An amateur prose writer strays into the dangerous wilderness of Verse- and lives to tell the tale. A gripping narrative on the mysteries and dangers of casual rhyme.

2. THE
STREAM OF
CONSCIOUSNESS
A Cerebration Of Poetry
By έ

3. How does it start, one wonders. Can the expert tell at the very
onset? Can the veteran observe the earnest gaze with which
the toddler contemplates the mobile and say, “There's a dark
cloud over your Precious, sir”, or “Keep that boy in hand,
ma'am, or he'll turn to verse”? How does one identify the
casual rhymer before he becomes a nuisance? Or- could there
be a seed of amateur poetry in everyone? I shudder at the
thought.
My own journey originated entirely with a World Literature
course book and an incredibly naïve and blasphemous
thought: “Hey, poetry really isn’t that hard!” Who knows- had
some passer-by done the decent thing and chewed off my left
eyebrow, I might have turned my bumbling good intentions to
gardening.
Anyway, off I went, disregarding P.G. Wodehouse’s sage
observations on the end of the amateur poet. I played with the
sacred haiku format; I tore up the rulebook on rhyme and
cadence and made papier-mâché monsters out of the strips. I
marched on when inspiration had dried up; I closed my eyes to
obviously-idealized depictions- glaring untruths, even.
Artistic license, it’s called. Sue me.
Even then, the harm hadn't been done yet. It's possible that
Genghis Khan dabbled in calligraphy, but it is only genocide
the world berates him for- because Concubine 37.6 had the
Christian decency to destroy his brushes as soon as he got
them, and make glue out of his parchment scrolls. It was not set
in stone that I should join the despised few. The internet,
however, made it quite inevitable. Previously, one had to do
something with oneself, and thenceforth gift the populace with
one's opinions on the weather, the government and
continental drift. Thanks to the blogging sensation, however,
people can actually find an audience without conquering an
Armada or translating Virgil or anything like that. Thanks to this,

4. my gems of versified wisdom were broadcast fresh from the
oven (oven being a a ready-made metaphor for my searing-
hot wit). That it was broadcast unedited goes without saying.
That my nuggets of rumination could have gone unsaid also
goes without saying.
Still, no one read it, so there was little harm done. Of course,
friends, but... ah, friends are the landfill of life. Then a little
flippant quip from a buddy- 'You should publish this, dude'-
solidified into an inspiration, and from that to a burning
ambition. Curse not my friend, dear reader. He does penance
by reading political autobiographies.
So there the matter lies. A good number of pages lay ahead of
you, full of my brave and hopeful stabs at the mighty windmill
called Lucid Expression. I only hope your martyr's countenance
is lightened here and there with a nostalgic smile for those
days when you, also, brooded as Beethoven could only wish to,
while berating fictitious muses for spurning your passionate suit.
Let the happy memories- of the 'ABAB' scheme and the mood
and the theme, of hyperbole and apostrophe- comfort you as
you hack through the wilderness of my mind.

5. This project is dedicated to those queer people who live the most poetic lives
with enough bloody-minded pragmatism for an entire clan of
Dostoevsky's best serfs, and yet still get their laughter lines before worry
stakes its own claim- from army troopers to zoo keepers, thank you for
being.
Also, to those who desperately wring the romance out of every second like
the fragrance out of roses, only to apply it most liberally behind their
ears, in their pits- those people who should be prevented, on pain of
flagellation, from keeping journals or writing letters. Fellow amateur
poets, this is for you.
Especially dedicated to the Great Queen Bee:
A house on her head,
Her kids in her arms,
Snakes and crawlers
Firmly underfoot.
Every monkey needs a Mommy to love am.

6. I am a stream;
From me flows wisdom and stupidity mingled,
Like mud and water in the bubbling brook.
I am a babbling brook;
I am a stream of consciousness.
Life, that unruly schoolboy,
Daily comes to sit my banks beside
And contemplate, and daily without fail
Toss stones in me, called experiences.
The ripples are what I write.

7. ART
Art, Art, wherefore art thou Art? Be thou but harmless Fun and we'd all be
yours forever...
You know, I genuinely believe that half the world's population consists of
artists, and the other half business-people. Unfortunately, the way life
works, the casual, life-is-a-journey approach taken by those of the artistic
persuasion is in lower demand than that of their angle-measuring, 'O'-
sandpapering, 'Q'-buckling counterparts. Results have gotten to be
something of an addiction with us. Even artists are required to actually
produce something before they are recognised as such. This is
unfortunate, you ask? Yes it is. Why? Because the full measure of artistic
spirit will of necessity render its earthly vessel incapable of activity. The true
incarnation of Art should have its mouth eternally ajar, and an indolent
gut.
Ah, what can we do? We've gotten so good at sponsoring people to feel
and express for us. It is much too late for us to start thinking for ourselves,
unless we make some pretty momentous strides in the area of memory
erasure very soon- to level the playing field. Because even actual artists
are plagued, in their search for originality, by the past. It occurs to you
that it's been a while since you last wrote about flowers. Use Google map
to find some charmingly overgrown garden which endears you to your
audience? You should, if you are like the typical artist and really have had
more important things to think about than crocuses, but instead your gaze
travels to that Longfellow fellow, and pff. Adieu, creativity. There is nothing
harder to do than getting the legends out of your head when you're trying
to find your own way to immortality. You know it sounds good, but
Wordsworth would never say that. It looks lovely, that cloud, but Whistler
would splutter at that technique. So if you are going to use that
progression for the bridge, why don't you just leave the Beatles out of it
altogether? And so on, till you just give in and do what they say.
Sometimes you actually take the path of least resistance with a song and
a smile. That's the funny thing: I have been blessed, in that I've been
relatively unaffected by the past, perversely because I haven't had that
much access to it due to my environment. I know this helps me stand out
as an original artist, but I can't help longing for the day when I'll get to go
into a big museum and watch lumpy potentates of the Renaissance era
intimidate each other from opposite walls. That's one of Art's great
mysteries.
Another is that there's 'literati', and then there's 'bookworms'.
But the saddest thing about Art is the life it requires. The moping, the
hanging about on the fringes of conversations, the hopeful smiles as

8. people approach, the heartbreak as they do drastic U-turns to avoid your
manifesto readings- it's all too much for me. Oh, the results are fun, sure...
A stream might somewhere flow
But for all the tears unshed;
Art isn't pain to me,
It's drink, it's bread.
...and introspection is good for you, but in moderation, see? The whole
suicide and addiction thing is really unhealthy.
I believe, though, that one can catch one's self before too much harm is
done, and return to society before a rehabilitation program is required.
The warning signs are:
1. Inaccurate and poorly-suited use of quotations. There is nothing
more dangerous than a young artist who has only just realised how
well- and barbarously- they get by without dragging Balzac into
things. I vowed to shave myself in penance after reading my first
high-brow magazine. A week later, I had began my journey into the
land of impromptu quotation, with A.A Milne. Only Shakespeare
holds any difficulty for me now.
Also to be noted is a propensity to share bits of unnecessary history.
2. Drastic change in choice of music. This can be used to forecast
both temporary (as in the case of heartbreak) and permanent (as
in the case of completion of a Literature Appreciation course)
artistic fervour. Emo music is bad, but jazz, I assure you is worse. The
more de-constructed, the more asymmetrical, the greater the
danger. But the worst is world music. If your loved one takes to raga,
or Sufi devotional music- I don't know. Bite them.
3. Marked non-adherence to the laws of conventional fashion. In
these cases, infection is localized. I mean, I had always seen them
on TV in their wonderful Tuareg outfits, but the scarab didn't really
bite me until I surveyed pantalons of similar capacity,
accompanying a certain young man's legs at a party. And then I
got nutty for sartorial acreage.
Oh, yes. Seriously speaking, this whole cleanliness thing, when you
take a critical look at it, really is just a trend too. In a couple
millennia we will be back to the Neanderthal aesthetic. And the
artist leads the way.
4. General suspicious artistic behaviour: If your cherished one speaks
of Ché or Guernica, quarantine them. If they walk around singing
random everyday phrases in a lilting sort of way, introduce them to

9. agriculture. If, the Lord forbid, they ask you to pose for them-
purchase a disguise, acquire a new identity and embark on a ship.
Freighters will let you work for your board.
5. Rebellion!: Hitler was a criminal. Your teacher is, practically
speaking, not eligible for a Hague trial. Don't talk like that. Do not
even think like that. That is the root of the evil, did they not tell you?
It is that which causes your clothes to acquire a tie-die motif, and
your face to instantly blossom with parasitic tendrils of adolescent
hair. I speak from experience; I had the misfortune to observe the
phenomenon on the face of a young man I was speaking to. It was
especially disconcerting because I had only just finished counting
my own sorrows. I rushed home to find the grapevines of wrath
creeping from my Sahara of a mandible. Trembling, I tried on a
beret.
Loved it.
The page is my ashtray
Where I tap out the remains
Of this tube-shaped life
After the fire inside has consumed it.
I am a poet, hear me raw.
Really, though, it is a good stage of life. It is good to have a past that
makes you smile and blush at the same time. It is the best sort of
foundation. There is so much that has been given to us by the generation
which first instituted global social engagement- despite the gratuitous
nudity and police brutality (the kind against the cops, understand). True,
they also gave us things like the Lame Protest Chant, and mantras, and
syphilis, but every good thing has its flaws. I believe the profusion of art is a
very good thing. We should all get to express, to wonder, get a feel for our
inside self. We should also get to experience the joy of meditation before
we receive our first cubicle (Complete with Overflowing In-Tray!). I
therefore welcome the blogging revolutions, both the macro and the
insignificant, and I treasure the fact that there are a lot more home
recording studios than there are actual ones. P.G. Wodehouse projected
that, when everybody had become an amateur poet, the thing would
die out, because no poet reads anybody else's work. Wouldn't that be
something? A world in which everybody so clearly knows their own mind,
Oscar Wilde and Proust are forgotten? I don't think civilization should have
common points of culture. Oh, I don't think they shouldn't have them, I just
think it's bad when we aim for conscious unity. We should each listen to
our individual centres, look to our individual skies, and find honesty from

10. both within and above. Then we should share like crazy, because that's
where the true humanity is.
We'll only grow old
When our tales are all told
And our lisping lips fall silent.
TO THE LORD OF RHYME AND SONG
Flow, ink, like water over parchment earth;
Shine, words, like sunbeams through my soul.
Move, thoughts, like boundless rivers
Through my pen, and leave a hole.
PLEDGE
We'll write like crazy,
Then sleep like the dead,
And we'll never forget
To keep our hands dirty,
Our eyes keen and
Our quills wet.
THE HERMIT SCRIBE
His was a nomad's heart,
The pencil was his staff.
He held unruly words
As a tender does his herd
And sheared their coats.
He strove against the winds of life,
Seeking fresh green thought and bubbling emotions.

11. EMPTY BARRELS WILL SPEAK
Some say make art when your belly is full-
Only fools, I say, will try to silence you.
The empty barrel's noise is a cry for heaven's dew.
CONNECTED
A sip from dream's river,
A dip in its flow,
Watching ripples scatter
From a stone throw;
Counting moon slivers
As they disperse,
Solemn sweet shivers
As fairies rehearse,
Dancing in the deep...
Milking the willows as they weep...
Songs of the night,
In bugs' living light...
Humble delights
Of the connected heart.
ENTERTAIN ME
Mulch me,
Over-indulge me,
Loam me...
Tome me.
Milk me,
De-silk me,
Shear me...
Raconteur me.

12. GROWING IN THE DARK
First it's just void,
Then shapes emerge,
And start to speak.
And still it's mute,
Then you hear your shoes:
They start to squeak.
Then you hear thoughts whizzing through your brain,
Then you consider if you're going insane,
Then you speculate on life... joy... pain...
You're growing in the dark.
ON RHYME
Iamb, iamb, iamb, trochee,
Rhyme-and-meter's not for me;
Some like order- good for those-
But "Poetry", I say, "is bite-sized prose."
TO THE WRITER SISYPHUS
We established the tribal griot;
We hacked at the log, we tackled the mote
This story, this African story,
Will it ever be told?
It's still running...
It never gets old.
TALK PARTY
Pound of bongo drums
And syncopated diction,
Mixing politics and fiction.
Words swirl like tie-die print
Around the buxom figure
Of Mother Art.

13. DRAW ME A DREAM
Draw me a dream,
Dreamer-boy,
Pick a char out of
The bomb-blasted ruins
And draw me a future;
Give me peace
And laughter,
A bird flying free-
Draw me a dream.
TIMON OF ATHENS
The very earth
Saw his death
Imminent;
The firmament wept,
Wind read the obituary-
Short, simple, sweet ceremony.
EDITORS
Cutting, pruning,
Sound retuning,
They with their blind shears go
Tearing memories apart;
They would have us think it art.
(A teacher inspired this one, relax. I have no problems with good, involved
editors with artistic sensibilities above that of an emu. If anything, we
should celebrate editors more, make them a more natural part of the
process. Editors, translators, art restorers, here's to you.)

14. SAID THE SILENT VOICE
Said the silent voice to me,
Pick up thine pen and write.
Said I, Why hidest thou from me?
It said, I hide in plain sight:
In children's laugh I tinkle,
In the thunder is my roar;
I'm the matchless beauty
In the preying eagle's soar-
Attend my thoughts, O scribe,
It said, and speak for me.

15. FRIENDSHIP
Ah, who could truly like a surprise visit?
But a friend fakes it.
Ah, friends. That delightful doormat-like tribe whose members treat us to
coffee and babysit our pets and positively secrete Kleenex. Love them.
I have a theory. I believe that the institution of friendship is quite
nonsensical. For qualification, you want someone you genuinely like, and
admire, and wish well. For usefulness, you want someone who doesn't
mind doing awful things as much as you do, you with your sensitive soul.
Ergo, anybody who is nice enough for you to want to have as a friend is
obviously too nice to be saddled with your hand-me-down tribulations. It is
imperative, therefore, that we redesign the concept for the good of our
civilization, and only make friends with the ones on whom we wish the
worst kinds of stress and agony. The really nice people we should just
watch football with.
Is friendship fundamental to our humanity? I'm sure it is, but it is by no
means unique to us. I have seen goats in real distress at the forceful
detainment of a fellow member of the local posse. I was recently sent one
of those delightful viral pictures which demonstrated just how otters hold
hands in their sleep- both cute and practical, i.e., all a relationship should
be. I don't know if that story's true, but I do know that most fungi and
bacteria exist in communes where his casa is everybody's casa, and my
lunch is public property. That impresses me greatly, because coffee can
be shared with minimum fuss among humans, but not backyard pools.
Bacteria share mucus. So much for the love innate in us.
The thing which impresses me most about relationships is the Imperial
Arrangement. Kings, priests and parents are permitted to claim that they
love all their subjects equally, though we accept that it is quite impossible
to do that. The Queen may ostensibly love the highest lord exactly as
much as the lowest waif, but neither of these gets to cuddle the royal
feet. Sir Waddles has that pleasure. Now the internet has made this
magical arrangement available to the common man. The average user
of the average social network has something like two hundred
relationships which are solely accessed through their account, and tells
jokes by broadcast. It is a phenomenal development. All you have to do is
wish them a Happy Birthday when your virtual secretary reminds you to,
and you have an ally who- as far as relationships go these days- sticks
pretty close.
Does that sound negative? Maybe the future will be. Possibly we're on the
verge of a cultural change that will make us a hive species, all scurrying

16. around as individuals, yet inhabiting a great shared consciousness made
up of bizarre snapshots and grammatically-flawed gems of wit. Should
that day come I will miss the simple times we had- the times we're having
now- when one's best friend was within arm's reach- a thing not to be
sniffed at, for people who occasionally need a good smack to restore
their sanity. But I don't worry too much. Think of the broadband such an
estranged future must have- think of the virtual habitats! Think of the
MMORPG!
I hate MMORPG.
We're doomed, are we not? Did the ancients see this one coming? There
was all this talk when Gutenberg started his technological revolution, of
communication being cheapened, but I wonder who could have
foreseen this wonderful, horizon-broadening, bubble-bursting interaction?
And it sets its limits, the Web, you know. You might think the possibilities are
endless, but they are not. Take the typical social network: there is a
programmed interface, ergo there's things the system has been trained to
do, and things it cannot. In the end, the least algorithm-defined parts of
the internet are blogs, video and picture sharing sites. And we had those
media already. So the internet age gave us the next stage of
transportation. Do you see? Every other form of communication, if it was
truly a form of communication, embraced all reaches of social
interaction. The internet just enhances parts. Therefore, we should view
every cultural change the internet brings with caution, because it doesn't
truly need to change us, the way it works. It just does, because we think it
is huger than it is. Text introduced the 'X' for a kiss, because you couldn't
deliver it physically, visual art introduced stylized depiction because you
only had so many colours and now mountains are purple and the Sixties
were sepia-tinted. The internet culture brings even more limitations than it
needs, considering how efficient it could be. Did we really need micro-
blogging? Truly? Now it is an essential branch on the tree of civilization,
but it was by no means needed. How do we know what news would be
like if it didn't happen in a mouthful of characters, and change every
twenty seconds? Would people give details if there was room for them?
Do people even bother to find out the details now?
But then again, when was the last time we did? Looking back, I guess we
should have seen it coming. For over a century our news has been boiling
down to the bare essentials, stepping back to give us the panoramic
view, till now we have to give special commendation to people who
bring us the 'inside story'. Why is there any other kind? We have these
huge technologies, and grand outlooks, and we are becoming narrower
people. We're in a mighty ocean of opportunity for expression, and all we
possess is our tiny little shell.
It's not that hard to break out of the rut, but you must begin to feel
beyond the edges a bit. When you see something new, ask about it. Not

17. all animé has to look like that. Not all music has to sound like apocalyptic
techno. There are more colours and pixels every year, and richer, more
diverse musical tones every month. But the greatest secret is to
understand that the world gets larger every day. Every song on this week's
charts is more insignificant than the songs last week, because every new
song is that much smaller a fraction of the whole body of human
endeavour since the phonograph was invented. And so on. When you
have grasped this, every day brings something new for you to learn, but
you don't let anything define you conclusively, because you have things
to look forward to tomorrow. And when you have began to appreciate
things as fleeting, insignificant decimals, people seem to grow bigger and
bigger in your estimation till your vision blurs with tears when you see a
friend as they are, stretching across time in unshakeable humanity. And
then an 'XO' for a hug-and-kiss doesn't quite cut it.
HELLO YOU
When you got back
The horizon curled upwards
In a smile...
It was droopy the whole while
You were gone.
MISSING YOU
My dear I found a way to keep you,
But it isn't quite fair to God,
Who, I'm sure, has 30-hour days
Whenever you go abroad.
COLD WAR
Your silence is a booming voice,
A gesticulating judge,
A damning indictment...
Your aloofness wields a stifling force;
Your absence is a tangible thing.

18. GLASSES PLEASE
I wrote you a song for a rainy morning with sunlight peeking through,
I wrote you a song for a highway corner with life rushing at you,
I wrote you an elegy for what has been, a prayer for what's to come,
I wrote you a toast to moving on...
I wrote you a song.
TO MY FRIEND
You define the sky and I'll define your limit,
Then I'll say don't grasp the moment while you're in it.
Still, our lives stand testament to the power of a dream,
That faith, though things may seem uncertain, works.
The test- we faced it; the thrill- we chased it,
The first to catch the iron of life and taste it,
Best it, possess it and leave walking,
While the rest were still talking with their eyes shut,
Hoping God would bless their folly- only if they knew:
He was with me and you, getting the business done.
RIDE
However we wish, we're not kids any more-
Now they just call us immature, insecure,
They say we don't know what we're heading for.
Wish I had the power to bless their mediocrity
Cause them finally to confess their insecurities
And learn to ride like we do, but they're too scared to.
We're scared too, but who's to try if not me and you?
We plant the yam, we forge the knife, we blaze the future's trail;
We coast where others have come, and tried, and failed.
We ride.

19. SECRET SMILES
Have we a secret?
When we last met,
You smiled at me
As though we did.
CHRISTMAS MUSHINESS
My favourite tales
Are tales that end:
'Myself and -'
So this is thanks
For your indispensability,
Much like seamless pants
And natural fangs.
Bless.
TO YOU ON CHRISTMAS DAY
Someday we will grow, I suppose,
And it will become unthinkable for us
To say the things we say now,
Do the things we do now,
Think the way we think now,
Till we express our love with
Gifts and store-bought sentiment.
Maybe that day is inevitable,
But it's hard for me to see your smile
And even think it possible.

20. TO A DISTANT FRIEND
And I swear I will wait,
My friend, by the gate
Where we last laid fond eyes
On each other, where 'Goodbye'
Rang through the cold night.
And when you appear through
The evening mist, I swear to you,
I will be waiting, and we will
Smile and hug and find we still
Love each other, as though you never left.
NEVER WALK ALONE
Take a friend,
Where’er you may go
To the mall, to land's end,
To the valley of the shadow...
Take a friend.

21. MUSIC
A sword cutting through the wilderness,
A tower of sound to which the weak can run...
I have this fantasy, concerning this young assistant in some lab, don’t
know when, who hit upon the genius idea of harnessing the power of
sound for generation of electricity, and spent millions sitting by the PA
array at countless Metallica concerts with a dynamo. It is extremely
probable, you have to admit. It is only a matter of time before the truth is
revealed in a YouTube video series. That young assistant was on to a great
thing. Only thing is, they should have tapped the vacuum-like peace in
the hearts of the violently gyrating concert-goers.
You know what I mean? That shivering sort of stillness that comes over you,
if you let it, with really good music? It becomes clearer on those days- we
all have them- where you get all the symptoms of an acid trip without
taking any drugs. I plucked my guitar one such time, and the throbbing
string seemed to swell with each oscillation until it was this fat bow of solid
silver. I get a feeling that that's how we look inside when that switch is
flipped inside us by a really good record.
I have a lot of experience with the power of music. Whenever I can’t
sleep, I strum nonsense on my guitar for some thirty minutes and my eyes
refocus on a bright and beautiful morning. I have never listened to an
entire Chopin concerto, because I always conk out about two-thirds of
the way through. Not because I’m tired- I once slept the five hours prior to
a BBC Proms concert to stave off the effect and still slept like a blanket.
The thing annoys me. I don’t go into a trance, my eyes do not mist up with
soft and mushy feelings, I do not glimpse the pattern in the fabric of
existence- I just doze off. Still, it qualifies me to say that music is a wild and
dangerous beast: the pleasure of stroking its coarse fur is exponentially
greater than that of owning, say, a Schnauzer. And walking is never a
chore.
But occasionally the unthinkable happens, and that wolfish fiend grows
attached to the bowl with “Buster” written on the side; the music acquires
a formula. What happens then? Everybody starts rapping exactly the
same way, and they give that formula a cool name and launch an
Inquisition against anyone who dares to try anything different. You
remember the wild enthusiasm of jazz in the beginning? It was a collective
name for… everything that hopped and squirmed into your head and out
of every other qualification. What it is now I dare not say. Oh, it’s still
beautiful. Of course it’s still beautiful. It’s just empty, that’s all. There’s no

22. transcendence to it, no magic. The coat’s still glossy; the wolf’s just lost its
growl. It doesn’t make people move any more.
Dark view, I know. But I also know that the wolf never dies. As long as
there’s still a pack somewhere that still pads through the night and steals
chickens, the howl will live on. And one day, Buster will hear the echo, and
his hackles will rise, his teeth will show, and the wolf will wake.
Amen.
SEUL MOMENT
A single glance...
The magic dance...
Ah, sweet romance!
We'll cup the sands
Of this hour-
In our hands,
Fragile flower-
And never ever break this trance.
TANGO
We step, you twirl, we clasp again...
The music swells- ah, sweet refrain!
We glide liquid, noiseless, through the night-
"The stars are watching; get this right."
MELODY
Shirtless beast of rhythm,
Beardless youth of soul-
One's got iron in him,
The other’s dug a hole.

23. CROSSED CHORDS
Soulful chords
Cross swords;
The dogs of war
Bay in harmony...
MIND MUSIC
Hearing songs within songs,
With ghosts of melodies wisping through,
And the spirits of summer voices singing,
Cutting through the sultry russet eve.
SING
Sing until your voice
Lends itself to the music,
Till inspiration comes from the sky no more;
Then sing yet.
THE GYPSY HOLLOW
Hands strum the guitar
Hands play the drum
Hands work a flute,
Breath supplied by airy lips
And ghostly heads nod,
And ghostly feet dance.

24. LOVE & RELATIONSHIPS
We live for it;
It is the death of us.
Love goes on.
Love is a mad, infernal force; the gates of Hell are guarded by Connubis. I
have no idea where ancient Rome got the idea for Cupid from, but it
doesn’t make sense. Unless the baby in question is the misshapen thing
with foul, grinning smokers’ teeth in Lucifer’s arms in Mel Gibson’s Passion
of the Christ. That could work. Yes, with arrow-shafts of depleted uranium,
equipped with pressure-sensitive nano-warheads with two-kiloton blast
force.
Love is a lean mean smitin’ machine.
My theory on friendship works just as well for love. If you truly love the
person, you really shouldn’t even consider saddling them with all your
baggage. You should just let them go. Or you can kill them, to eliminate
the threat of some other inconsiderate jerk preying on them. That kind of
thinking appeals to a certain kind of mind. But instead, the world abounds
with people who have lists on what they’d like a soul mate to do: Be There
For Me is the favourite. Comfort me when I’m sad; sit with me in the dark…
and to think that people complain about the horrible treatment interns
get. At least they only need to get the coffee. Lovers have to be the
coffee. You have to be the bright spot in your sweetheart’s day. That is an
awful lot of pressure.
The problem comes from the way we get our emotional education as a
species. 'Breakfast at Tiffany's', as lovely and as deep a story as you may
think it, cannot prepare you for life with someone who leaves blobs of
toothpaste in the sink. It isn't meant to. It is supposed to make you feel so
good inside, you become temporarily immune to the animal feeding
noises and the alien hairs stuck in your beloved Personal Comb.
Considering that this is very rarely the case unless it's one of those movies
where one of the protagonists has a serious disease or actually dies at the
end through the film, I guess Hollywood has failed horribly with romance.
Romance. There's a problem right there in that word. Romance. It literally
means 'story'. Which makes 'storybook romance' a tautology. Which
makes elopers a very suspect breed of fish. And which, most importantly,
makes the bulk of relationship advice tantamount to a generous helping
of Plutonium. Which makes 'Killing Me Softly' a most appropriate song.
You shouldn't ever have to change your life specifically to accommodate
love. You will have to change, of course- everything changes us; that's
what growth means- but you should never have to do it without personal

25. gain. If you ever do, either you've gotten hooked and will do anything to
get your buzz, or you have become a pragmatic beast who sits there
drawing up compromise contracts with a spreadsheet. Most of our
relationships get by without self-immolation or safety words, so why do we
encumber our intimate lives with such mad rules? And my understanding
of the rules phenomenon extends to cover the 'No Rules' rule. Judging by
statistics, one's best friend will last longer than one's spouse. Which means
we should take that more seriously, and put more work into that, and take
more quizzes and name-compatibility surveys about that. We do not. If
our friend starts exceeding the Soulful Look quota and we haven't just had
a fight or a crisis or a death of a close relative, we express concern for
their mental stability. So is love getting smothered? It is natural to care so
much, and I suppose in a perverse way, a harried spouse might consider
just how loved they are to be so persecuted, but it is hard to find time to
consider this while battling between sleeping in the office or finding a
really strong alibi for the weekend.
So we are raised to nurture insanity, not love. Well, not to fear-
socialization isn't that difficult to reverse, as our prison systems show (I
mean that in a way directly opposite to the one that has your eyebrows
up there). But no, the unscrupulous must needs cash in on this unconscious
yearning to see our soul mate in a straitjacket. Along comes the self-help
society’s foray in the dark and dangerous rainforest of Love. Now
everyone is romance-literate. They know how to tell the exact moment at
which a relationship starts souring, with little more than facial cues and
colour of clothing for reference. You have any idea how much of married
life depends on couples overestimating their life span by a few decades?
Why should you need to teach someone how to love and maintain a
normal relationship? When it comes to people with a true disadvantage in
social interaction, we get professionals, do we not? If it's not a genetic
anomaly, you are considered a bit of a danger to society. In an ideal
world, therefore, the readers of relationship coaching books shouldn’t be
allowed to purchase firearms or join the security services. And the writers
thereof should be hounded by said security services and have the
contents of the above-mentioned firearms introduced to their internal
organs.
A fundamental question occurs to me, concerning these 'Tell-tale Signs of
a Break-up' things you find in the newspaper, with the bald, spotlessly-
shaven guy and the well-manicured lady sitting faced away from each
other on a couch ('Note: These are models', they tell us. The shock renders
us vegetables.) Are they written by people who have been through
breakups? If so, how many? Methinks one requires a minimum of four
heart-rending relationship disasters to qualify as an expert. And there
should be laboratory conditions, to verify that the partner is the textbook

26. monster, and not one's self. Then one could get one's certificate and start
working on the opus: 'Love and Loving: What We Get Wrong'.
Have I ventured advice of my own? I beg your pardon. Give me some
credit. I could have said something catchy and cringe-inducing enough
to cement my place in the industry, like 'All's Gold That Listens' or
something like that. I did not. No thanks necessary. But if I were to
encapsulate my wisdom, I would look to my cat: This thing was going to
be raised by a single mother anyway- because male cats are really pigs.
Unfortunately, she lost both mother and twin within a week. As a result, her
attitude to mice and vice versa has rewritten over a million years of food-
chain wisdom. Occasionally I wonder if she'd land on her feet if dropped
from a height. Yet this girl insists on pretending like she'd be on the streets,
handling business, if it wasn't for my over-protectiveness. What is the big
deal about independence? I wonder how people rationalise the decision
to reshape their relationships to prove that their lives don't revolve around
their partner. I know nothing of romantic relationships, really, but my life
revolves around my family and about six close friends. That's life.
Bottom line, they lie when they say they know the rules. No one knows
your rules. We use language almost unconsciously, and the number of
principles we do not fully understand could drown us. That's how the real
world works. And don't think so much of love. Love is a demented
chicken, going about, pecking at random grains of corn. It is the partner
that one gets to choose- and one should choose. With great care. What
use is fireworks and string music if it comes with burns and blisters? But with
every word I speak I am hurting the relationship advice market. Go find
your own truth. And keep it to thine lovely self, I beseech thee.

27. THE PIT
Some look for it and find it,
Some don't and fall in it-
Love, the bottomless pit.
LOVE
Love is a strong wind;
A taunt in its face
Is a spit in one's own.
LOVE ON TRIAL
Solace to all the flowers
Spilt by jilted lovers;
Peace to the shards and splinters
Of myriad jars and shutters
Who paid for love's undeserved fame;
Your time has come.
THE ENIGMA CALLED EMOTION
Is love an equation or a place?
Or a wraith, a mere concept,
To which each man may put a face?
Do we get at all to choose what to feel?
Or does love merely beckon, and we all come to heel?

28. THE MOON IS WRAPPED IN SHADOW
The moon is wrapped in shadow-
The sun has shunned its face.
Like my heart it's cold and cloudy-
Love has left us in its wake.
YOUNG LOVE
Boy can't talk, girl can't listen;
Girl hopes for love, boy for kissing.
What more can there be? They're clearly juxtaposed-
But there's so much we can't see till our eyes are closed.
Whispers a little motherly voice, low and kind,
'Love, my dears, is blind.'
REDEEMING LOVE
... and there you put a refrigerator,
so I couldn't stare at the wall any more...

29. WAR
When I heard about soldiers playing Dolly Parton’s ‘Nine-To-Five’ on their
iPods in battle, I experienced nil horror. The significance of the casual tone
of voice was lost on me; the similarity to the video-game experience went
unnoticed. The only thing I could think was, ‘Dolly Parton. In battle. Well,
they’re soldiers. They don’t need machismo.’ Then I thought, ‘Mm. I’d
play Liszt’s ‘Consolations’. Martial Zen.’ The video-game syndrome, it works
on me. Two seconds after coming to terms with my own frailty, my feral
core on the battlefield… nothing would ease that shock. Games teach
you to disrespect the sanctity of the lives of others. War teaches you to
disrespect your own. Nobody gets death who hasn’t had blood dry on
their hands before, and gone back to barracks and done a quick mental
count to find that the soldier they sat next to yesterday isn’t here…
But the more I think about it, the clearer it is to me that the course of
history is F1 class, not cross-country; there are no off-road shortcuts. War
has to happen. Biased capitalism has to happen. Persecution has to
happen. Some things just suggest themselves to people. You wake up one
morning and you hear the distant baying of the hounds of War around
the treed hare of Sanity, and suddenly your back straightens and you
acquire a solemn piercing gaze, and a bad haircut. It just seems to be the
way the world works. Maybe it’s linked to some instinctive urge to
depopulate. If so, the lemming legend offers a much easier plan.
Despite this certain knowledge that the bloodthirst is never fully gone, I
can’t help but feel good about the species’ core when I hear of soldiers
flipping the bird at officers and sharing cigarettes, that international
language of oppressed foot soldiers ever since the discovery of tobacco.
Or thinking of their lungs as well as their shared humanity and faith and
sharing chocolate and singing good old carols at Christmas, and rousing
songs about the resurrection while they bury the dead. It tells me that we
are not fools. It tells me that somewhere deep down we know that
however great a service you do your country in battle, the ones who bring
the peace are the ones the world will remember with pride. We gently
manoeuvre the medal-laden boys and girls to the back of the group
photo and try to forget what animals we had to be yesterday. Indeed, the
medals don’t stay on for long either. They’re stowed away carefully in
some box and polished once a year and stared at with unseeing eyes. But
the memories of the carol melodies sung to strange words, and the home-
made cigarettes with the unfamiliar tobacco- those stay forever.
And now, we have revolution. Revolution has muddied the waters quite a
bit, has it not? The world has never known so many to want to kill for goals
so huge and far-reaching before. The world has seen some uproar before-

30. take the seventeenth century. That time saw the systems of God-given
rule weaken under huge pressures: plague, political turmoil, famine.
People who had borne inhumane treatment rose up, not because life
had no longer had meaning- mostly because it had never had any- but
because life itself was threatened on all sides. People were maddened by
desperation to the point that they abandoned the pillars of their belief
and sought revenge on the people they had been raised to worship. They
went out and murdered landowners and clergy, and then the thing would
have subsided, as in previous times, had political elements not herded the
frenzied masses to a bigger agenda: the fall of royalty. Revenge had
been had sought against the people they held responsible for the neglect
and the plagues and the hunger, but they were educated to understand
that those nobles answered to the monarch- a monarch whom they very
possibly hadn't seen before. That revolution wasn't born in the minds and
hearts of the people; it was schemed on paper and realised by
inflammatory propaganda.
Now we experience something entirely different. When my lights go off, I
blame my president. When one's cousin is arrested, one blames the
government. We apportion blame in grand ways now. When a bunch of
political extremists attack a commercial tower, a nation takes offence,
two indirectly related states gets invaded on the strength of public anger,
and a religion gets ostracised. Those guys probably wanted revenge for
the invasion of Jordan and Lebanon, and the BBC. They killed lawyers,
retailers, accountants- almost anything but military strategists and
imperialist Zionist propaganda-mongers. I stood for the Arab spring, not
that I would have wanted it to happen before I saw it starting, but
because I genuinely believe that anyone who makes their people
disregard their own interests and safety in the thirst for revenge must fall.
Humans don't go around wanting to kill. That's why we have to train our
soldiers. We are pushed to the ledge, and there is no greater evil in
humanity than to pushing someone to a point when they want to take
life- whether their own or another's. I genuinely believed this was what was
happening in North Africa; now I'm not so sure. Now, I fear that we are
becoming a mercenary species. Not mercenary in the sense that we fight
dispassionately or for personal gain, but we channel our desperation so
very well, one just has to wonder which came first, the goal or the
motivation. Because I don't think humans should kill. I pity those who serve
in firing squads and execution chambers and compassion centres and
armies, because no matter how necessary the death, no one should have
to effect it. Because humans pay for actions in their heads and hearts.
When hysteria comes, people do things and when it's gone, they are
ashamed. When people keep their heads and do the same things, and
they have that thought process available to them forever after, that
messes them up. That makes them sociopaths, We used to get this. We've

31. always acknowledged it through our hypocrisy, claiming to be so proud of
our military, yet telling awful tales of the returned conscript. We've always
trained killers to do the dirty work so we wouldn't have to, and now we
push weak little fragile humans to go fight for the future. And we do it with
a guitar. We are making sociopaths of little children in Libya and Syria just
like we did with children in Vietnam and Congo. And however much we
speak of standing with them, our cost is infinitesimal compared to theirs.
And that is our condemnation.
LIKE MEN THEY DIED
Here fell a man,
And there another.
Like men they died,
Like men they died.
Some lost a son,
A friend, a brother.
Their women cried,
Their women cried.
Ne'er once thought they
To beg a reason-
Not their part.
Their king their hearts required,
On them relied.
Like men they died,
Like men they died.
THE WARRIOR’S WIDOW
The drooping willow
Drinks the tears of the river;
The warrior's widow
Refills the muddy bowl.

32. WAR
... and still men cursed and heroes cried,
And fear and faith fought side by side
Till stung the taste
Of lives laid waste
Their hardened hearts inside.
CASUALTIES
When the smoke clears,
When out of the fog
The war-hounds slink,
It's never houses, landmarks slain-
It's people; this is oft forgot.

33. CIVILIZATION & THE EARTH
Earthworm to mole to farmer,
Snake to rat to bomber,
There's few changes in the world.
Taking this blue melon as a microcosm of the greater grapefruit that is the
universe, say I, it's safe to assume that there's really no 'intelligent life' out
there. Oh shut up, some people say. Some people, you see, are proud of
civilization. Those people say, well, look what we’ve done. However
flawed our work is, it is a work to which every human since the dawn of
time was contributed. True, but it’s not your masterpiece. It is the result of
collaboration between your instincts, the weather, gravity and the finite
universe, and the dangerous words floating around in the air. We did very
little. It’s like painting around a projected image. Sure, it requires
technique, it requires dedication. It does not, however, require
intelligence or originality. We just read the script.
Lord, if only we’d noticed the scribbled-in corrections.
The greatest dilemma is when it is completely logical. Take this Big Data
revolution. The technology's plagiarism of Orwell is clear, but how to stop
it? It seems the rational thing to do. Practically speaking, I almost find
myself looking forward to the day Facebook can suggest music I actually
want to listen to. Of course we want service delivery to be fair and
practical. Nobody should be able to trick the system into favouring them.
Obviously, for life to go on as usual, we'd prefer if we could. I, for one, can
forget about student loans if my internet data is available to the banks. In
fact, based on my search history, they might consider it advisable to
smother me in my sleep. Who am I to stand in the way of progress
though? They say these new technologies will improve efficiency. Thing is,
I despise efficiency. Efficiency shows amusement by acronyms.
Has any generation gotten it right? I wonder. The age of innocence is
always a few decades behind us, but that’s just relative. The age of
innocence which the prudes of my generation- myself inclusive- refer to is
the sixties, when free and irresponsible love, and electrically distorted
music first shook hands, when the world was divided into two by a
metaphorical metal curtain. The one my mother gets nostalgic about
(without having lived in it, of course- that’s what defines an age of
innocence) had a war in it. Still, I suppose it was better then than now.
People even fought cleaner. You had dashing spies go and kill people,
not little boys. And they got the troops of concubines right here. And
music had a twang in it. But what am I going to do about it? I love the
environment, but I can't say I feel its pain. I am very dependent on my

34. computer, and I hold my deodorant quite close. These actions cause it
pain, and still I do them, because that’s what life means to me. And to
the generation after mine, life will mean a bit less- or more, some say- and
so on, like an all-night party, until someone is finally considerate enough to
cut the lights. And secretly we all want to go home, because we stopped
tasting the drinks like two hours ago. We’re living on metaphorical money,
eating chemical food, drinking toxic water, shoving for space. Mountains
of debt and oceans of Sprite- and we call it progress.
...A mortal's eyes,
And a mortal's pride
In his finite world.
And every time a messiah comes along, the winds of change get caught
in the brambles of insanity.
What's wrong with our civilization? I'm beginning to think its our
transference of knowledge. The dog's bedtime instinct often makes more
sense to me than our educational system. People keep their certificates
around longer than they keep their textbooks. Harried teachers help
students cheat the system. Parents beat children into submission, then
they blush with pride to hear their grown-up children say, “I understand
my parents' actions now, and I'm thankful.” That is not a vote of
confidence. That means that you just kept the antisocial act under the
whip until somebody better than you could help them grow out of it.
Often, kids never find such a person, and Life has to do it for them. Hence,
'Experience is the best teacher'. And despite this hackneyed aphorism, we
keep raising kids the way we do. And there's still more textbooks than
workshops.
That’s why almost everybody has an ending burned into the front of the
brain: fire and brimstone, a tsunami to top all tsunamis, a solar flare, ten
thousand avenging angels- we secretly expect an end to all things, but
we all believe ‘all things’ doesn’t necessarily include us. I believe in
Heaven, but I've learned to hope I’m not going there. I mean, I hope my
humanity doesn’t make it over. I want the conscience to stop back-seat
driving and finally take the wheel and get us out of this dark wood. Naïve,
you say. Any more naïve than civilization? Sex used to mean
reproduction. Now it means nothing. Money used to mean food and
security. Now it means nothing. War used to mean self-defence- now it
means nothing. Okay, none of them really means nothing. Now they
stand on their own worth, which is really nothing. We have sex for sex’
sake. We crave money for money’s sake. We have war because they
were going to attack you anyway, soon enough. Our religions have
devolved from certain knowledge that there was a lightning-hurling man
above who would be really angry if you didn’t at least pretend to like him,

35. and now it is something we do for the sense of fulfilment. We didn’t see
the values change because it happened in decimals, so we just kept
drawing and building. If there is life out there, that’s why they’ll be coming
over. To see the Leaning Tower of Pizza Boxes.
SILENCE
Growth! Growth! the people sing.
Progress! Ah! their voices ring.
Give us a king!
Your sins will not be forgiven thee.
THE END
... and they lived happily ever after
On sunshine and laughter
And fruit from the polyester tree.
CIRCUS
And while they sang
One dared to ask,
And what do these for wine?
They drink blood.
THE FUTURE IS NOW
We've struck the bridge,
The crossing is now upon us;
It's not the future's fight any more.

36. DIRGE
As winds blow
Across the sands,
Like unruly children
Dry grasses scamper
Across ancient sea-beds,
Through withered forests;
Waves of ocean,
Now waves of sand,
Sweep over the wasted land;
Ghostly trees seem
To heave and sigh
In the storm;
In the sadness
Of the howling winds
It seems now and then
A bird cries,
A bull calls,
An ape screech
Rings through the wastes,
And the barren white
Echoes and re-echoes
These dirges to nature,
To poor Mother Earth.
CIVILIZATION
Greed grows from gold,
And hate from perfect peace.
While the righteous sleep
The wicked sow their poisonous seeds.

37. IT IS ROUND
It is round,
It is metal,
It makes a distinct sound;
It is evil,
It can kill-
Coin or cannon-round?
EARTH, 6000000000 BCE to 2050 CE
The earth was born,
Then it died;
No one cried.
And that, sadly,
Is all there is to write.
DRINK YOUR FILL
Judgement day will be a while
(Yes it will)
But will it come?
(Yes it will.)
Grass will shrivel in the fields
(Yes it will)
But will it grow?
(Yes it will.)
Some will go and some will come,
Some will picnic in the sun;
Some will die, some will cry,
Some will think that they can run.
Death will catch them, in good time-
Yes it will.
Drink your fill, traveller-brother;
Drink your fill.

38. RHYTHMS OF REVOLUTION
Freedom always has a beat:
The beat of fevered hearts at rallies,
The beat of students' feet;
The beat on oblivious mothers' doors,
The beat of police sticks;
The beat of electronic war drums,
The beat of freedom on oppression's massive barrier...
The beat of little shards of terror raining down into liberated hands raised
in thanks.
POLITICS
Naught but hot air
From empty vessels,
Lowly vassals trying
To steal a crown,
Little bits of cardboard
Kingdoms falling down.

39. RELIGION & FAITH
Ah, religion. The great controversy. Truly, though, is there anyone who
doesn’t have one? The spectrum extends from being nice to strangers, to
seeing the coffin lid as a horizontal door. I have a couple dozen. I believe
Liverpool will win next year, I believe two plus two makes four, I believe
school is pointless, I believe Jesus will come… I believe a lot of things
which just arise from inside. Everybody, at the very least, believes in shared
humanity. Some take it farther with shared language and currency.
Currency, at the very least.
Seriously, consider. Why do we believe in money? At first it did mean
something. It meant gold. Now it just means China hasn’t called in its
debts yet. Worth a party, but hardly worth the groceries. And yet we
believe. We’d shoot our mother for enough pieces of coloured paper.
And can you seriously look at the thousands of people in suits shouting
values of metaphorical stock certificates at each other, and dispute the
validity of an altar dedicated to some rain god somewhere? That god will
never amass the number of followers Microsoft has. Or Superman, for that
matter.
The only valid reason for knocking religion is when it isn’t honest. Oh, I
don’t mean when the worshippers don’t truly love the god they’re
worshipping. I mean, who can truly love a god whose sole responsibility is
plagues? Still, belief of any kind is essential. You don’t want people sitting
around and debating grammar. What most rational people really hate
about true believers is the way coincidences come to buttress their
delusion just when the argument was all but done. Just when you’re
about to start mocking them because it didn’t rain after all, here comes
some NGO to dig a borehole. And then the simple souls take it as God
working in mysterious ways. You will never understand why the universe is
so wicked, leading the poor innocents on like that. In the meantime,
they’ve got all their washing done. It’s disturbing how they always find just
enough cosmic coincidence to tide them over for a couple of years. It
would take a true believer in the non-existence of God to resist the urge to
join them.
The other great question is, where does the extremism come from? It
comes from a vacuum. That’s what makes it so cool- it is the only thing in
the universe which can do that. Fundamentalists, terrorists, inquisitors, all of
them, they need to make their own evidence by destroying all others.
That’s what makes them so desperate. It really doesn’t disturb a believer,
either in God or the lack thereof, when an opposing view is aired. They just
shake their heads at the naïveté of it all, or bow them in conscientious

40. prayer that the poor misguided one too will find the light. If it shakes them,
they obviously weren’t very steady to begin with.
But does anyone get it right? We keep reducing our concept of God to fit
our capacity, forgetting that that voids all claim to the title in the first
place. That is something that every worshipper must first understand:
there's the God who is, then there's the God we worship. It's not a He,
because that's a sexual distinction. It's not alive, because that makes
about as much sense as water being alive. The fact that God tolerates
our narrow-mindedness is, to me, a thing of wonder- and there's
remarkably few of those now. We have forgotten how to wonder; now we
think we've learned how to understand. God help us all.
Religion is not a symbiosis, and it’s not insurance. It’s not a warhorse and
it’s not a death wish. It is based on faith, and that is a high and beautiful
thing that comes from trust; trust as great, or even greater than, the trust
we place in family and friends. You can sit there with your higher power,
and just talk. That's a beautiful thing. It's not a diary hosted in the Cloud, it
is a truth within yourself. And until we understand that, that the kingdom of
God is within us, we'll get it wrong.
FRAGMENT: EVEN SO COME
... and then shall the Lord of the Harvest come
and reap these fields of granite...
THE COINCIDENCE REGULATORY BOARD
Servants of the creator
Sit left of dead-centre
Monitoring all that's to be:
The gaffe initiator,
The chance regulator,
The Head of All Things Unforeseen.
There a chance meteor
Hits a freak black hole,
Which triggers an impossibility-
There! See?

41. TO GOD
You reign over the big picture;
I live in the pixelated mess.
I'm always glad to have someone
Who gets it that I'm much, much less than.
THE FOOL’S PRAYER
How, O Lord, he cries,
Do I nail this job without
Your help clearing this path?
These diamonds will cut my feet!
ON GOD
How does one keep the faith?
First find, said the Sage, pockets
Wide and deep enough.
ENLIGHTENMENT
...when you learn to sit in unqualified humility
till you see God's tear race the sparrow to the ground.

42. DESPAIR
At the end of the tether,
Wondering whether
To kick away the chair...
Any good psychoanalyst would feel duty-bound to point out to me just
how many sad poems I have in here. I would, in turn, feel duty-bound to
shoot them.
Depression is boring. Depression is depressing, actually, and self-
perpetuating. You sit there and hear these things in your head, and you
roll your eyes at the drama of it all. You would never say such stupid things
if you were sane. I hate sadness. I hate the horrible cycle of loneliness and
self-absorption. I hate everything that seems to make up forty percent of
my emotional range. Looking at Poe and Baudelaire and Kafka, I wonder
if it’s worth it to be considered a genius. Of course it seems like genius to
the world, the thoughts are so weird and unique. Actually, it’s just the
products of a warped mind. The world reads this stuff and indulges in a
little shiver of delighted horror, but they, poor madmen, had to live with
these giant roaches scrabbling around in their heads. Nobody ever thinks
of that.
Still, it seems to help when you write it down. I suppose that gives it a sort
of definition which limits its power. It’s very embarrassing, though, to come
back after the clouds have passed, and read this… stuff. Sometimes it
doesn’t even seem honest. It’s a weird thing.
And the associations don't help, do they? Things just keep finding you. I
don't know how I even found Springsteen's darker work. They teach us in
school that reflection works by light, then I come home to find myself in
shadows. Sometimes you wonder how come your circles are so well-
defined, how people who aren't like you learn to keep away. Considering
how long I've had this streak in me, it's probably emblazoned on my
forehead, in absolute lack of expression.
Considering all this, I don’t know why I even left this chapter in. I suppose
it’s worth the laughs. I just hope it doesn’t leave any more shadows in the
world than it came to meet.
But I genuinely do not understand suicide. I do not get how the drive to
survive can just switch off like that. Certainly half of the time I wouldn't
mind dying, because I mainly stay alive to get some stuff done, but as
much as I lack that distinct appreciation of life, I'm much too human to
actually remove myself from the game. I have an enormous fear of death
which perfectly balances out my apathy to life.

43. Also, there's that little problem which keeps me going: what if it's all me?
What if I'm like the wicked Queen of the North, and summer will return the
very second I'm departed? What if all the problems in my environment are
tied to me? That means I'll be missing one heck of a party when I'm gone.
No, I'll stay, thank you kindly.
SEND ME AN ANGEL
I haven’t known hunger since
I swallowed my pride
But I’d feel much better
With the Lord by my side.
I LOVE THE MOON
I love the moon.
People can't understand this;
I love the moon.
I love it that, unlike
All that I've ever known,
It didn't leave, like the windblown
Leaves and sand and people
That were my home.
Now my rock is in the deep blue sky,
And I'll never have again to wander why
All things are so false and unfaithful.
Like the sun, which comes and goes,
And the morning sky, soon in dusk's throes,
Like the wildflowers in the sands, which wither away.
No, the moon stays, and sings me asleep.
I love the moon.

44. MAL ANNIVERSAIRE
Ceci N'est Pas Un Garçon,
I8 by 12 months,
Pain on memory,
Artist unknown.
ABORTED GENIUS
I sing a song of pocket change,
Of life lived running from the rain;
He went to the loo
Two hours to début
And never resurfaced again.
ROUGH WORK
Living in the margins of life
Like rough work on a test sheet,
To serve a purpose, then be crossed out.
THE SILENT YEARS
... and the more we mean, the less time to say…
Until we learn to get words out of the way,
We seem doomed to wander this earth forever,
Mere shadows of our expressed selves.
LIFE
How can we think this life worth living for
When chances come through the window
And misfortune kicks in the door?

45. SORROW SONG
And above birds circled,
and afar off cows lowed,
and the earth with the passive cruelty
of the eternal kept on
spinning
spinning
spinning
and you stayed dead.
QUE SERA
Some must live on the mountain-
Il faut que, I suppose;
Can't be helped.
And some in the valley where
The floods splash through-
Il faut que, I suppose;
Can't be helped.
NIGHT
And in the night
Comes cold, impartial light
That shines to seek out your one fault
And leave a long, dark shadow on the wall.
LIFE
The friend who frowns loves you;
The foe who smiles stabs you-
Oh what a life this is!

46. PERSPECTIVE
And oft it seems the light
From our greatest good
Becomes in others' sight
A mere candle in a wood.
SAME OLD STORY
.... until you're just that worn, tattered thing folded into the corner of the
lobby, like last year's fashion magazine...
SORROW
What do you do when people die?
I? I cry.
I find a nice quiet hollow
And pour out my sorrow
To the air, to the earth, to the sky-
That's what I do when people die.

47. SATIRE
So this guy
Walks into a car...
Satirists are bastards. Every last one of them.
I get to say this because I have the same outlook on life myself, and I
know just how evil it is of me that I find the frailties of my species amusing.
Stuff’s going horribly wrong and there I stand, pointing out the wicked
irony of the moment. I seem to watch crises in freeze-frame, zooming in on
the ridiculous bits, like the man up the coconut tree when the bullets are
flying, or the portable generator in the hallway of the electricity company
station. Do I help address the problem? No, I do not. I don’t even see the
problem half the time. I just see the absurd effects.
Sure, this does make life easier to handle. In fact, my good humour often
works in direct proportion to the desperation of the moment. The
Apocalypse will very probably have me in stitches. That does not mean
I’m fun to have around in an elevator when it’s trapped halfway between
the sixteenth and fifteenth floors, with suspicious snapping sounds coming
from above. Indeed you might lynch me if you ever found yourself with
me for company in such a situation. In horror movies, I’m the next to go
after the snobby prom queen character.
Still, there’s so much to laugh about isn’t there? The universe loves
absurdities. It makes them inevitable. Look at the duck-billed platypus, for
example. Or the ostrich. Or the concept of the ceasefire. Or the U.N.
resolution. Or the U.N., period.
On one side of the world, the incumbent with thirty years in power is
bussing the same two hundred supporters from town to town. Why? If his
people complain, even grumble in their heads, he has them tortured, but
he really worries about what the BBC thinks. On the other side of the world
there’s a bunch of two hundred long-haired youths who just bussed over
from some other state. They are retuning their guitars and praying for a
saviour, forgetting that the last time they were sure they’d found a saviour,
that saviour went and ran for office and became the Man they are now
fighting against. The best part is, each group thinks the other’s point of
view is so alien. How could I not giggle?
Or there’s the government agricultural committee holding its sessions with
all the windows shut because those crazy rural farm folk are out there
shouting again, and on the other side of that coin there’s the politicians
who believe that if all the normal people who really make the country run
would come up to Parliament- dropping the duties which make the
country run- and use their knowledge of the situation on the ground,
they’d work administrative magic. Then there’s the two armies locked in a

48. border dispute, failing to notice that it’s so difficult to plot their desired line
for fencing purposes because both sides are busy building illegally over it.
Then there’s the U.N resolution again.
I wish I could have a radio program where I’d just sit and read U.N
resolutions with slapstick noises in.
Some people who don’t get the point go around saying life is absurd. Life
is not. The absurd is often downright horrifying. Life makes perfect sense in
a way that makes you slap your forehead and groan. Life catches you
with your head in the clouds and gently but firmly reintroduces the
principle of gravity. Life catches us saying stuff like ‘I’m only human’ and
replies, ‘You are so right’, and blinks in surprise when we burst into tears.
Still, that’s no excuse for satire. Life is like an elephant. Satire is like a
demolition squad. It's the 'Please Sign Here' bit that hurts.
P.S.: Any references to actual persons, organizations or events, whether
real or imagined on your part, are apologised for. Also the flinging of poo
at said actual persons, organizations and events. My keyboard isn’t
housebroken.
P.P.S.: Apologies to all die-hard feminists who are upset by my use of the
phrase ‘The Man’. ‘The Person’ doesn’t have quite the same ring.
PREYING (ON) SEMANTICS
Coincidence and convenience happen to mate
And their child is by the elders christened Fate.
WIKILEAKS
Bones in the closet,
Ghosts in the bin-
Dead men don't talk
But they sure do stink.

49. THE TRANSPOPULANTIC TRADE
Some shake it, some bake it,
They all get rich off the man who takes it-
Ain't life a stitch.
The Mexican supplies the Nigerian don,
The Afghan cooks the crack the Marine coasts on,
The doctor makes the pill, the pusher gets paid-
That's what makes the Transpopulantic Trade.
BLESSINGS O DICTATOR
Blessings, O Dictator!
May your allies multiply.
May the debt relief continue!
May your critics choke and die!
May the just Lord clear your sinuses,
So your weekly rants sound better...
What? Rants? I did not say rants!
(Here our supplicant wets his pants)
Your highness knows I meant speeches-
They're just jealous, the poisonous leeches...
Ah, where was I? Good sire, my fountain
Of praises threatens to dry, but were the sky
A parchment, and my tongue a quill,
The essay would stink- I haven't the skill.
But we know, don't we all, that his Majesty is great.
His Majesty's beard is long. When his forces congregate,
They are at least two hundred strong.
His awesomeness is hard to describe, (Without inviting death,
He thinks but forbears to enunciate- but too late,
The king will rise... the king is rising... the king smirks
And sinks regally down again.)
'An extra ration of gari and pepper for his family.'
Blessings, O Dictator! the vassal sings.
As they haul him from the chamber, the sniggers ring.
Ah, the Majesty is witty. 'His family', the King said.
Must have hated the little ditty.
Our supplicant, alas, will soon be dead.

50. GUANTANAMO
Oh no, the soldier groaned,
A bird just broke the no-fly zone.
LO, I PONTIFICATE!
Côte d'Iviore. Big black bold print,
front page: Helicopters purchased;
Government has advantage. But how?
public gasps. Machines counterfeit?
How to remunerate? Gbagbo jubilates-
100% hike of tax rate.
Merchants irate. Protests by Ouattarate.
Government proceeds to depopulate.
Opposition forces reciprocate.
Stalemate.
Some wise guy in the UN reads a speech-
His own, we must state- calling on delegates
to adjudicate: "Select an invasion date!"
Checkmate.
Ouattarate, overjoyed, hibernates.
Erstwhile bastions of hate aggregate,
Now affectionate. Skirmishes abate.
Gbagbo now succumbs to natural fate.
Populace, hitherto willing to accommodate,
Begins to demonstrate. Ouattarate, it states,
Deserving of similar fate. UN also inculpates.
Losing advocates, Ouattara camp disintegrates,
Sheds affiliates. Presently, front page
With Ouattara portrait: "Five-Day Prez Abdicates!"
G'day mate.

51. YES-MEN
Mirror, mirror on the wall,
you see more gluttons than them all.
THE WARFIGHTER
Your helmet, sir;
Your epaulettes, your boots-
Or they wouldn't know who to shoot.
ALL DIE BE DIE
... 'cause when it comes down to it, dear boy, there ain't nothing
like ladies' boxing gloves.
MONEY IS SUCH A BEAUTIFUL WORD
Green and pink and magent,
Bronze and gold and argent,
Shapes and colours,
Sheens and odours,
Money's real sensual stuff.
AN ODE TO…
Internet porn, O internet porn!
Miracle place where C-listers are born!
Teens adore you, bachelors gore on you,
Hubbies and octogenarians subscribe-
Oh my!-
Truly you're one of a kind-
Oh my!-
The king of the internet tribe.

52. POLITICS AND STATISTICS
The first flood took two-thirds
Of the populace; the second took the rest.
It's safe to say therefore, my friends,
We reduced the casualty rate- yes,
My friends, we are indeed blest.
BON APPÉTIT
You pollute the air,
The sun shines rare.
Add your spilled oil,
Things aquatic broil
And are fished ready from the sea;
Bon Appétit.
THE SURRENDER
And their guns-
Oh, those guns
That flashed as
They marched in-
Became masts for
The flags of truce
That saw them out.
ON HOLY VENGEANCE
A tongue for a lie,
A head for an eye;
You steal from me,
You scum, you die.
THE RAT RACE
Lemmings, rather,
We should call 'em,
Rushing as they do;
First one way, in the a.m,
Then- whiz!- the other, after noon.

53. WIND AND SAND
Wind and sand:
Ain't life just grand?
One group's paid to dig a hole,
The other's paid to fill it up.
SAMSON’S ASS
... and O, the foes thine jaws have slain!
Even better, mule, while Samson's ass was dead,
You ain't.

54. HUMOUR
I’m not entirely sure I agree with the theoretical difference between satire
and humour. As I understand it, humour is defined by the proponents of
this classification as ‘innocent fun’ and ‘not a whiny-baby stinky-poo, like
something whose name starts with s-a-t-a-r’. Really, I just say those people
should realise how weird they look on the kindergarten rocking horse and
learn some spelling already. Still, I sort of get their point. It is true, there is
such a thing as healing humour. Here’s the difference as I see it: satire is
the jokes life plays on us, told by someone who was standing outside the
landfall area. Humour is the jokes safe enough that you can appreciate
them yourself. There is always someone with a truly legitimate reason for
finding satire offensive. Good humour is usually rated ‘E’.
Wait, it isn't very often so, is it? For some reason, non-satirical humour is
very often simplified to an extent that it needs to be tailored to specific
demographics. And once that is done, the temptation to pander to that
demographic by knocking all others is very strong. Truly universal jokes
have always been rare, and now the narrow way is but an imaginary line.
Sure, we don't have black-face, and we don't ridicule disability (well, not
as much), but who knows what the future will despise us for?
Still, I strongly believe that comedy, the innocent sort, is truly the only
relevant entertainment, specifically because it is usually less relevant to
our lives than anything else. We get to enjoy it in abstract. Perfect
falsehoods go unchallenged by the consciousness, because it really
doesn't matter in any way, and the art benefits as a result. For this reason I
spend at least sixty percent of my entertainment time watching cartoons;
I can laugh knowing that it means less than anything else possibly could.
But whence comes the crossover appeal of slapstick violence, even in
animation? Why is it that it doesn’t seem wrong when the universe
contrives to place eight planks (or tree branches or iron girders or
whatever else one can experience most intimately and uncomfortably for
a few precious moments) at exactly the right intervals to interrupt a falling
individual’s trajectory eight memorable times? Some say that the best
comedy is the kind that the audience can relate to. If that’s true, then
good comedy died quite a few years ago. Otherwise it would mean that
we all have tremendously messed-up lives, or a certain very unfortunate
friend. No, humour has no reason or rhyme. In much the same way,
percussion doesn’t actually need a rhythm. Their respective functions
define life and music. To do that, they must fit in perfectly with the
accompanying instrument or situation. Some comedy will heal your
sorrow; some comedy will actually make you sad. Somehow though,
good comedy is as natural as worship. If you don’t get it in a temple, you’ll

55. get it in a stadium, or a concert hall. When a baby is born, they smack it
to make it cry, and then they have the impudence to say ‘Natural
Reflexes Vigorous’. I wish they’d push the favourite uncle out of the
window sometimes. Laughter is the true natural reflex. That’s why it makes
no sense to classify it as kind, or innocent or free of politics. Just as long as
it’s funny, as the Hollywood exec once said.
PHILOSOPHY 101
'Tis the early worm
That meets the whetted beak
Of the early bird.
GOOD NONSENSE
The conundrum of the idiom
Is that the horse really wouldn't mind
The cart coming first sometimes.
LEGEND
And he won renown
For being so familiar
As to call the Devil Lucy-
To his face.
CELIBACY
... 'cause ain't ribs that protect the heart, boy-
it's bad hair and socks.

56. COMIC (BOOK) ROMANCE
...until sometimes I can't believe that two frames back
we were lovers.
AS A FRIEND I SHOULD TELL YOU
... it's not a heart you're missing in your chest, dear boy-
it's a bullet.
REVOLUTIONARY ALTRUISM
And if in time you should retract
With new-found proof that I was right,
You swear your phagus to contract
And laissez-faire? Then by my plight
The freedom fight would much achieve indeed.
OR ELSE WHAT? OR ELSE I’LL SHOOT YOU
It's an outright felony
That folks in Pre-Zoic jalopies
Should get to promenade
Unchecked, and serenade
My poor, poor ears with their metal song.
THE WAY OF ALL FLESH
... And the forbidden fruit
Now comes in cans, enriched
With vitamins and minerals
In brand-new packaging,
Available somewhere near you.

57. MINE EYES APPEAL
Mine eyes appeal;
Yours reveal clear
And lucid criminal intent.
SCIENTIFIC NONSENSE
Any theory can be proved workable
With men in white with mobile mandibles
And press junkets of size respectable
Enough to proclaim it so.
HEALTH WARNING
One whiff that blew
His system through
And he wasted,
In situ.
NEVERLAND
So where is it all babies are
Running off to when they forget?
Had they good memories, I suspect
They'd all be vanished quite.
GOMORRAH, A.D.
... And it was in that day
That men began to quote Bible passages
With ellipsis, like in product testimonials.
GLOBAL WARNING
The dollar sign did weigh
So heavy on the earth,
It lost its gravitational sway
And seemed to shrink in girth.

58. ISCARIOT
You've done well, dear Iscariot
Ill-gained riches suit you;
Though, riding in that chariot,
You beg the world to shoot you.
THE BIG CHEESE
He jumped from a cliff into the ocean,
The sea turned to vapour in her fright-
O Gorgonzola.
WEAPONS OF MATH DESTRUCTION
Alpha, Gamma, 'x' and 'y',
The square root sign and dreaded 'pi':
When all apart, they do no harm-
Put them together, you've bought the farm.
ODE TO TRAFFIC
Cars all stuck:
Half-parked,
Double-parked,
Round the corner
Roars Noah's Ark.
Cop's clear out of tickets-
The world's gone crazy
To help me fit.
THE ROLLING STONE
A roving spirit
Breezed in one day-
Out went my purse the other way.

59. HOPE & JOY
Stuck in the mud and dreaming of skies;
Dancing the waltz to the music of flies.
If comedy validates life, hope guarantees it. If there was no hope in a
tomorrow, anywhere in the world, there truly wouldn’t be a tomorrow. I
honestly believe that. It’s not the whole fairy thing, it’s true. Some explain it
more rationally, with the perception-altering effects of depression and the
proliferation of small arms, but I say everything explains everything else,
according to the theory of relativity. Hope is a powerful thing. It is like
cocaine (to define the joyous and vigorous approach to activity) and LSD
(to define the idealized perception of results of vigorous activity). In short,
it is like a good espresso. Of course then the problem arises of how to go
to bed. There are times when you need a clear head- where by clear
head I mean an outlook composed of equal parts of the fog of
depression and the fog of delusional optimism- to pick out the fuzzy,
many-legged bits in the bowl of cereal called Life. And when others are
engrossed in this gut-wrenching procedure, the last thing they need is a
chirpy, bright-eyed Huzzah And Up And At ‘Em. At such times, the small
arms are purchased for unselfish reasons.
But still, we all harness hope in one way or the other. Bringing it down to
the lowest common denominator, we all saw monsters in the shadows,
clear as… night. We knew for certain that they were there, and it was
really no use shutting our eyes and sliding under the sheets. We knew all of
this deep in the core of our being, but for some reason it helped to hear
the blind grown-ups say, ‘But that’s only a dressing gown.’ We knew it
wasn’t a dressing gown; the very suggestion was ridiculous. Still, we chose,
consciously or otherwise, to believe in the experience and security
embodied in the grown-up more than in our own eyes. And somehow
that did make the monstrous skeletons collapse and quench the evil
flaming eyes. So I guess in a way hope is a sort of religion. When it gets
wings and starts wearing a cape we call it faith, but when it’s still a
shambling thing we hang up with the baby mobile, hope is all we get to
call it. It is quite useful though. Hope breeds joy, and joy breeds hope, and
the ensuing overpopulation will slowly but surely drive the primitive
handgun into extinction and bob the sun up and out of that same dark
hole.
And gratitude is a powerful part of that. One learns to push the G-word
away, as a male, but I have recently woken up to the fact that two
minutes out of every morning spent in Pollyanna Mode may be the sole
reason why I can pass for an optimist. On close inspection, it becomes

60. clear that all the bad bits in our past weren't so catastrophic- specifically,
tomorrow came. One can scientifically postulate, therefore, that
tomorrow will come again tomorrow. Q.E.D.
I’LL MISS IT
Somewhere a bullet flies
That had my name on it;
I missed it.
And a death bell tolls,
That tolled for me;
I stilled it.
Somewhere a joint is passed around
That somehow passed me by;
I snuffed it.
Somewhere a funeral pyre burns,
That burned for me;
I leave it to burn, and fade, and die.
Somewhere a plane takes off that'll never reach the sky,
But my mother is not among those who cry;
I missed it.
More bullets yet may fly,
More ways for one to die may come yet-
For you, if you wish it:
I'll miss it.

61. PARADISE
When bombs are thrown
They will not blow;
Down they'll go
And rot, to someday grow
As a flower;
And life will flow
From death.
WE’LL OVERCOME
Now we accept the wall before us;
We've learned the hard way that
It don't crumble when we deny it-
Now we're going to climb it.
SEIZE THE DAY
Time, jealous of my lot,
Would hasten age and rot
To my door.
A fig for him; a grape for me.
CARPE DIEM
My joy is way too violent
To rest silent in the grave.
There's bubbles in my blood.
HOPE
Castles built of cloudy fluff,
With spires of beams of golden sun;
Dreams can often, with time enough,
Give hope and get the business done.

62. THE BATTLE
It would seem, my boys,
He said, his gruff voice
Mellow, that's us done.
Would Mars that we'd won!
Was one man's lament.
No! he cried as he went
The troops among; No, my man!
We're not quite yet undone.
And where we fall, he grinned,
Will Jason's seeded warriors spring;
Where we rot will grass and freedom ever grow.
ON ANGRY SORROW
Muddy rivers lie;
They show no sky
In their murky depths:
They deny the very sun.
TENACIOUS ME
It'll never be too late to change,
Not even when I'm dead.
I can learn to fly; I can be the sky...
That's what the Good Book said.

63. MYSELF
When I was a kid I used to use Oprah as a device for introspection.
Seriously. It wasn’t conceit or wishful thinking or anything; I simply found it
easier to be honest with the talk show queen, even in my head. I guess it
says a lot about the way my mind works that I didn’t even give myself the
allowed commercial break after a really awkward question: there were
just these great throbbing pauses. Felt like Larry King on a bad-suspender
day.
Anyway, it means I know a lot of embarrassing things about myself. Not
just know, not like the way we all know we pass gas sometimes, but I know
in writing. It’s unusual, considering where I come from, where life is so in-
your-face, so practical, that you’d have gotten blank stares just a decade
ago- i.e., before MTV- should you have asked someone what their
favourite colour is. (Mine is the green of a young banana, or the black of
the yawning mouth of a cavern of unmentionable horrors; but that’s
beside the point.) I actually know what I truly think about the meaning of
life and my place in it. I know my stance on love and relationship. I know
what I’d do with a million dollars, and why. I just say this to make you
understand that if this chapter was an exercise in self-introspection or a
symptom of self-absorption, it would be much grislier. Much, much more
so. There’d be sonnets in, juxtaposed with clamours of Judgement
trumpets. Instead, the few personal bits are (I hope) examples of me
poking fun at myself. I like poking fun at myself. I do it as often as some
poke needles into themselves, and for very similar reasons. The seemingly
boastful bits are really just wishful thinking.
The actual reason I left this chapter in is, the stuff in here applies to almost
every one I know. I discovered when I was young that it is pointless trying
to Sherlock Holmes people. I just compare strangers with people I know.
Using this theory, I have amassed a fantastic crew of friends, all quite
different, but possessing a little bit of something that I am proud to have
inside myself. The best experience any writer can hope for is to create
something that resonates with something in their own being, and then
discover that a couple hundred million others also get it. I wonder if you
can relate to the one coming up right now…

64. THE BARD
"All right then!"
-And he clicked his heels
And rubbed his hands-
"I'm off to rock the world!"
I AM
i am a grove,
verdant, flourishing;
i am a spring,
bursting, bubbling,
springing ever strong;
i am a wound,
gushing, expressing;
i am a river,
i am a stone;
i am a bird.
I am the sky.
ABOUT ME
I'm a poet.
I write the words
The nation can't speak.
I chastise the oppressor,
I stand for the weak;
I sound out the corruption
And plug up the leak with my words,
My song; that's what I do.
I'm the one the spirits speak to.
I sing for the barren now made a mother
I cry for the offspring now laid to rest
We can't all pass the test; some will break.
For their sakes, I speak.

65. BY THE MIDNIGHT CANDLE
The world outside awaits
The sound of morning-hark;
Inside I sit- clackety-clack-
My crazy writer's shack.
TAILOR TO THE WORLD
There isn't, as the saying goes,
Much left to the imagination
In this life.
Hence come poets, and philosophers,
And artists, with words and pictures,
And theories, and lyric, to spin and fashion
Clothing for the naked truth.
DREAMS
Do my dream men dream of me?
When they close their eyes,
Is it my world they see?
I've always wondered, often dreamt,
Of the land where my dreams all went.
ENIGMA
My old self and new do daily meet
On what I call good Conscience' street
And neither knows the other for a friend.