© 2009 eil Carter (Text and Images)

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Night Jazz black leather chrome song. Summer night chanting chanting
moonlight moon vibe people calling me over there but not me paralysed
no I can’t move no I can’t move at all.

She won’t let me sleep and she doesn’t like my head she doesn’t
like me at all but she is with me not against me understanding though
they seem to want me dead gone out over there or anywhere anywhere
but here right here in the hole in my head the deep hole in my head that
goes down and down and dark and cold and where I live.

There is some neon there it lights the people like a film set and of
course like a film set it’s raining and the pavement is black and shiny
reflective gleaming. I put a cigarette out with the toe of my boot and
draw myself small inside the long black coat protects me from the cold
makes me feel old keeps me down I think I should burn it buy a denim
jacket or an old leather instead.

There is not much nice in the city everything that looks nice is
really corruption and greed and oppression. The people are not nice
either they don’t like me I can tell they whisper about me they don’t like
me at all I don’t belong here they say I am not like them too rich too poor
too straight too bent too effete too bitchy too stupid too bright too
colourful too happy too sad too lonely too tall. Yes they don’t like me at
all. I upset them.

They are upset because I don’t freak enough when I am

intoxicated, they are upset because I am tactful, they are upset and now
they want to make me upset, but I don’t upset easily because I am used to
this bull this kind of horse manure has wallpapered my existence for a
long time and I don’t give a damn anymore. I have become numb to the
awfulness deaf to their protestations idiots may rule the world but I am
still the master of my own destiny.

In this place the walls are positively Tolkienesque dingy

rainsoaked stonework an artform in itself and decay and neglect have
turned old world into food for poets and painters.

In this place two in every ten people are real the rest are clones
stereotypes you can write them off dismiss them they are not important.

The two people left will be like you bewildered incredulous at the
idiocy that surrounds us amazed that people are inclined to accept the
ridiculous solutions that we are sold as sense.
 Like the last time anyone used their imagination was a good twenty
years or so back then when there wasn’t a shoddy but convenient dull
answer for everything. We have taken the quick route and missed the
poetry all the quality all the intricacy has gone out of life. Minimalist
simplicity has won the day and our minds are enslaved and starving.
Modern life is meaningless the world has gone Formica the intricate
tapestry replaced by plastic moulding everything stripped down to the
noun

a chair

a table

a shoe a car a train a hat a man

oh god it’s awful the poet in me thirsts for some meaning anything
stimulating something with complexity something to puzzle over texture
the weave something that is not new and smooth and shiny something
real.

Hesitantly though I must concede that I am probably barking mad.

By most peoples’ standards.

I am not introspective anymore I used to be but I tired of

introspection it was all written by the same author all painted by the same
painter I contribute but really Michelangelo Raphael they had the edge
there was still mystery legend in their day.

What on earth did they want from me anyway I asked myself as I

stared at the wall on earth was all that ABOUT? AYWAY? The strangest
days I ever knew. All I managed to understand was that leafy suburbia
held as its secret an underground revolution behind closed doors but what
this revolution wanted from me, honestly, god only knows. Was it my
body, my mind, my thoughts, my soul? What? I really cannot say. But
whatever they wanted they wanted it a lot and I would have gladly given
it whatever it was had someone had the sense to explain it to me in some
way what on earth all that strangeness was really all about. Did they
want my wisdom teeth, my nasal, hair, my toothbrush, my duvet cover, I
am afraid I really can’t say, but whatever it was, they wanted it, but my
lack of insight perplexed them, and me, myself, at every turn.
 And, all the while, older men, you are not kidding are you? Older,
older men, that’s one way of putting it I suppose. Senior Service, no
wonder I don’t make love anymore, not in years, like some kind of
protest at the extreme poor quality of prospective lovers that this world
was offering me. A kind of strike, industrial action my celibacy. A
protest at the poor quality of person and appalling men that were being
offered to me. Nothing at all thank you very much. Even animals like
me have some kind of standards.

And I still moved forward and resisted the urge to simply rest and
reflect. A journey THROUGH life all the time searching and thirsting for
meaning. All the time amazed and astounded by the shocking greyness
of most people.

The haze that envelopes my life is due to a lack of any anchorage

to another human being. There is a freedom gained, of course, resulting
from full independence from all others, for the purpose of friendship,
romance, whatever. But in being alone one loses reference points and
solidity to depend on, in order to feel, well, real actually. And a
dreamlike quality of life arises.

All that I’ve been through, many people would not have survived,
and I am not particularly tough myself.

The medication used to come on like waves of nausea and

numbness alternating and crashing in again and again. And the isolation
well I am isolated now but when I was really alone it was horrible
although at times for short periods of time I enjoyed being one amongst
strangers because it gave me a buzz to be so independent and in charge of
my destiny to an extent.

In the summer I would get sunburnt because the medication used to

make our skin sensitive to sunlight, as a side effect. One time I had
shaved my head and had cuts all over my scalp as I had used a disposable
razor.

I went out in the hot summer sunshine for about an hour that’s all
but had to flee inside as my head was burning and the razor cuts
combined with the acute sunburn was so painful. I likened it to being
stung on the scalp by a thousand angry wasps. I went inside and a kind
young nurse dabbed my head with cotton wool soaked in calamine and
with words of sympathy and her medical care my agony was soon
soothed. They dug out a baseball cap from the hospital stores after that.
 And from then on every summer for years I always had baseball
cap, whatever the fashion.

In hospital there are days and nights when really nothing much
happens. These days are rare as mental hospitals are busy frenetic places
often full of people wailing people crying people fighting violent people
putting their heads through windows. But during those quieter times the
time I spent in hospital was not so unpleasant side effects aside.

I could lie on my bed for hours remembering how to relax putting

myself back together again peaceful moments to rest and recharge my
batteries sedated yes absolutely stoned on antipsychotics but the relief the
huge sigh of peace and tranquillity enabled me to draw a line underneath
the anarchy and awful tensions that forced me to hospital in the first
place.

Strangely it was usually the first few days or so that were often
quiet and event free so that, as I used to self-harm the peace came hand in
hand with care and good nursing for my cuts, gentle, tender nursing for
my physical injuries and peace and calm to soothe my mind of the horrors
that had caused me to lacerate myself.

One time my left forearm, the top of the forearm was an area of
slashed flesh four inches or so of red exposed raw flesh and congealed
blood, nurses would be very sensitive and almost maternal as they tutted
gently and cooed concerns “that looks a little infected”. They would
praise my courage as they dabbed the wounds with iodine and surgical
spirit.

My chest was badly cut one time I did it with glass if I remember
correctly, having locked myself in my bathroom in my flat with big
shards of broken milk bottle. I had smashed one in the back garden with
a brick for the express purpose of hacking away at myself later. Four,
five inch cuts below my nipples on my chest one each side, deep cuts that
bled voraciously for a short while then congealed and hardened into
scabs.

In the hospital they had said that it really needed stitches but they
didn’t stitch it because the scars would show much more if they had.
“They will scar” those kind nurses explained almost blaming themselves
or such was their tone, for any future scarring that would result. Almost
saying “we could’ve done better” which of course was patently not the
case, they really had done all they could.
 I still have the scars on my chest on my arms, but they have faded
with some time, I suppose we all have scars anyway, some of them show
some of them don’t so much. As for the nurses, bless their hearts because
they care when you’d begun to think that nobody did.

So I lay down on my bed full of tranquilizers and sleepers, they

always dose you right up when you first arrive at the hospital those first
few days pumped full of enough tranx to bring down a rampaging bull
elephant a rogue elephant. I couldn’t keep my eyes open enough to do
anything but rest on my bed the first few days I didn’t eat or drink, save
for the water that kind nurses brought me in plastic jugs and plastic cups
yes, plastic they said in case I got up to my old tricks again and used the
glass to break into weapons to use against myself to try to force some
feeling from my numb and plastic body.

Strangest thing, as I lay there, my eyelids would close and I would

drift in and out of consciousness and all I could see in my mind’s eye
were Tom and Jerry cartoons, kids’ cartoons Tom and Jerry beating each
other up in violent slapstick comedy all played out in my own mind’s eye,
but stranger still these visions had an ephemeral nature as if I could
barely make them out as if they were ghosts of cartoons, there alright but
only just and just beyond comprehension. Like watching Disney without
my specs on or slapstick cartoons shown in redundant film stock in the
mind of an audience of one. I was haunted by these images I tried to
ignore them, but I saw them anyway resigning myself to their ephemeral
yet insistent presence, so irritated by the dichotomy, they were there, but
they were not, only tangible just enough to annoy, not tangible enough to
observe or enjoy.

The, sleeping for a while the cartoons became real in dreams and I
would wake laughing or with a jolt as Tom got his comeuppance smashed
in the face with a frying pan, his head used to be left frying pan shaped
and vibrating like a tuning fork.

Poor Tom. Remember Tom and Jerry?

The women in those places. Oh the women. Now there’s a kettle

of fish. The loveliest people but so messed up. I’ve had so many women
cry on my shoulders in those places, hospitals, loads of times a beautiful
wonderful person crying her eyes out over their bullying husbands their
addictions, their alcoholism, their depression, their hallucinations, their
delusions, their weight, their self-harm.
 But they are so courageous…

I love women more since these hospital friendships. Thrown

together like strangers meeting on a train. I have lost my romantic
involvement with women over the years. But my eyes were opened to
those brave beautiful women and I understand women better now. I’ve
gained respect for women because many women seem to go through hell
and remain so brave, so charming, so brilliant, so funny. To keep your
sense of humour in such circumstance is heroic in itself, and to remain so
humane so clever so charming so good and so cool with all that going on,
yes that is really something.

Take anorexia, the illness in itself so destructive, the treatment so

painful, the recovery often so slow, but to be able to laugh about force
feeding only half an hour after the event that brought tears of humour to
my eyes whilst tears of sympathy were also appearing. That woman had
me in stitches, I was holding my sides begging her to stop her hilarious
anecdote. And she knew, she knew, she was being funny, oh for
goodness sake I was thinking what a crime it was that the girl wasn’t on
the stage.

These women amaze me, they’ve got a black eye and a broken
nose from the violent husband back at home and their primary concern in
hospital is keeping a maternal eye on the fifteen year old boy that’s on the
ward, in the hospital because he was homeless then he was sectioned and
the kids got a broken arm and she’s helping him with his bandages. Guts.
These women have Guts.

About those cartoons, I am suddenly aware that I ought to make it

clear that I don’t generally hallucinate Tom and Jerry cartoons. And I
don’t think it was the illness. So I am left with the honest conclusion that
it was the tablets that were doing it. For goodness sake don’t tell the
kids! They’d be raiding the drugs cabinet for a really wild Tom and Jerry
trip! Not good. I think personally that antipsychotics should not be given
to kids until they are, well, not kids anymore, eighteen in other words,
until then, give them the benefit of the doubt, they are only kids, if they
appear psychotic, we should realise that it is just hormones, adolescent
hormones. All these youngsters need is more time, society should hang
fire on the tranx, they might after all be on them for the rest of their lives
if you start them now, give them a couple of years grace? Incidentally a
good dietician can sort out most problems, but then again the psychiatrists
have been promising me a referral to a dietician for the last twenty years.
They’ve also promised me in turns a psychologist, a behaviourist
psychologist, hypnotherapy and all manner of referral follow-up that
never materialises in the real world. The only follow-up anyone ever gets
is a community psychiatric nurse and the meds, that’s all, they promise
you the earth, don’t believe it, when you get back home nothing comes
your way. They close the file, put you back in the filing cabinet and it’s
on to the next appointment with the next patient. In all honesty that’s
how it seemed, and in my experience general practitioners do the same,
no follow-up, just empty promises. Very charming and all that.

A lot of people in mental hospitals have one thing in common.

Their illnesses, whatever they are, are a response to aggression and
violence. They are people who can’t handle aggro. Most ordinary people
endure a lot of aggro, hassle, violence, daily. And mentally ill people,
anorexics, self-harmers, schizophrenics, manic-depressives, all of them
have developed symptoms of one mental illness or another because these
are sensitive people who can’t handle the aggression that ordinary people
take for granted is going to be there. Most people just put up with it. The
mentally ill go crazy instead. It’s that simple.

Obsession used to rule my life. I was obsessed, shame, but there it

is, I was obsessed with that thing that turns men’s minds more often that
most things that can make a man go crazy. I am speaking of spooky
weird books talking of bizarre rituals and strange beliefs. I got really into
those books, “maaan”, and I went comprehensibly insane. These type of
books could have been written with the expressed purpose of driving the
readership loopy. They are bad books and I would advise anyone to leave
the awful things alone. I was throwing runes obsessively consulting them
so often that they became more important than the decisions that I was
trying to make in the first place. Books like these brought out the darker
side of my imagination and my personality and so increased my suffering
exponentially as the obsessions developed and continued.

Now, I am a nice bloke, I’m moderate gentle, sensitive, but the

personality disruption left me as a person I did not recognise I did not
recognise the person that I had become. I had become unsociable,
sociopathic, withdrawn, unlikeable, strange. Utterly unlike the real me.
Over the years since these strangest of days my real self my real
personality, the likeable happy go lucky nice bloke that I really am has
taken back the controls and my recovery, halting but progressive, is now
under way. Obsessions are controlled, delusions and personality
disorders are diminishing. But you know, it all would have worked out
so much better without those awful books in the first place.
 I can sing you know I really can, I can sing like an angel like a man
possessed like a devil a demon other worldly a voice that comes from the
spirit world I channel it through me a voice that echoes with the pain of
life and the loneliness of my death.

She tears me in two this girl this woman who I love she used to
love me she doesn’t love me anymore and yet we are still together sleep
together eat together walk together but always I know that she doesn’t
love me anymore it’s so hard to take I can’t win her back there’s nothing
I can do she doesn’t love me anymore and it’s awful. She tells me she
loves me but I know she doesn’t love me anymore the words are hollow
she is hollow I cried in my sleep last night it’s either hate that she feels
for me now or nothing at all she doesn’t love me anymore and though she
lies in my arms she’s not there and right now I just want my baby back.

And that thing I did to myself that hurt that really hurt I have never
known pain like that oh god it hurt I was just stuck there like a victim of
Vlad Dracul I couldn’t get free I was just stuck there and it hurt it hurt so
much inside myself awful pain like terror like fire like falling like dying
like torture like too much pain to much living too much modern life too
many old dusty blankets too many dingy refuges for too many dingy
people too many wasted people too many people who are only half a
person too many wandering half life shells too many people who never
come to anything wanderers lost egg shells broken lives hideous little
scenarios between people who don’t matter never did matter never will
matter dirty lost eggshell people half lives inconsequential half lives.
Such a shame that they should be like this poor broken fools.

…What if a respected leading psychologist should be brave enough

to stand up and tell the world that this thing is too ordinary too run of the
mill too regular an occurrence too common and occurrence to be
monstrous. That it is a personality type or a series of personality types
that we are dealing with nothing more nothing to get to upset about too
many of them for them to be an aberration something wholly unnatural
too many of them everywhere Uncles Aunts sisters brothers mothers
fathers the bloke down the road next door at work which means that what
we are dealing with is more like an everyday occurrence a series of
personality types nothing more science society could recognise this wake
up! Could come the cry from the revolutionary courageous psychologist,
this is much more like ordinary life than you are admitting too there are
too many of these often wonderful people for this thing to be some
isolated rare event this is some part of the human condition a not
uncommon piece of the human experience and furthermore a lot of these
people are not freaks and criminals and monsters but in fact in their hearts
to their souls some of the nicest people you could ever hope to meet who
actually really care about other people whoever they are who live their
lives enriching other peoples’ lives encouraging the weak a helping hand
for the downtrodden crazy society can’t continue to demonise this huge
section of humanity let’s see it from their point of what if it’s not a
problem what if they really are not hurting anyone what if they would
never wish for this part of their personality to become destructive and
painful for anyone it’s just a part of life it’s just a part of the human
experience we could learn a lot from some of these people they are often
very brave very dignified so very courageous very sensitive very sensible
very down to earth very wise let’s consider this rationally it’s every
fourth person you meet these people can’t really be monsters most of
them like everyone else and people that you love respect admire care
about. This is personality type not monstrous aberration. Do you see the
picture I am painting? Isn’t this how it really is? It’s a new Millennium?
What is this strange pious war that you wage on your own brothers and
sisters? Are they really so much worse than you? What is this horse
manure? Are they really so much worse than any of you?

I know that we would have to restructure reshape society that’s

what the Renaissance was all about that’s what the age of enlightenment
was all about. Let’s be rational let’s think this through without our dim
witted pious prejudices. It’s your brother your sister. A member of your
own family missing your love and unnecessarily hiding behind a wall of
silence fear and intimidation probably secretly thinking all the time “I
wonder what the fuss is about anyway?” Who do they think I am… the
Devil himself? It’s so normal, so average, so everyday, isn’t it? Really?
A lonely person needs patience and understanding nor fear and isolation.
Stop making them feel so isolated, and lonely, in the first place.

An enlightened society would seek to understand and embrace such

a large group of people in its midst. In its own household. The more we
care and attempt to understand them, the more we diffuse any unwelcome
situations, duck.

Guilty is a horrible way to feel but in my book the very worst

emotion to be stuck with has got to be jealousy. Real deep down gut
burning unexpressed evil venomous jealousy is just about the most
horrible way to be the most appalling emotion to feel. When I
experienced unexpressed jealousy that was just about the most painful
few months of my entire life. The worst emotion that I had ever
experienced on this earth. If you ever feel jealous, for god sake express
that emotion tell someone, talk about how you feel. Don’t do what I did
which was exactly the opposite, I bottled it up told no one how I was
feeling did not attempt to express myself and for months it was as if I was
burning in hell.

I couldn’t speak about it I was struck dumb with a burning

jealousy. I wouldn’t recommend it.

I came so naturally to me, and those perfect gentlemen treated me

with respect. They were gentle with me and though it was me seducing
them, I invariably let them believe that they were seducing me.

And, instinctively, they understood, they played the game, they

were very cool. They made me feel like a million dollars and they made
me feel SPECIAL, they were perfect gentlemen each and every one until
the morning the next day a few days later when the spells wore off and
spoilt they acted up. So you are so special? What about me, me, me well
what about you? You got what you wanted you had an interesting
experience to giggle and whisper about with all those other queens?

But, you know, that’s just me being cynical. I always ended it, I
always initiated it and throughout I always controlled every more being
empowered like this gave me a huge buzz and what’s more it was always
me who decided that I had the power in the first place. It was a nice
game and I made the rules so I had to win I don’t lose for kicks, after all,
who does?

With girls it was always so much more complicated after all there
were two ego’s, the size of my own, at stake, with girls who wanted after
all much the same as the game I played with guys and although I could
quite happily provide and enjoy my ironic role reversal to Prince
Charming I soon tired of all that other stuff the talk of love and romance
the so predictable lines that had I not spoken myself so many times with
so many different blokes. When one has become an accomplished player
the game itself can lose its appeal I always knew what they would say
next and I always knew exactly what my line should be to achieve my
desired outcome.

And with girls a whole load of other stuff becomes important but
they don’t know how to bring all that stuff to the table and try as I might I
couldn’t help so I had a paralyzed women in my hands and there was
nothing she or I could do about it and they became suffocated and I felt
much the same to be honest and realised I wanted out and let them down
gently and went straight into the arms of the next guy every time. Love
had become demoted from a life for two to just a game for two to play
and somewhere along the line I seemed to have lost all capacity for
genuine feelings of romantic love it just ceased to happen for me I never
felt the feelings anymore the longing the excitement the buzz the agonies
the thrill the lovesick pangs of something approaching worship of another
human being. No one now was deserving of me as a lover to revolve
around them pandering to their every need, want, whim. No one is
deserving anymore these dusty freaks they just don’t deserve it buddy-
boy. People like these new dusty losers they just don’t offer me anything
like enough in return for the kind of love that we knew about all those
years ago. And until they do? I will wait and see.

Were we not all like that sometime when we were younger?

Doesn’t THAT mean before we matured? Doesn’t that make them just A
LITTLE IMMATURE? For the love of Dracula. The ache in my side like
a rib that has come loose and it hurts like my memories of you and you
and you and the headaches are rare now but not as rare as the sight of you
or you looking brave on the street people unique doing their thing this is
me this is what I am what I look like sound like dance these are the
clothes that I wear this is how I love how I speak this is how I breathe not
just another no impact oh yes one of those saw a thousand of those the
last year or so no light in their eyes like you and you and you someone
was home someone was in I wasn’t alone with people like you and you
and me in the room heads held high doing our thing being ourselves
being interesting fascinating anticipating a glimpse of you and you and
you oh just like Romeo and Juliet my heart beat so much faster just for a
flash from your eyes yes you and you and you made me feel so alive yes
you and you and you all of you today was a good day today I would be
seeing you and you and you and you shone people don’t shine like that
anymore no one laughs like you anymore no one thinks no one feels like
you anymore. Where did it all go wrong? What is this new life who the
hell are all these dull usurpers anyway? Even if you won’t see me can’t
you remind these dullards that they haven’t a hope in hell of ever coming
near to replacing you.

And you knew me, “I THOUGHT YOU LIKED HIM?”

I can’t forget you won’t forget you I love a lot of people those
days. A belief unshakeable that you had a light in your eyes like I had a
light in my eyes I did I had a light in my eyes and so did you don’t you
ever miss me like I miss you like missing an arm a leg an ear and eye?
Don’t you ever feel that for ME like I feel that for YOU?
 I don’t understand how you could OT feel like that about me
from time to time because I know that you must because I KEW you, all
of you, I KEW YOU, all of you, I KEW YOU, the people I knew would
feel that cry from time to time about me try to find me from time to time
even in some pub to look for that guy with that look in his eyes.

The people I knew, they care, the people I knew would come and
find me put their arms around me stroke my say everything’s ok you’re
with your friends again now love is back in town now an end to all your
suffering the people I knew would not be able to stop themselves from
still loving me come looking for me, still wanting to be with me putting
their arms around me wanting to hear my laughter wanting to see my eyes
my hair my words my clumsy dance my beautiful ways of walking
talking loving thinking being oh yes if I ever knew you at all then you all
miss me as much as I miss you. No chance mate this may be hard to
understand, the dream I can’t control, my behaviour I can, yes I admit I
just don’t have enough of a grip I admit yet you tell me I am hip oh yes I
am so stupid although I am stuck with a bad man’s dream it seems but I
am not a bad man myself no not a bad man not a good man I am just a
madman I have never really hurt anyone like that but these people voices
they don’t leave me alone ever.

Is my heart so tiny has it never grown or is my head frozen in time

although I can’t change everyone around has seen me shine shine shine.
Oh I live like the undead I know it’s not cool the lack of control but it
could be really could be with a little understanding from you just like
everyone so could you please even though you might think me not a man
I never hurt anyone indeed lately I never even get so involved with
anyone and I don’t hate anyone I am not hateful even if others find it in
their hearts to hate me.

As for you well you are the future of love when did I ever tell you
that you cannot be free?

Who or what do you think I am anyway I’ve become a man whilst

waiting for you to help and meet me halfway meet me halfway it’s the
only thing I ever tried to say I know I am immoral and everything but
really this thing has got way way out of proportion I will never be the
monster as you know all too well I am too in touch with my emotions
meet me halfway.

I can’t put the blame on anyone else and I’ve racked my brain but
it seems this thing really did begin with me. But all this time and even
now I am waiting for you to meet me halfway that’s all I’ve been trying
to say all this time listen the night may be dark with me but the sun still
shines all day for everyone.

I sometimes feel quite ashamed shame on me if this thing really

began with me racked my brain can’t find no one else to blame shame on
me then please meet me halfway that all I’ve ever tried to say all these
years please please meet me halfway.

Everything looked blackened around the edges and everything was

either claustrophobic and red hot or freezing cold icy icy no friends no
allies now just me and against nature does nature hate me want me dead
oh no god everything is so painful sharp dangerous where is my soul now
why am I so unhappy then she introduced me to her body and I turned
inside out upside down my bones stretched tight back breaking fever fire
on fire on fire for you my little darling fever for you girl. Gone mad
maybe, it happens to us all it’s only your body that’s dying. Fever.
Fever. Fire.

Walking around town oh they put me on cloud nine in the place

where I was born where I drew my first breaths oh god they put me on
cloud nine here take away my fears make me smile despite myself thank
you for loving me thank you for saving me thank you thank you that was
too much that was so real thank you for bringing me back to life love
laughter where would I be without you hell or somewhere all that was too
much you have revived me thank you thank you.

They call this place a hospital! It’s filthy! There’s fag ash
everywhere diseases love this place they thrive here this place is filthy
this is no hospital! This place is like some mad opium den full of
diseases and vileness and insanity this is no hospital!

The young women are preyed upon by the nurses and the male
patients alike here the young guys get lectured here by the Christians and
have to hold their own with older crazies chock full of violence and super
strength that comes from a mind with no inhibitions where fighting is
concerned everywhere here the threat of impending violence hangs in the
air like an indoor riot might break out at any moment and this all the time
twenty-four seven to coin a phrase.

It’s quite worrying really. Go to a nightclub to meet people really

with the best of intentions to go alone to a nightclub just to meet new
people and party, really best of intentions but when you get there you
remember suddenly how very shy you get dumbstruck all night because
you are so very shy you think why didn’t I remember that in the first
place might have saved myself the bother and stayed at home. Oh yes go
to a nightclub on your own just to sit alone all night crippled with shyness
whilst everyone else is partying laughing because they came here with
people they already know, stupid!

So very shy dig a big hole for myself die and throw myself in it
must remember always that if I go to a nightclub well only when I will
know at least five people who will be there otherwise it’s just a ridiculous
waste of time energy money everything.

And that’s when I got up to dance, enough said about that I feel but
honestly it’s no wonder I always danced not that it helped as regards
others you understand just that it helped to pass the time spent alone and
crippled with shyness and inhibitions.

Oh no, what am I doing here? Enjoy the next few moments, the
lynching is booked for this afternoon. Shall we do it again her body said,
might as well we spent all last night doing it, then I’d best be going I
think, by the way, is your father a violent man? Don’t answer that. That
terrible feeling oh lord I don’t really belong in a bed like this, oops!
Right let’s finish up then I’d really better gather my things and get going.
I believe in preserving all life, especially my own. Have a nice day!

Oh no! Finish up, best be going. No need for talking, look, please
always remember my name is John, John, always remember that name,
John… And always remember how very SMALL I am, and fair, blonde,
really BLODE, BLODE, and muscular, really muscular, always
remember that, bye then, have a nice time!

And then twenty years later you still can’t stop thinking about her
and what might have been, what you could have even now both of you
the one girl that really got to me, you know, she really got to me. Meet
her now, love and romance, love and romance, married, everything, yes
she really really got to me can’t stop thinking about her, never mind her,
tenderness, she was really beautiful and had an amazing personality a
wicked sense of humour, wicked figure, yes it’s true, it’s really true she
really got to me. And if you are reading this, look me up, only you, the
only one who ever got to me, look me up?

My life is to strange, I am incurably ill. I’ve seen things you

people would never believe as the saying goes. So next time you walk
down your suburban street living your suburban life think of me and
know that there is a whole other life other existence beneath the
shallowness and plasticity and rules and regulations. An underbelly a
whole other realm just below the veneer of respectability it’s not about
the golf club mate it’s not about the appearance of everything, dig a little
deeper and you will find a middle earth populated by other-worldly
revolutionary spirits. Not clones, not walking in step but real, warm,
making mistakes achieving greatness, alive, alive, the ones who sleep and
the ones who wake.

Ours is not sycophancy towards the boss. Ours is not keeping up

with the Joneses. Ours is not the mortgage the loveless marriage the
monotonous unstimulating job. Our is the living, the warmth, the life, the
love, the breaking free the ignoring all those bores, the adventure, the
mysteries, the shape of things, the heart that beats, the warmth and the
cold, we don’t do what we are told, we are not going to war because we
are not marching in step.

So keep your smart but casual fashions keep your worries of what
everyone will think bury your parents’ dreams that you would keep your
head down at all costs and never really live, because we suffered, we
achieved ecstasy, we knew life and death.

We knew pain, we knew joy and through all those pains always the
knowledge that it’s all good because despite everything and everyone we
are alive… even if we are a bit confused. Night jazz black leather
chrome song. Summer night chanting chanting moonlight moon vibe
people calling me over, over there. Speaking the word experience, in a
deep voice, having seen so much more.