Thursday 17 February 2011

The rules of a gentleman...

are listed here.
Some of them are obvious, some of them are personal, some of them are amusing. All are genius.

Just past tipsy.

It smells of spilt alcohol. Muggy and cloying, the stench is sticking to my clothes and staining my fingers. In a detached vanity I walk through the mess of people. My hands catch at their clothing as I pass; the ones I don't know I avoid touching, knowing, seeing. Shy away. The tiles are smooth under my feet, the soles not protected from their cold by a tights-layer of thin threads. My balance is always the first to go, and I stumble as I walk. One step, two step, concentrate. Pride keeps me upheld.
The noise and loud and shouts of the people who's volume goes up the more they drink are thudding against my temples. I hear the smack of a glass on wood. The laughter at a bawdy joke. The gurgle of liquid being poured into a mug. Suddenly the mug is in my hand, and the drink is sharp on my tongue, and the heat of my friend's fingers is tight against my palm. To one side we hold our own conferences and our own meetings and our own parties; our corner of familiarity in the fog of strange people. A card game starts in the middle of the floor. I sink to join it in a flurry of velvet skirts. The cards are sticky with drying drink. It's hard to concentrate in the noise. A jug of bitter-sweet liquid is being passed from grasp to grasp. My hands shake as I put down the mug. I'm not even half-drunk yet. But I think that's enough.

The night after.

The not-yet-familiar warmth
against the cold white starch of
someone else's sheets.

Friday 11 February 2011

I see people.

Sometimes I see people I know I shouldn't. Taylor Swift was visiting a house on a street near mine. A dark-skinned Ramona Flowers passed me in town, her pink hair vibrant against a black hoodie, a blue canvas bag over one shoulder, and Scott Pilgrim himself cycled past me only a few weeks ago, a striped beanie covering his curls. I've seen a blue-haired Singer on the streets of Oxford City, and one of the Inelesi in a back alley, his lumbering gait and translucent skin impossible to disguise. A slim, long haired Tolkien elf was in front of me in a super market queue. Little Red Riding Hood as a child has skipped past, holding onto an elderly woman's hand. Sometimes I even can see the Ford Prefects of this world. A slightly too intense gaze, or a reaction to normality that is unexpected, and suddenly... I can see it. And I know I shouldn't be able to.

Lost.

Pure white in front of me, let me see, let me see.
Follow those skipping feet, down through dark streets
and over grass green. Blue skirt, shoes cream.
Earth dirt swallows me whole. A distorted reflection
confuses, takes, engulfs my sense of direction.
Let me sit pretty, blonde haired little pixie.
Teacup in hand, I don't understand.
Stop the spinning, crying, growing, shrinking;
catch me with a labelled bottle and a door too small
tell me your poetry as I fall fall fall.

Friday 4 February 2011

Quick post - No. 8

A little piece of magic.

From here.

When all the lamps expire,

and I know you've got it so wrong,
and the conviction that you feel
comes out in your song,
and your music is so haunting
because I know exactly what you mean,
and your words cause a wound
because you're singing them right at me...

I'm still so proud of you.