Response to Little One, PS it's Ok and Erise

NOVEMBER

Skipping Lord Brunchington’s for a fight
The Convent
Finding The Vorticist
Saturday Afternoon Heartbreak
Good sex
Bad party
Talk of rape in Collingwood
Tears on my nokia
Housecleaning with the Go-Between’s
Watching amazing Street Cricket whist making the bed
Pending house inspection
Performing with half a heart
Laughter with Zoe Rotthier
Cocktails and Hungry Jacks
Hugs from Steve
6am cab ride to work
New arrangement isn’t working
Glen reunion
Cara reunion
Peter Stuyvesant Blue in a pouch
First time at 1000£Bend
Free Slurpie Day
Park after dark
Fitzroy Pash
Gentleman walks me home, you don’t come home.
A German visitor sleeps on the couch
EnRoute through Melbourne with $2, an iPod, Chalk and Rilke
Getting Stoned
You come home for a shower and stay
My appointment with Jason
Admitting a little bit of me has died
His amazing smile
ROYAL BLUE FOREVER!
Piking on a date
Organic white wine, one whole bottle and no hangover
Threatening to walk in front of a truck
Comedy in Northcote with physic children
BootCamp
Seeing my Grandmother for the first time in 13 years
Dark chocolate ice cream sandwiches
Summer Challenges
The Date
Lots of love left for my friends
Hot Bitches with full tummies embrace at the Grace
Cut lunches
Betrayal and more heartache
Unrequited love
Not believing a thing Bob Dylan says and moving on....to Billy Bragg
Day drunk
Cut and Dry
The apocalypse starts on my first coffee date with BHC
Getting refused service at Ding Dong
Sharing the Beyonce love
Outfit suggestions via text message
Moonbeam and I walking on the same wire
I WANT TO CUT HIS COCK OFF!

SUMMER PROJECTS!

Thanks to Elise, I am inspired. This summer will be PACKED!
I shall wreck of buzz words such as: PROMISE, PRODUCTION and PRO-ACTIVITY.
So, everyone out there: Send me a SUMMER PROJECT!

So far:
Write a sonnet by my birthday (31st of January)

Write a series of poems set to a theme: Summer of course!

NEW ADDITION, to read "Infinite Jest"

It's all trash when it's this close.

You look at me

with longing?

I have mistaken your look for desire

for an appreciation. I think your Billboard reads:

BE HAPPY WITH YOUR LOT IN LIFE. I AM.

But, really your look

is a longing?

For everything I am not.

Watching me talk you feel

a horrible discomfort.

A cannot ever be

a person?

THE PERSON.

For whom you will fall in love.


****

It’s all trash when it’s this close. So close that morning breath isn’t sexy and they notice how terrible your spelling is and you hover, you hover and break plans just to make more plans.
Then it shifts, like your teeth, subtle movements until there's a gap. That's when it's fun again. David Attenborough would be astounded by how quickly we try and scuttle close together again, having an amazing time. Trying to fuse with our openings, occasionally settling for elbow joint or behind the knee. UNTIL, we are so close, its trash.

MY LIST FOR IMPROVEMENT

- Regular exercise
My disposition should not be ignored.

- Stridency
Be hard or go home.

- Drive myself insane
In order to attain a certain level of self gratification I have not successfully achieved with hair cuts, expensive clothing purchases and the like. It is time to get results.

- Be consumed
My preference will be with the self and not the other, as the latter is proving to only result in heart ache.

All Poets are Afraid of Sex

SHE dressed sexy for her first meeting with The Poet.
It was alright, she felt, having been told once by a young man buying Murakami in the Brunswick Street Bookstore that “All poets are afraid of sex”.

Standing in wait for the number 19 tram SHE received a text message from a Philosopher, who was riding past on the tram going in the opposite direction. He said SHE looked like a circus performer. Perfect. SHE thought.

Upon her arrival in Brunswick, which was really Coburg, but SHE decided not to mention this to The Poet as it might hurt his feelings. SHE was greeted by an oversized stuffed bear beached in the driveway of his home. In a fit of violence someone has taken a knife to its belly and its stuffing bled down to the footpath.
What a contradiction to witness the crime scene of an inanimate object. SHE felt it to be a very disconcerting beginning to the relationship with The Poet.

Nevertheless SHE rang the doorbell and The Poet answered the door with toast crumbs covering much of his face. SHE felt he may be quite partial to cream cheese in the morning as apposed to the afternoon, when most people would eat cream cheese. Or was SHE was getting confused with soar cream? Either way it certainly wasn’t shaving cream that glued the crumbs to his face.

The Poet’s house was not what SHE expected. SHE thought he would own a lot wood, that his house would smell of beeswax and he would socialise only with cups of peppermint tea and gum trees. But alas SHE found he much preferred to move in the circles of Milo, racing car bed spreads and carpet stains.

Well, if dreams where reality SHE would spend a lifetime swallowing her yawns.

So SHE stood in the kitchen with the couple. The Poet and the toast crumbs. What riveting conversations awaiting her. SHE knew SHE would spend a lot of time scratching her face and talking about people with celiac disease. The distraction would be like quick sand, slowly sucking her ability to converse down the into the lino floor.
SHE felt the need to distract herself from the mess on his face or for him to at lease introduce her to the crumbs. Maybe she should have bought a hula-hoop with her and proceeded to spend the morning performing useless tricks in the hope it would make The Poet laugh heartily enough to shake the crumbs to the kitchen floor.
Instead SHE said, you have something on your face. The Poet replied. Oh…err. Thanks for saying so! It says a lot about the type of person you are.
SCORE, she whispered.

The Poets kitchen was large, one might even say abnormally so. SHE, again, was disappointed by this. How was SHE to have awkward flirtatious conversation with The Poet when they may as well have been standing on opposite sides of a railway line?
The Poet held up a variety of tea bags.
Although SHE had exceptional vision and had on numerous occasions been told by her optometrist SHE could be a fighter pilot, SHE was simply too far away from The Poet to distinguish between the bags draping his fingers.
SHE would have to admit that she couldn’t make out the labels. How mortifying.
The Poet did not seem interested in the tea bags at all and threw them into the sink in exchange for a giant tin of Milo.

The Poet wanted to make his guest a glass of Milo?

Suddenly it all became clear to her. Was The Poet was attempting to make himself unattractive? Did he want to repel her? SHE stood brewing, how could a milk moustache possibly be endearing at this point in the relationship?

Tea would have been preferable. Tea spoons, sugar cubes are visually sensual aids that SHE was convinced would entrance The Poet. For goodness sakes just take a minute to think about a bubbling kettle of steaming water being ever so slowly poured into a shapely teapot. Tea parties the little known aphrodisiac.

SHE kept referring to "The relationship”. SHE kept thinking about what he must think about her? SHE was being a self obsessed nobody. Sure SHE could walk out of the house thinking he was some sort of frigid socially awkward beast. But really SHE was the one wearing hot pants at 10am on a Wednesday morning.

But wasn’t he intrigued? Her interest, her gentle prodding emails to meet The Poet. The numerous evenings she spent at work, well after dark discussing her growing fascination with Kevin the Security guard. Did this not come across?

Are all poets really afraid of sex?

SHE needs to be educated on the stereotype of The Poet.

Please direct your imagination to Exhibit A: The Poet.

You will notice in his natural habitat he permits himself higher doses of stimulants generally in the form of coffee. The highly caffeinated artist feels comfortable amongst the presence of symptoms such as dilated pupils, bad breath and the irregular openings of the sweat glands when no physical exertion has been performed.
Completely reliant upon sensory experience The Poet will rarely be seen in footwear and is of the attitude cold weather is good for the disposition.

Thus it is fair that SHE assumed the want of body heat would be of great importance to The Poet.

The Poet, in his highly creative prime will generally develop colour blindness, thus as you may observe the bright purple pants are a mistake and The Poet actually believes he is melding beautifully with the autumn colours of his neighbourhood, sporting a handsome olive green.

SHE will leave The Poets house in Brunswick which is really Coburg with a heavy heart.
This is due to her failure to understand the page and the person are always vastly different.

Where Are You Tonight? (Journey Through Dark Heat) By Bob Dylan

I am so obsessed with this song, I can't stop listening to it and just look at the lyrics!? They are incredible!

There's a long-distance train rolling through the rain, tears on the letter I write.
There's a woman I long to touch and I miss her so much but she's drifting like asatellite.
There's a neon light ablaze in this green smoky haze, laughter down onElizabeth StreetAnd a lonesome bell tone in that valley of stone where she bathed in a stream of pureheat. Her father would emphasize you got to be more than street-wise but he practicedwhat he preached from the heart.A full-blooded Cherokee, he predicted to me the time and the place that the trouble would start.
There's a babe in the arms of a woman in a rageAnd a longtime golden-haired stripper onstageAnd she winds back the clock and she turns back the page of a book that no one can write.
Oh, where are you tonight?

The truth was obscure, too profound and too pure, to live it you have to explode.*
In that last hour of need, we entirely agreed, sacrifice was the code of the road.I left town at dawn, with Marcel and St. John, strong men belittled by doubt.
I couldn't tell her what my private thoughts were but she had some way of finding
them out. He took dead-center aim but he missed just the same, she was waiting,putting flowers on the shelf.
She could feel my despair as I climbed up her hair and discovered her invisible self.*
There's a lion in the road, there's a demon escaped,There's a million dreams gone, there's a landscape being raped,As her beauty fades and I watch her undrape,I won't, but then again, maybe I might.
Oh, if I could just find you tonight.
I fought with my twin, that enemy within, 'til both of us fell by the way.Horseplay and disease is killing me by degrees while the law looks the other way.Your partners in crime hit me up for nickels and dimes, the guy you were lovin'couldn't stay clean.It felt outa place, my foot in his face, but he should-a stayed where his money wasgreen.
I bit into the root of forbidden fruit with the juice running down my leg.*
Then I dealt with your boss, who'd never known about loss and who
always wastoo proud to beg.There's a white diamond gloom on the dark side of this room and a pathway that leadsup to the stars.If you don't believe there's a price for this sweet paradise, remind me to show you thescars.
There's a new day at dawn and I've finally arrived.If I'm there in the morning, baby, you'll know I've survived.I can't believe it, I can't believe I'm alive,But without you it just doesn't seem right.
Oh, where are you tonight?


*AMAZING!

Feedback, please.

Dear Readers,

If you are out there, gimme some feedback on this.


Bare stage, centre and downstage is a large free standing bathtub.
The tub is full of water.
Inside bathtub are two men. They are fully clothed.
On the floor next to the tub are several bars of soap, a wash cloth, a scrubbing brush and some industrial bleach.

MAN ONE: Slow, it was all very slow and measured and the tones of all their voices were similar/

MAN TWO: (So…)They’d spent a lot of time together?

The intonation was very pleasing to them, as when people like the same colour. They had chosen a pitch and stuck with it.

It bothered me slightly,/

Bothered you?

….In the showers amongst the steam. Were they meant to be uniform?

Like the birds that shriek and never chew, just swallow?

Scrunching up his nose They sneaked, as if performing exercises that would better define their shadows. I did not watch, rather I ogled as they rubbed one another’s backs, soap and foam creating marbled ripples on naked bodies. Stands and becomes physically involved in the descriptions
They were proud; proud of themselves and of each other.
It is funny the way they grabbed at their flesh, as if to make sure the brilliance of their composition is real. Not a mirage.

Was there a leader?

Shaking his head They were so slow, so slow I could barely make out their faces.

Are you having a dream? Maybe you are talking in your sleep and I am simply here to note everything down, for later.

Batting away the questions with hands Why can’t I move the bar of soap over my body as they do? I am too fast, too repetitive.
I cannot form ripples.
I cannot form.
I am not part of them.

With this toothbrush I wish I could glide across my crooked dental structure and make the shapes they do, in the showers, amongst the steam….

You already said that!

What?

You already said that, at the beginning. About the shower and the bodies and the steam. We already know.

Who is ‘we’?

Us?

Don’t snap at me. We seem to be stuck here together.

Yes, I am here next to you, listening to you. I have been responding? All this interrogation, this whole conversation is a bit tiresome, don’t you think? And the water, it’s gotten cold.

I just want to be like the people in the showers, I want to be able to move and form a whole as they do.
I cannot form./

A whole? If everyone felt whole there would be no yearning, no…effort? Can you think?
I mean, really place a fine tooth comb back over your life to a time when you were really persistent?
You just didn’t give up.
I find that I persisted with people, with friends, lovers.
Something so complicated, somehow becomes a tangible, attractive a pursuit. Not like the future.
That loams over ones head, heavy and different and angry.
Angry because it thinks you will splinter its smooth surface with mistakes and tangents.

But, for me to persist is just to watch?

Silence

Oh, you bore me.
So these people, these figures are they sexy?

They’re beautiful.

Sexy?

Perfect.

Sexy, isn’t perfect. On this line, Man 2 turns away from Man 1, resting his chin on the edge of the tub.

What were they doing? What were you doing? Did they notice you watching? Do you like the feeling of being watched?

pause

Do you? Turning around again Man 2 stares at Man 1. Their faces are now incredibly close to one another. It should be visually clear to the audience that Man 2 is making Man 1 uncomfortable.
Man 2 quickly bores of the uncomfortable situation he creates and breaks the stare.

So watching them; is that like having a shower and watching television at the same time? Or reading porn on a tightrope?

What?

I am just raising the stakes. Distracting us, I can tell we are both going to end up with a cold or worse a chill. Your lips are blue, not as blue as your eyes. More like the blue of the ocean on a cold day, when it has nothing to offer you. Would you like to see? Your lips? I can find a mirror..../

The ceiling isn’t very high. Don’t bother with…You shouldn’t even be here. What if they come back? I am trying to keep a low profile. I could be a crack in a tile. I could just keep watching. I don’t have to stop….I won’t stop.

Is watching enough?

What else is there?

You just want to live vicariously through others?

Stop asking questions!

Okay, I am going to stay and watch. THAT.... was a statement.

Statement?

Now, you are asking the questions. I am going to stay and see what all the bloody fuss is about.

Standing up Do you think, wet clinging clothing makes you more appealing? Perhaps the ripples of the clothing could be mistaken for muscular definition?

PFFT!

Well, the heaviness. It could make me slow, tranquil.

STOP!…shhh

They are both at once motionless and silent.

What are we listening to?

The lapping...You must feel calmer now?

Man 1 remains silent

Cover your eyes

Man 1 obeys the command

Perhaps when you open your eyes. I can be interesting to watch? This will merely help us to pass the time. Till they come back. I can take off my clothes. You can practice. Watching me?

Still with his eyes covered I’ll watch you; but please don’t take your clothes off.

What? The movement in the water, as I remove my pants? Are you afraid it will give you motion sickness!? I’ll be slow, careful.

No….motion sickness!? Shaking his head, eyes still covered by his hands No, I am far too discerning to see you naked.

You could never be as slow as they are.

I am not relating to you very well. And while I’m at it, people should always answer a question.

Man 1 removes his hands from his face, so he may see again You don’t even know me.

Man 2 splashes water at Man 1’s face.

Don’t sulk, you’ll change shape. You will be bulky and cumbersome and there will be no where to put you. Nobody likes a waste of space.

What are you? A little man from God? Fuck you!

Something is taking form within you and I don’t like it. You are lively. I don’t like it. Do you want to watch or not?/

What would you like to say to them? What should we say to them?

“Serve me love, like a knight. But be sure to use a sharp knife. Be pensive, not encouraging”…. I find enthusiasm for life, repulsive. Man 1 lets out a large exhale ‘sigh’…My expectations will flounder, won’t they?


Something is Illuminating within ourselves… we’re having a simultaneous premonition.

But we’re both wrong…

Nodding…And now our bulbs burn brighter.

Man One reaches over the side of the tub and grabs a hooded jumper lying on the floor, he puts it on, pulling the hood up onto his head.

Take off that hood!

There’s no point, fruitfulness has moved to my periphery and I’d rather forget it's even there. They are NEVER coming back!

It is terribly dangerous, especially for one whose wish to see and not be seen.

At least the danger gives me a little thrill

You’ve just got too much time.

Yes, I find I write ‘To Do’ lists when I’m unoccupied. You should see my dairy, its full of them, it is embarrassing.

Just think of the state of your memoirs....

Conversation Over Breakfast

Mr: You are not yourself.

Sir: Which self is lacking?

Mr: What? You’re very distance; it’s as if you’ve been dislodged.

Sir: I have relocated recently.

Mr: Your inner monologue is a dreadful bore, it’s so....need it now!

Sir: What’s wrong with a sense of urgency? I’ll be damned if I care whether it is all about consumerism or not! I’m a doer!

Mr: I tell you....you are NOT yourself at the moment

Life Changing.

Sir: ENDORPHINS! Have changed our lives.

Mr: I always forget. But we are very different now.

Sir: Trust me. I suggest if you aren’t aware of any difference and/or change in countenance, to follow suit anyway.

Mr: Is feedback welcome?

Sir: It’s encouraged!

Mr: I have an example!

Sir: Excellent.

Mr: If we stood behind lead light as the sun shone through the glass, our hearts would glow.

Sir: No bleeding here!

Mr: We haven’t cried in months.

Sir: HA! There you go... some evidence.

Mr: We read differently.

Sir: AND! More importantly we are read differently. Others are able to insert commas and breathe at the sight of us!

Mr: It is the unless, limp, unhealthy heart/

Sir: That drips grimy sugar blood. All that instant gratification...

Mr: Makes them thick in the head, they ply themselves with a cardboard insulation/

Sir: I’ve seen it!

Mr: A bulky eyesore to the clear brainers. They have no space to think.

Sir: We walk on clouds.

Mr: But, you know people do look excellent hung-over.

Sir: Only for one day! Endorphins, have changed our lives.

Sticking To Your Guns

Plans. Yes. Plans.

Make time.

Plans?

Make time!

P....p...plans...?

Make, time...!

(have)....Plans?

Make....TIME!

Ihaveplans.

(and) TIME.