I ALWAYS IMAGINED IT WOULD BE LIKE THIS:

At the late night esoteric art bar our discreet arrival
is elephantine in contrast to the worshipful silence of
the audience, listening intently, heads down, faces behind
fingers, not able to sip beer or blink lest even a molecule
of the sanctified air be disturbed. Eye’s nail us as we
snake between the seated feet, holding in our stomaches &
breathes, the room crackling with disdain at our late arrival.
Behind a lap top & mic a man squirms in silence, straining
muscles in muted anguish, his inaudible words obscured
by the sound of his hands cupping air.
To his side an older man, microphone, papers spread
on a lectern, similarly opens his mouth as if to speak
then, considering, closes & retreats, hands dance delicately
around him, describing ti-chi arcs.
This goes on for 5, 10, 15 minutes. No one sighs, or breathes
or laughs. A woman in the from row snaps, moves like she’s human,
lifts a bottle to her lips & sips, pulls out pen & paper & begins
writing a steady, methodical, list, of, words.
The lap-top mute, squeals, screeches, breathes heavy in panic,
arms flailing, chest rising & falling in panic, sputtering clipped
phonemes, before returning to his silent screaming. His companion
responds with a poetry reading, biographical extracts about
self knowledge & discovery, bathing late nights in effluent pools
on the outskirts of San Francisco.
An hour, the performance concludes when both artists relax,
‘And now this is ME’, the audience bursts into rapturous applause,
masking our swift weave to corner seats where we conceal ourselves
for the second half.

(K)

BEAUTIFUL DECAY:

Rolling thief, looting images, sucking poetry from the streets
of Berlin, rich pickings for one so long away from New York.
Voices queueing on the night phone, clammer to access my room.
This digital life, this philosophy of Love in a Glass Car,
poaching city voices, carried like dust on the wind, familiar
for the first time only as I watch your busy feet go sky-walking,
high on the walls of decaying buildings, the ones I still find
so alluring.

(K)

STICK IT ON BILLBOARDS:

There’s a giant Art-Woman painted six stories up
an end-of-terrace wall, frozen-girating to the sound
of silent drum machines. An Ice-woman makes a lipstick ‘O’,
a bright Red ring with her lips, emotionless eyes,
simulate arousal, image without passion or love.

(K)

AS I WALKED OUT ONE MORNING:

Walking to your house, trying not to look like a tourist,
hotel map cradled in a pocket fist. Men smoke cigarettes
on corners, scuff the ground, heads bowed, shaved rough,
dressed in Black, phoenix stones calling the Night-line daily.
Automatic Kings of waiting, paint spattered jeans, watch me
sideways, squinting, hang around for action,
squat between stark tenements.

(K)

SONG TO THE FUTURE:

Riding in the back of another night taxi through the
old Eastern sector, deserted streets. Another M.O.R.
underscore, another Man salon, lights off, dormant for
the dawn, another abandoned corner. The words,
‘Hair Finger’ whisper in my head, I don’t stop to question,
write them down, sing them to the future.

(K)

POSTCARDS OF NO-MAN’S-LAND:

A Trabant procession appears right of picture, exits stage left.
A little street circus for the tourist camera, a smile, a grin,
a nostalgic giggle for the digital clickers, turn side on, tilt
your head & smile, smile, smile – Gurning for lenses at the Wall.
Point & click, click, click, kiss. Razor wire scribbles, outsider
daubs, quant, covers-band politicking in paint. Remembering a time
we would’ve been shot just for standing here. Now it’s a taxi ride,
a stroll, a drunk’s stumble, a lover’s moon. Jazzer blows a horn,
back against the wall, selling CD’s in a bitter wind to the
transient few, across the road, the giant pixel screen on another
branded arena proclaims the fabulous names, the ten commandments
of platinum international artists queuing to deliver their
multi-million dollar merchandise.

(K)

SATURDAY MORNING DRIFT:

Walking empty streets at the back of nowhere.
Waste ground, parking dirt for long distance trucks,
virgin black top under the bridge. Your beautiful
dancing marks, so precisely placed, never defile
the walls. Transforming object into sculpture,
flirt with my electric eye, drifting in a chill wind
between the rails & the river.

(K)

THE ELECTRIC FANTASY VEHICLES OF EUROPE:

Van Morrison, serenades another breakfast buffet,
black tea starved, heavy on the meat. We hum & nod along,
grazing tit-bits & fries, thin smiling, demarcating boundaries.
Late arriving couples with shower hair, floating, distant eyes,
radiant, calm, bubble-people. I’m drowning in the wind of
heavy soap, it’s time I walked the streets.
See the Ice Train,
the Grey Ghost slip – describe a line across the horizon.
Rhythms of the colours of exotic forms, fantasy vehicles,
efficient, electric, Kraftwerk, industry, Europe, Endless.

(K)

FLOATING WITH ANIMAL:

Following Mr Black-Black, ragged nail marks down his back,
Billboard woman smiles at me in Pink, too Pink, in passing.
She smiles at everyone she meets,too perky for these streets,
made me feel special for seconds, dumped me for the next one.
Now cabins float beneath us on a lake of dark, shapes
picked out in tiny lights, outsider sanctuary gardens,
withdrawn from the dance at the heart of the city of outsiders.
Salty rocket-gun & Violently Luminous Concord, push their faces
in through our windows as we glide, radio anaesthetised,
I float off the back seat with Animal.

Listening to: ‘In St Cuthbert’s Time‘

(K)

SOMETHING BAD WITHOUT A HOME:

The residue of something bad without a home, discharged fluids,
on an unloved back seat, constant use. The driver flicks through
stations, chasing an addicted to M.O.R. America, talks to his
cell phone in staccato grunts, hunched over a tiny thing, glowing
in the dark between delicate fingers like truck stop sausages.
Street light rhythms, dim, yellow, feverish, European.
Bull-necked apartment blocks, facades brutalised by Cy Twmbly,
posters ripped to fabulous by Clyfford Still. Riding in the back of
a Berlin taxi, late night in the rain with Dave & Iggy.

Listening to ‘Of Lovers, Gamblers and Parachute Skirts‘

(K)