grow twenty
stories high. Cafe’s appear when you need them, just by thinking,
clustered in cool enclaves, quiet, spiced, exotic, conversation
exactly right for a dancing pen.

(K)

IS THAT EVERYTHING/NOTHING?:

Mother humming Block-Buster theme tunes,
Wind down the window,
Cruise past,
Slow,
Crank it up!

Momma wears a tent,
Hiding baby,
“Hello!”

(K)

THE CROW’S MONARCH:

On a high stool at a high shelf in the window of a different cafe.
Teapot, teacup, saucer, porridge, tiny pot of honey & a black
plastic spoon. The girl behind the counter starts stirring the
porridge with the spoon without wiping it, pushes it towards me,
smiling. I watch the black stump disappear into the oatie swamp,
hoping the scalding water will have killed off winter’s finger-vermin.

(K)

THAT THING:

A low red building glimpsed through trees, clad in corrugated iron,
windows cut anywhere for the best views.
Market day, a crowded cafe, a long high table like a shelf under
the window.
In a car on the roof of a multi-story carpark, engine off, radio off,
a phone pressed to the ear – guided by a voice.
A small room at the back of a house, piled high with boxes of fresh
trainers, all the same brand, some the wrong size.
A carrier bag full of paper memories from a suitcase used for
travelling years ago.
A peanut butter sandwich.
A delicate conversation.

(K)

FIRST SOMETHING BLACK BETWEEN THE STARS:

Picking banjo in a bower of fairy lights. Thinking about delay-lines,
machines I experimented with as a kid. Early tape-echoes, 1960’s,
why did I stop? Last night, sat on the bonnet of the car, alone
between the fields, beneath a full sky of stars. Engine running,
flask of black stuff steaming , practising new tunes for the tour,
stopping cars that wound down windows to shout their names.
The stars & the car & the engine running, the black stuff & the music
playing turned negative positive – new stuff feels good.

(K)

ROLL ON:

After Christmas it’s a dead-zone full of static & noise unless
I’m on the other side of the world, in a farmhouse in the
Australian out-back. Then it’s simple, nothing to do but chill.
Here on the island I feel like a cotton wool ball that’s being
slowly pulled to pieces.
From fourteen years old ’til nineteen I played a gig every
New Years Eve & that’s what I wish I was doing now. It’s still
in my bones, the need to be on the other side of the glass, get
away from the noise of the silent waiting, be doing something,
keeping busy. Can’t fully throw myself into work because people
expect me to be around, joining in with stuff that scatters in
too many directions. I’d rather be working than here in limbo,
a dancer without a groove, Mr cotton wool ball.

(K)

GOT UP BEFORE THE SUN:

Diary went missing in a day of multi-tasks. Porridge, Tea, Poetry
& Peace, gathering thoughts, lining them up, sifting the good ones.
Picking up party lights & Pyros, booze & snacks & plastic cups.
Clock watching, scheduled into future rendezvous’, then driving,
meeting, greeting, eating, talking, walking, shopping, sopping wet in
northern rain & parting sad, drive south in the dark-n-wet & scrape
the car driving to a meeting to line up thoughts that scatter
like broken strings of pearls. Pull into lay-bys on unlit back roads
between the fields, deep puddles conceal holes shredding tyres,
laughing, phoning home, grateful there’s no broken bones or homes
or anything that can’t be put right in a spray booth. Sitting in a
room of mad heads, hearing the similarities, gratitude rising,
driving home.

(K)

07:00:

Catbus, first bus, rides empty between the fields, cuts dark
with luminous eyes, all it’s bones lit up inside. Flickers behind
naked trees & hedgerows, black shadow fingers, magic lantern.
Moves silent along the road, unseen, still as a shrine prepared
to receive.

Listening to Kris Davis ‘Always Leave Them (wanting more)’

(K)