Dear friends, relatives and frelatives

Dear friends, relatives and frelatives

At this time of celebration Tina, Harry and I would like to share with you the ups and downs what has been a turbulent year.

I am glad to say, after her third stint in rehab Tina has finally conquered her addiction to conkers, this has made her a much happier person, my sunny disposition of course is still mostly reliant on the liberal use of alcohol, antidepressants and class A drugs. 

Harry is finally coming out of his shell. He has joined the local track and field club, excelling in the 100m sprint which he completes in just under 11 days. It’s very disappointing.

Tina is insistent that I take up vegetarianism for health reasons, my response being that I intend on dying covered in the blood of my enemies, surrounded by their marinating carcasses.

By enemies I mean cows, pigs, chickens and all of whom have made the fatal error of being born delicious and slow witted.  

In April we endeavoured to create the country’s very first urban fox hunting club on our estate. Instead of horses and beagles we were to use bicycles and local dogs; 6 staffordshire terriers, 2 jack russells and a large cat named Spot.

Our efforts came to an abrupt halt when the authorities turned up. We explained that we had no intention of killing any foxes we merely wanted to round them up and educate them in proper bin raiding etiquette and such. 

They pointed out that several of our bikes were stolen from the local elementary school and that Spot was actually a small child in a particularly convincing onesy.

Apart from occasionally frightening the locals at Waitrose, by dressing up in a hoodie and asking where the discount beer at, I believe we have finally been accepted into the lower middle class society that is Wanstead.

Merry Christmas everybody and happy New Year.

Kindly yours,

Troy, Harry and Tina    

The thing he sells

The windows burnt with morning fire, so I moved across the table like a spider and poured the poison from the glass. The TV whistled and hummed with stars. All I saw was the dull ache that rots; death, hate and putrid states of being.

I must leave this place.

So I moved across the table like a spider through the broken door of my dreams and into the joyless sunlight. With fresh pain to sell the man, I placed my heart on a train that never stopped, to a desk that sounded like hungry teeth grinding. And as the moments beckoned, delighting in my misery I set my pen to the ground. I dug the grave of a thousand words and they paid in drops of my own blood.

I must leave this place.

Night crept and broke the heat with cool suits and the promise of love. So I moved across the table like a spider, through the ice that formed. Freedom stood open chested and beaten with the cat. I licked her face for just one sweet taste but her tears were acid and her skin began to flake. I sat to figure the situation; what had just began? At the other end the liquid stood waiting to be consumed.

I must leave this place. 

So I moved across the table and poured the poison from the glass.       

The Winter

Coats cling tightly to huddle figures in the wind. Night splits temporarily by the buzzing street lights’ yellow glow.

The bus waits.

Her hands rise to fend off his pleas, heart broken by a thousand deep and everlasting cuts.

He reaches for one last chance only to be brushed aside, her voice beating away his advances; she tilts her head downwards so as not to see him cry.

He serenades her with the memories of their youthful love; a tree that promised warm and tender fruit.

How badly he’d failed to tend her blossoms.

His knees meet the icy concrete; she steps away, long hair dancing like liquid darkness, to leave only gravity and his constant remonstrations weighing on his sanity and turning her name into screams.

But she would get on that bus, the longing would begin and she would look down on his wet and confused face from behind the frosty glass on a journey to the end of the line.

And he will know she is gone for the very last time.

The Grey Man

There once lived a man who'd forgotten how to dream. His home was full of neatly arranged boxes in which he packed all his troubles and ticked them off as he plodded soullessly from day to day.

A series a tedious daily, pressing routines tolled on the man’s very sanity and settled on his face in deep lines and crevasses. Food became another task and music faded into the background until only the clanging of alarms signalling a change from one state to the next could be heard.

His heart grew weary of from hopelessness.

On a day like any other, as he sat at his desk stamping relentlessly at his accounts in his now tiny living space, the ground tremored violently with ominous intent.

The house was torn in two as its roots shook forcefully with more, even mightier rumbles. The boxes, stacked high, collapsed all around crushing and pinning him to the ground. The things he worked hardest for now would end his life.

Suddenly the earth split violently pouring steam into the air and threatening to devour the man and all his labours.

With just seconds to live a miracle came over the unfortunate soul. The smoke cleared, the noise subsided and in the moment before he vanished, the sun touched his face, birds serenaded him, and the colours of the brightly lit day became real.

 Smells rose bringing back memories of loved ones, ones loved and the pure joy that was all but a distant past.

Hot baking bread; cinnamon loaves, the warmth of his mother’s kitchen as she sang joyfully to him, the grass of a thousand fields under bare feet, the tree of his first kiss, the popcorn of the broken down cinema that once shimmered with stars, his first car, the first touch of naked flesh, poured out of the recesses he'd hidden them in.           

As the ground gave way the man screamed in horror through tears of pure regret but there would be only one miracle that day.        

A Life In Famous Colours

Miranda bursts through the double doors, Glock 9 mm in one hand, money-bag in the other. I hear her laughing wildly behind the rubber ape-face mask as she charges across the forecourt to where I'm parked just beyond the pumps, engine running.

She throws herself into the back seat and rips away the face. Her dazzling blue eyes look feral and meet my concerned glare, her red lips part in a grin of pure wild spirit, blonde hair flowing like forest fire, suddenly I'm in love.

“Where the fuck is he?” I shout, dragged from my delirium by a wave of steadily pumping adrenaline.

He retreats out of the kiosk, Remington pump action at the hip; he shouts some unheard instructions to the terrified occupants and turns to leave. Relief washes over me.

A single shot from inside smashes through the glass. Albert is lifted off his feet and twists horribly in mid-flight, crashing heavily to the tar. Blood showers the sunlit morning.

The shock in the boosted 1967 Chevy Nova is palpable, Miranda screams, I scream before I can stop myself.

Albert picks himself up and staggers woefully in our general direction, a shadowy figure in a black hooded sweatshirt pushes the doors open and melts into the sun light.

The stranger lifts the barrel of a Desert Eagle with both hands, I catch a glimpse of tiger-eye gold ring on his little finger, and pulls the trigger.

The cannon cracks the day and eviscerates Albert’s head in a shower of blood scull and latex, his lifeless body is thrown like a rag and slams against the rear wheel of the Chevy.

He fires a third shot which clangs into the side of the car rocking it with great force.

I ram the gas and the beast’s engine responds with a roar and a squeal of rubber on the slick surface breathing smoke into the air.

The Chevy kicks right and slides into traffic there’s a crunch of metal as progress is halted by an unfortunate station wagon. I see the driver; his face is drowned in fear and confusion.

For a second everything stops, I hear my racing heart beat, feel the leather between my fingers the smoke in my lungs, for a second I live.

“Drive!” she screams through a veil of tears. I hit the hammer; this time the Beast’s traction is true.

I see the stranger in mirror; he points his cannon then thinks better of it as he fades into the distance.  

Harper's Bazaar

A red lipped beauty stares disdainfully at you through the smoke of her extended cigarette holder in velvet gloved fingers.

Ostentatiously styled and made up, with netting pouring over part of her face from a fascinator perched unfeasibly angled in her dark, sculpted hair. There is contempt in her eye; a visible anger at your shortcomings which she’s only too happy to point out.

If Harper’s Bazaar was a person this would be your first impression.

Rosie Huntington Whitely cuts a figure of fierce femininity on the striking cover of the September issue. “The Power of Fashion”, is the proud proclamation.

I thumb through the pages of beautiful people wearing beautiful clothes slightly intimidated by the sheer size of the tome like copy.

The art work dazzles from the very first page; the glamour and prestige promised by the fashion royalty blossoms in an array of well-chosen models, outfits and accessories. 

       

The articles blend in seamlessly and cover a wide range of subjects; fashion, art, literature, each one skilfully written and rapier sharp.

The big celebrity feature is written by Alex Bilmes.

He insightfully endeavours to extract a deeply human story from the model and actress Rosie Huntington Whitely’s life away from the stage. By the end I’m ready to forgive her for her role in destroying my boyhood love for shape shifting robots. 

In all Harper’s is not the ice queen she first appears to be, rather it’s a penetrating look at the trends that make life interesting.

Sure not everyone can afford this season’s Gucci pumps or the latest Tom Ford handbag and no one will ever look as good as Kate Moss in Stella McCartney, but Harper’s provides an opportunity for your imagination to take walk on the fab side.

I See

Walking along the concrete road, with street lights bearing down, I feel a great gravity weighing on my soul. It’s at times like these I close my eyes and envision another place.

I see the bustling city of my birth, and the African moon as it tells its tales to the sounds of heavy baselines and crackling vocals that rupture the night.

Friends tip their drinks and call me by a long forgotten name in a language soon to be lost. Figures sway with delight and intoxication fills the room.

I see a stretched out savannah to the East, that touches the breaking Sun’s sky. Predators and prey on the grass lands below; intertwined lives dependent on the rushing summer storms.

Hearts of living warriors carved out of steel, weapons glistening with hubris, hunt each other with fiery desire.

       

I see torrents of rain on blood red soil that feeds bold and boundless rivers.

I see lightning strike the earth and thunder beat the sky.

I see the dying evanescence of a dream, the faded musings of cruel gods and in despair I weep for this scorched land.    

The New Yorker

It has just gone 0528 on the first train to London and the carriages are already full.  My fellow passengers muse themselves with pages of the Metro and cast suspicious glances in my direction as I flick through the July issue of The New Yorker magazine. 

“America remembers” declares the most prominent cover line on the front cover half sleeve that opens to reveal a cartoon scene depicting the ground zero monument where the twin towers once stood.

Tourists and locals shuffle about taking photos and carrying various articles of undeterminable paraphernalia, smiling happily in the summer sun.

 My eye is drawn to one individual who stares disparagingly at a woman in a scarf; a security guard stands between them somewhat metaphorically. This is certainly a weighty prospect to be considering at this tender hour but I continue.

The first pages pass quickly, with letters from readers and preludes, listings and reviews of events happening in New York City.

“Stones and Bones”  

  

The main story appears on page 38. Adam Gopnik gives an insightful account of his visit to the 9/11 Memorial and compares it to various other historical sites. His observations pertain to the psychology behind the bricks, mortar and marble cladding.

The page turns easily but the subject matter remains heavily provoking and politically charged. The rest of the articles seem fluffy in comparison.

Cartoons and poetry occasionally break the torrent of text and the photography is gritty, deep, carefully thought out and tells its own story.

If you expect more from a publication this is the magazine for you, its quirky design belies a wealth of worldview altering, progressive journalism between its slender leaves.  

                   

The New Yorker is a grown up publication for grown up readers. It stares critically at American society and American society stares back like a child awaiting the approval of an austere parent.

The Heart Attack

The summer wind blows merrily, promising rain to ease the suns fever. Thatched roofed, white with red trim, the shabby cottage drowns in an ocean of green countryside. Alone it braces the forces.

Inside, a German Shepard looks tentatively at its owner. Aware that the situation has somehow deteriorated, confused as to what action to take.

The only human occupant scribbles furiously at his desk pausing only to pour the contents of a bottle of Jack down his throat and grimace as it burns.

“What you looking at Bernard? Stupid mutt,” slurs Stanley Marsden, a writer and photographer of some repute. Age, booze and self-loathing have taken their dues on his temperament and once good looks.

Bernard produces a high pitched sound in a response.

“Get! I'm f***ing busy or drunk … pick one!”

Its been two years since Stanley and Bernard moved into isolation. The cottage’s ground floor serves as the living area and study and the first a spacious and seldom used bedroom. Here, Stanley hopes to find the words of his greatest work yet. Words that had eluded him until this morning, they flooded onto the page.

“Out dog! Go run in the field, chase from the squirrels,” Stanley laughs out loud at his own drunken error, “Silly dog.”

The front door stands open but Bernard is far too concerned with his human’s odd behaviour to be tempted.

“I should have got a cat. Someone offered me a cat once, I said no. Cats don’t … care.”

A new sadness creeps over the pen-smith; as if the sum of his sorrows has arrived to collect a great debt.               

“Miriam,” he says to no one in particular, the memory is sharp and direct. The warm familiar depression has taken its place in his head next to the booze; they make dark and uncomfortable fellows.

The misery has arrived.

“She loved us you know. She could have loved the whole world and still had more for us.”

Bernard barks a bright acknowledgement.

Stanley feels a familiar tug in his chest and the anxiety blossoms, causing his breath to quicken until he is almost gasping for air. Not now pray not yet. He grits his teeth and clenches his fists in anticipation for pain that doesn't materialise.

He closes his eyes and sees her, Miriam. She’s naked and her bloom is full, still supple, still taut, she laughs and beckons him with those heavenly eyes.

It passes.

Too many troubled shades; the hours of work, selling out, the book tours, the drugs, the trusting and quick to please interns all circling like bats over a tombstone.

“I could have changed the world Bernie, just got caught up in this nonsense. I could have changed the world but I got rich instead. It’s corrupted every part of my life. We forgot the things that matter, lost sight of the beautiful things in life. I miss her so much.”

Tears roll across his face, he wipes them away crudely but they return: “I'm dying Bernie. The vale is so thin. I’ll never finish this. I always thought you’d go first old boy.”

The second wave hits him hard. His chest binds and a bolt of pain powers through his left arm. He falls to the ground contorting his face and neck involuntarily searching for just one more breath; Bernard rushes over and tries helplessly to comfort the stricken man, licking his face and whimpering.

His heart is a trapped bird in a ribcage. They’ll never find me, is his final thought as the bird breaks free.

The human lies motionless; Bernard howls mournfully for the sorrowful loss of a life so short. 

Troubled Nightmares

Clayton McKinley groans into consciousness as the sunlight blasts away the remains of his troubled nightmares.  Shadows creep as the light dances through the tiny single bed apartment on the 6^th floor he calls home.   

At least I made it to the couch, is his first thought; it’s not a happy one. He sits up, rubs his eyes; across the shabby living room, in the only other chair, rests a familiar figure dressed in a deeply red suit, blue shirt and black tie.

“We have dealings Mr McKinley,” says the steely toned voice, his short blonde hair unnaturally cultured; a toothy grin on his weltered and scarred face.

Clayton aches, his head pounds and trying to recall his visitor’s name is a struggle worth foregoing.

“I bare you gifts Mr McKinley,” says the figure pointing to a pair of Glock 9mms on the battered coffee table.

He recognises them immediately.

“Lincoln Garfield-Kennedy at your pleasure,” he introduces  himself grinning menacingly, a desperate void comes over the two men.

“I have one purpose Mr McKinley,” says Lincoln cutting into the silence, “I am here to facilitate your madness.”  His teeth glow in the enduring sunlight. “Do you recall the events that brought us to this point? Last night?  Think a minute it will come to you.”

Clayton covers his face and exhales, what is this sceptre talking about? The haze lifts unexpectedly, a street, a pub, a girl dancing, a cab, it dawns on him she’s still here. The suddenness of his realisation punches him square in the gut with the force of a prize fighter. He turns to look at the closed bedroom door with foreboding.

“She’s in there lying lifeless on the bed, red eyed and purple lipped,” whispers Lincoln, as if not to wake her, “You had fun last night. Be assured, she suffered greatly”.

Clayton’s stomach gives-way in a wave of bile and booze, it spews through his fingers and onto the filthy carpet before he can do anything about it.

“You strangled her with her own panties, you sic f***”.

“Why are you here?” says Clayton, when the heaving eventually subsides enough. He knows the answer even before the question is uttered; his throat burns and tears glisten in his bloodshot eyes.

“I am here to relieve you, unburden you of the guilt and remorse. You sir, are a predator and they are lambs. You have a need for mayhem and destruction.

“Now I could tell you that this is because your father beat you like rug, or your whore mother rejected you as a child or even that the gods have chosen you to do their terrible biddings against the wicked.

“What it all comes down to is this; Killing is who you are, like a singer sings or an artist draws naked b*****s, it makes you whole”. 

        

There is no denying this; Clayton recalls the powerful elation that came over him in the seconds that her life slipped through his fists.

“Pick up your weapons harbinger, bring savagery to the civilised; bring the darkness of Hell to the sheep.”

He obeys.

“Bring them death,” says Lincoln.

Clayton pauses at the front door, looks at his bare feet and putrid soaked clothing and steps out despite of this, guns at his side ready for malicious intent.

As the shots and screams rise in the morning air Lincoln throws his head back and laughs.

I seek

I seek Darkness 
In the folds of time
To hide my insecurities 
They plague me in the day light 
And reflect the pain I bare 

I seek darkness 
In secret places
To carry me from my foes 
To shield me from their searching eyes 
And strike fear into their souls

I seek darkness
In the silence
To set my mind to rest
A bridge of warm black serenity
From this world to the next

A Night

Out of the stormy tears

in my frightened heart.

A breath upon my soul,

promises a shining new start.

Hold me like yours,

a child so close, so sure,

That there will be a day,

from the darkness that is so pure.

The ‘To Do’ list

Life is long and there is so much to see and be a part of. So I have decided to write a list of the 30 things I’d like to do most before I have to settle down and be a grown up. I hope this inspires you to write a list of your own:

1)      Eat a Cornetto.

2)      Drink Viper blood in a bar in Hong Kong.

3)      Drive Route 66.

4)      Base Jump.

5)      See Budapest.

6)      Eat a Philly Cheese Steak.

7)      Eat a Hot Dog in New York.

8)      See Florence.

9)      Visit the Haj Sofia.

10)   Meet an Eskimo.

11)   Sail the Med.

12)   See Vic falls and Great Zimbabwe.

13)   Trek Scotland and see the Northern lights.

14)   Fire an AK 47.

15)   Read “Crime and Punishment” by Dostoyevsky.

16)   Write a novel.

17)   Hug a million people.

18)   Party at a Chase and Status Gig.

19)   See the Black Keys in concert.

20)   Learn to read Music.

21)   Go back to Ethiopia.  

22)   Surf.

23)   Catch a river shark on the Zambezi River.

24)   Have a feature Published in the ‘New Yorker’.

25)   Be in a Shakespeare production.

26)   Set a copy of “Need for Speed: Underground” (for Xbox) on fire and scatter the ashes on Jim Morrison’s grave (either you haven’t played NfS or you don’t know who Jim Morrison is”).

27)   Read an inspiring piece to people on tube.

28)   Take a selfie with Marisa Tomei.

29)   Give away my most prized possession.

30)   Find out and acquire the thing Tina wants most.

If there is anyone of these you’d like to participate in by all means tell me in the comment section below, I'm quite determined to make this list happen.  

An Autumn

The autumnal colours break the boring grey, vibrant yellows, reds and flame oranges among the dying green. Finger like twigs, point to the coming of the icy blasts, to the north. We ride this spinning rock, what a trip, what a beautiful fall.

They amble along the concrete river while a breath dances between their feet, swirling lazily the leaves that cover the ground. Busy with self importance, the spectacle is lost on this unnatural breed, a veritable paradise to we who would only look. The summer dies a righteous death.

Breaking daylight singes the deep cloud; a slither of warm light touches the broad rim of a hat I bare, so I tip it to expose the flesh of my skull, pale, starved, it soaks nourishment from this scarce resource.

Sensational waves tingle in my mind, shadows vanish, clarity becomes. Worshippers would use this moment to speak of God, artists of inspiration, those that look, an event never to be seen again, like a fleeting glance of a crashing star or the very moment you fell in love, and what a beautiful time to be in love.

Broken Flowers

We are a bouquet of broken flowers.

The unwanted seeds, no one expected to grow,

Cast on stony soil.

A song written on the unread parchment.

The Music of a lost Generation, no one wanted to hear.

And yet here we are.

Standing barefoot in fields of shattered glass

With our heads held high.

In full bloom and full voice,

Too beautiful to be ignored.