Read This
I
died today
and yesterday
and every fucking day
for the past
fifty nine years
and so have you
and no one has
noticed or cared,
but its natural,
its life,
I
lived today
as
you who
read this,
lived,
were always
somewhere
in-between life
and death,
again
and
again
and
again.
All About You
This poem is about you,
that is,
how I know you.
I
was familiar with the
gossip and the bullshit
surrounding you,
but, after our
first meeting I knew
for shit sure it was
bollocks, ugly lies:
in
an indescribable
way, like nothing
before in my life,
I
fell in love with you,
not sexually/physically
or
romantically or
lustfully or out of
pity but your zest
for life, no matter humble
or
repulsive,
was insatiable,
you loved all of life,
you would see things
in
others that no one
else could see or feel,
this poem is all about you,
a
decade after you left us
to
go to a place, where
you had been so close to,
so
many times, before.
Anna
Was anorexic and alcoholic,
she was half my age
but
we
had a lot of shit in common,
aside from being drunkards,
literature and painting
were major connections:
she would paint these darkly
beautiful hauntingly distorted
faces in torment:
she had very few friends and
she would cut her arms and
legs with razor blades and call
the emergency services and
then refuse treatment and
would then be detained for
her own safety:
sober the next day, shed
walk away, sad and
regretful: a male care worker
took advantage of her frailty
and a few weeks later she
mutilated herself so severely
that by the time the paramedics
arrived,
her wings had folded tightly.
Burn Out
So
many
have tried
to
put the
fires out
and
failed,
there was
always
something
remaining
and even
in
death,
by
way of
dirty heroin,
even that
did not
extinguish
that natural
beauty of
your
wonderful
inferno.
Studio Work
In
silence, was I,
smoking a joint of hash,
sat in my studio
and I saw a wasp
entangled in a thick
spiders web,
thrashing, struggling
violently to free
itself to escape
death:
for some moments
I
watched nature
working its survival,
capture, kill or be
killed and then I
thought, fuck it,
I
didnt know this
wasp and it didnt
know me but that
didnt seem to
matter as I
carefully cut
through the web
with sharp scissors,
the pour soul was
frantic as I moved
outside where I
very gently snipped
away
at
the sticky fabric and
then within a few
moments, the wasp
broke free and
flew away, not
looking back:
Good luck fella
I
whispered,
picking up the joint
and inhaling
healthily
through a
tight smile.