Showing posts with label strangeness. Show all posts
Showing posts with label strangeness. Show all posts

Sunday, 25 October 2009

As If to Prove the Point

As if to prove the point in my last few posts, I went away for a couple of days and went on a boys' night out with an old friend from school. It says something good about me that I have old friends and new friends, and men friends and women friends.

Right now I'm sitting home alone with a glass of wine and some tunes on the stereo, (Supergrass, The Dead Weather, Taj Mahal) doing some computer repair and wondering about doing a little bit of writing between now and ten o'clock, when Match of the Day is on. Four matches and fifteen goals in today's programme. That promises to be worth watching.

I lit a scented candle twenty minutes ago, and just realised I can't smell it. That's because I didn't light it. Ah. Easily done, easily overcome. My mind is still good at freezing, distracting, burying. I don't need those bad habits anymore, but so far I haven't figured out a way of dropping them.

This thought just drifted into my head. I can't remember a time when I was less horny in my life. Not since I was ten, at any rate; but that was pre-history, a time when I had no knowledge of such matters, and no desire to look in the mirror, wash my hair, have good clothes to change into after school, or be able to play a guitar.

The bright, light, warm, sparkling side of my nature is very quiet at the moment. The dark, difficult, broody, cynical side is fading. Do you know how hard it is to throw away old, faded clothes, even when they don't fit any more?

Tuesday, 10 March 2009

Breaking the Silence

As he slips through the side door
And sits at the back
People say
"He has no right
To do it this way.
Shouldn't there be trumpets
And drummers
And banners
Red carpets and fanfares today?"

But what breaks the silence
Is mumbling
And coughing
And stumbling and finding a place.
The place to begin
My attempt to explain
Some things that I never
Intended to say.

Like:
Love wasn't something
I always believed in
And sex wasn't something
I always enjoyed
And dreams were like diamonds
More readily found
In the bit of a drill
Than the rim of a crown.


They tell me I'm happy
And damn it, I know that I am
That was the idea all along.
And I wouldn't complain
But it's hard to describe
A world in which so many
Big things go right.

Because finding the place
Where you're ready to start
Is the last thing you learn
As it all falls apart
It's the tearing away
Breaking down, letting go
All the things that I never
Intended to know.

When
Love wasn't something
I always believed in
And sex wasn't something
I always enjoyed.
And dreams were like diamonds
More readily found
In the bit of a drill
Than a fair lady's hand.

But what breaks the silence
Is not even words.
What breaks the silence
is
not
even
words.


Saturday, 17 January 2009

Three Strange Days

I discovered this tune in the bargain bin at Atomic Records some time in the winter of 1991-92, and bought it just for the title, and because it was 25p.

I never regretted it. In fact, if I'd ever had a seriously romatic relationship with myself, this might have been "our tune"....



I lent the CD to some friends of mine, who got married, then divorced, and I don't know which one of them to ask for it back. It's deleted now. I've ordered myself a second hand copy.

When I Googled the band name, I found out the singer died in 2001. Testicular cancer. Age 32. Shit. That's not nice. I've ordered a copy of his solo album, too. I suppose it'll be a disappointment, but it has a nice title: "Inarticulate Nature Boy".

For three strange days
I had no obligations
My mind was a blur
I did not know what to do
And I think I lost myself
When I lost my motivation
Now I'm walking 'round the city
Just waiting to come to
For three strange days

For three strange days
I couldn't put a smile on my face
So they dressed me up in all of their clothes
And took me somewhere else
And Johnny Clueless was there
With his simulated wood grain
So I pulled up a chair
And started drinking by myself
For three strange...

I've got to make it through
No matter what it takes
Oh I've got to make it through
These strange days

I lay down for a while
And I woke up on the ocean
Floating on my back
And staring at the gray
It was completely still
Except the pounding of my heart
Bringing me back to life
From three strange days
Three strange...
Three strange days
Three strange days
SCHOOL OF FISH
Words and Music: Josh Clayton-Felt