All entries for December 2009

Desperate December

It has been a most odd few weeks. I'm not really sure what is happening to the world but it is definitely falling apart at the seams a bit.

Granny Groves passed away on Tuesday. It feels very surreal, I've never lost anyone close to me. She was my only Grandmother and even then, I didn't get to have the full enjoyment of knowing her. She was wonderful.

I remember very milky tea with lots of sugar in it when she lived at the old flat.

I remember going through Dad's old toy cars in the sliding glass cabinet.

I remember playing "I've got a lovely bunch of coconuts" on the organ in the bedroom.

I remember the teapot that was also on Pauline Fowler's shelf in Eastenders.

I remember the horrible, ghastly carpet.

I remember those Chinese musical balls you moved about in your hand.

I remember tickling my cousin Barbara at Christmas and my brother singing Twinkle Twinkle little star on the toy kareoke box.

I remember "you've put on some pounds" comments when I was already self-concious enough.

I remember my first boyfriend meeting her and realising I didn't want to marry him because I wanted to be a "Granny Groves" to someone one day.

The funeral is on Thursday and I'm very much looking forward to celebrating her life. She wrote poetry, and maybe a little of her gift is shining in me now.

: 13 Dec 2009 19:47 |  Tags: Journal |  Comments (0) |  Close comments |  Report a problem

Haunting me on the bus home.

The sky seems to crunch like broken glass and syringes, a wild cosmos. I left via the emergency exit of the dingy club we’d drunk our sorrows in, romance on her sickbed since that 99p Valentines card travesty in February. It is a staircase I climb, yet it is of no shape or colour, no substance. I simply seem to mount the sky, a kind of broken glass suspended in space. I move quickly, stealthily, hunting something way up there, in the black infinity. Raw egg drips down my chin, frothy yellow poison, a rabid dog. I’m sure it’s vomit, from an over-zealous attempt to drown something troublesome within with vodka and daiquiris.

The sky seems to flatten here and I am calmer now, there is no sound of buses reminding me to go home. The universe seems to unfold and I inhale colours that had been left off of the curriculum. A perilous shade of pertileena, a mist of mysul and a hue of beautiful tomkinf bathing my body. My five senses explode into seven. It is like everything and nothing makes sense at once, as though I am drinking from the fountain of knowledge, hydrating my soul. Yet with this knowledge, my sorrow grows greater, burning a hole in my chest, reminding me of the inhuman thing I did and have done and continue to do.

I can feel the rain, a thunder storm, but there is no wetness, no water to wash away this decaying sense of doom. My skin itches, I want to scratch it off, those 7 freckled layers, this paper membrane that carelessly contains this wretched soul. Exorcise me heaven, purge me of my wrongdoing. Where are the buses now? Let me go home and sleep this off. It’s just the alcohol. It’s just the alcohol.

There is a bell echoing, somewhere in my head I think at first, but it is more distant than that. Perhaps my mind is distant and they’re gone riding together, on a jaunt around the universe, my bleeding brain sat in the basket of the bicycle, wearing a straw hat.

I can see it now and a boy riding towards me through the sky, illuminated by a plethora of colours. I am sure I drank with him tonight, stooped over the dirty bar, sticky with whisky rings, the illegal smoke of cigarettes that should be in the mouths of strangers in the rain outside, drifting over our heads. His curls obscure his eyes, but they glint occasionally, in unison with his smile, somewhere between mischievous and lethal.

“I know you, yeah, English girl, throwing all that bizarre vocabulary at me and asking all those probing questions. I guess I’m famous now right?” He laughs, but I don’t catch the joke. The sky beneath my feet suddenly feels less stable. It’s like my body is swinging, a child stood on a swing with the shattered glass of drunken youth beneath.

“Don’t look so scared, I’m a friendly guy. Yeah, you know that. You made me feel really welcome the other night.” I just knew he knew. You know when you just know? That glaring smile that was so calculating, strategically stretched across his glowing cheeks. He was handsome, but only recently aware of this. It was the way he stood, so familiar with this place, as though his kingdom. I was suddenly the one being questioned, judged, persecuted.

“So you know?” my lips tremble, my knees fail me, and I submit to him, as though he’ll show me mercy, as though he is my God and I am not worthy, and I’m not. Not since he knows, not for what I’ve done. I hear the water in his mouth like the cracking of thunder and his foamy spit lands just beside me, I don’t know if purposefully or not.

“Yeah, actually. I didn’t expect you to be the type to do a thing like that. I dunno, you just seemed so together and open. Controlled.” He comes closer, but I can only see his feet. “Did you think you were living life? Did you think it would make you feel something when you did that? It’s vulgar. God, I thought you were so pristine, kind of self-disciplined.”

“I am, I mean, I was... but sometimes we slip up. You must know that. You fall off your bike, you mess up and you get back and you try to live. And I’m trying, I’m really trying.” I try to sob but fail, I am not sorry enough.

“Riding without a helmet is one thing, the breeze in your hair, but you’re riding in the storm, you’re running through a hall of broken mirrors. You’re just sick.”

The sky implodes, I fall through it, through its colours, and I hear his bell, haunting me. Haunting me on the bus home.

: 02 Dec 2009 12:56 |  Tags: Creative Non-Fiction |  Comments (1) |  Close comments |  Report a problem

I'm worried about Cyril Miller.

I am worried about Cyril Miller,
trouble getting his chubby thighs
to mount his precious Kawasaki
sweat dripping into his jolly eyes.

Since his wife died, fish and chips
every single night, the “pensioner deal”,
looks so proud when he gets home
with greasy paper and jellied eels.

I watch from over the rotting fence
(the one he refused to let me paint)
as he smothers bread with butter,
a cholesterol feast with no restraint.

He leaves the house at midnight
looking for trouble on the streets
reminiscing of his slimmer youth
the best bobby on Minehead’s beat.

I heard he had a stroke last week
and now he smiles with half a heart,
my face sinks like his when men come
to strip the Kawasaki into parts.

: 01 Dec 2009 13:22 |  Tags: Poetry |  Comments (0) |  Close comments |  Report a problem