Wednesday 23 February 2011

Suspended Animation

(A metafiction exercise from class)
As I sit here conjuring this story, with the events unfolding around me, I am overcome by the feeling that I am rotoscoping life, moment-by-moment, with every word. These assorted letters are the sketchy, twitching lines that construct and animate his face. If I had been familiar with the shade I would have accurately called his eyes Persian blue. Not knowing it however, I instead settle for cerulean and in doing so do them little justice.
His eyes were cerulean. He begins to walk from the gated park entrance to my left but, for no reason other than my neck hurts, I blink and find him now waltzing from my right. I stare at him as he makes his way unknowingly before me and cannot help but marvel at his sweetness and the way youth glows from him as though he is filled with plutonium. I notice his hands looking purposelessly empty which raises the question: what object or activity might adequately occupy them? The balloon that suddenly appears dissolves into a lollipop of a similar colour before fading to a nothingness that ends up as a painted wooden horse. It was the same one my younger cousin received one Christmas.
His name is Ely Epstein, you can see it spelled out in his gait and in the name labels stitched into everything from his socks to his boater. His shorts are long but not nearly long enough and he absent-mindedly bends to scratch the itch just below his knee instigated by the added fibres of my description. The bland burnt sienna of his boater ribbon fades through a slow spectrum of colours until it becomes a rich maroon because I will it to. As I stare at the world around me my pen documents that which I choose to acknowledge or alter.
The shrubs grow and shrink with the undulating fluidity of my dreams and I have complete control. In my minds eyes I can watch myself writing without looking.
Alex was tapped on the shoulder by what had begun and a genderless shadow. As the varying shades of darkness are drained from the figure and float through that air towards my bench and I, the shadows leak down into my pen and turn into the ink I use to describe him. The Persian blue irises of the angular man of thirty-four looked down into themselves. Alex’s older doppelganger is visiting from the future, from the moment he dies. Travelling chronologically through events and memories from his life in that single future second that drags on into eternity.
My kettle has boiled. I need to make tea.





I have returned with tea.
It takes a moment for vitality to be breathed back into my scene. It is as though a breeze washes over everything, bringing it all back to life as I quickly read back through what I have written.
Intrigued to see quite how far I can take this I drawer a line through Ely Epstein’s name. A gaping rip scars everything behind him as my world turns two dimensional. The nameless character shimmers like a mirage before being sucked away from me though. He is lost to the nothingness beyond this page on which my words have drawn.
The image that is left blurs into pixilation. What have I done?

Friday 18 February 2011

Brick City

“You should have seen all of this before the fire”,/
Another experience shut off and lost forever./
The lift shaft is empty but for rusty dangling cables,/
Trailing from the ceiling like the last hairs on a head./
Carpet curls its way up the stairs with melted edges,/
Doors - wedged half open - expanded in curves by heat./
Moss maps the floor where it’s not slick with oil/
And bent shelves are flecked with paint like octopus ink./
Diaries dated ‘72.  His name was Peter.  He was sad./
Hard to believe this summer beneath blue skies./
Someone has dragged an ancient sofa outside/
To do nothing but grow mould on the slate mound./
A fire safety notice sticks ironically to cracked plaster./
Creepers edge in hesitant fingers up window panes,/
Sneaking through new gaps to get at the sun./
A monitor dropped from a window is spread 2D on the floor/
And from the fourth floor you have an all round view,/
Tile and beams have caved in to free up the sky./
Now walls lie like carpet in this place, Brick City./

Friday 11 February 2011

Lock-In

The table top was such that the beer mat was stuck, curled and disintegrating into its surface.  With no time to dry between drinks, the damp ring was sunken from the weight of hours of lost conversation.  Smoke still hung low across the bar that morning as the sun came up and in through the thin curtains.  The air was densely and ominously thick, the atmosphere tense and reminiscent of tens of people having suddenly been forced from the room.  There were creepers clawing in through the rotting window frames in the bathrooms.  They had never been straight, the cracked tiles on the walls and floor, crumbling away to dust all the time and leaving a toxic ant farm of snaking grouting.  There were glasses still squashed in huddleds along every windowsill with beer growing flatter and flatter, and the three shot glasses smashed on the floor by the kitchen door were still lying on the linoleum in smithereens.  The sticky pool the shards were shadowed in had lost its shine.  The wonky art work on the walls had not been put up straight in the first place.  The till had been drilled to the counter top and nothing had been done about the doors that had been hingeless when they arrived.  One far corner of the room was stacked ceiling-high with barrels, slotted together with weighty metallic smoothness and propping up three bass guitars.  The naked bulbs hanging bellow the shelves behind the bar shone up in Technicolor through the bottles above.

A Passing Acquaintance

The man stands motionless, wedged into his three-piece pinstripe skin that was tailored the best part of two decades ago.  The outfit would have appeared shabby and incomplete had it not been for the Brogues.  As an ensemble it distracted the eyes from the near threadbare elbows and fraying lapels, loose hems and fading lines.  The dull tinge of on-setting rust shaded the links in the chain of his pocket watch.  Hidden beneath his trousers were sock hold-ups lacking elasticity to the point where the three day old, cologne-drenched socks sat slack around his ankles.  The crude swallow inked amid his greying chest hair told of a past he had always been cautious to divulge.  There was an old, empty cartridge in the fountain pen clipped to his breast pocket but he felt sure no one would ever find out as he rarely had cause to use it.  He stood apart without intention from the likes of the tracksuits, jeggings, Ug boots and fur-lined gillets that greedily swarmed the length and breadth of the city’s streets.
Distracted for only a moment by a Hermès cravat in the window of their Bond Street store, Rupert was jolted into breathlessness as his shoulder collided with someone else’s.  Everything else seemed to fade to silence as his assailant’s mobile phone kissed the pavement.  He looked down to see the top of a hair do coiffed with fashionable attentiveness.  After a slender arm had reached for the telephone, the head rose slowly on a shapely neck to reveal a young and handsomely angular face.
               As the phone rose to the young man’s ear on a profuse wave of apology, a voice drifted quietly from it quite unaware of not being listened to.  The soft lilt of its voice matched perfectly the strange grey eyes and seraphic face framed by the shoulder-length mahogany mane.  Her unassuming beauty rang out in her pronunciation of gentle vowels.  She had stumbled unintentionally into floristry and would have liked, had she known, that the smell of thousands of blooms clung to her every fibre.
               At the end of that day as with every other, Alana had trussed her hair up into a messy bun that barely seemed capable of containing them.  She thought to herself how the bunch of peace lily’s, still in full bloom on her coffee table at home would not need to be replaced for days, before locking up.  The scarf that seemed incapable of staying around her neck found itself trailing for her bag as Alana rummaged clumsily for her flat key.  The rooms she had returned to for the best part of a year welcomed her with the enveloping smell of wood, nag champa, pollen and tea.  The door bell rang just as the flat door clicked locked.
“Who is it?”
“It’s Josh, I’m looking for Etienne.”
“You’re after the buzzer that’s two across and...four down from the top left.”
“Sorry.”
“It’s no problem.”
               Josh drew a deep breath as he relished the knowledge that he had not had to see the face of the young woman who had been at the other end.  There was no voice at the end of the correct button.  Instead he was buzzed in almost immediately, giving the strong impression he was both expected and late.  His jeans, hanging low on his hips, were weighed down as he climbed the stairs by his sizeable belt buckle.  Etienne’s flat was surprisingly minimalist for someone so flamboyant, though the few knickknacks he had were not present without meaning and forethought.  Among other things the miniature globe, stuffed humming bird, bongos, cat skull, box brownie camera, records, juggling clubs, sea horse tank and antique coat stand all had their place and purpose.
               The two young men sat talking about accordions for some time until, realising he was parched, Etienne left the sofa in search of tea.  Catching his eye from the communal garden visible from the kitchen window, a young boy wheeled himself around on a tricycle.  The plump legs jutting from the trousers he was on the way to outgrowing, struggled to maintain momentum and kept him jerking in stops and starts.  From the window of the ground floor flat below Etienne the young boy’s mother, Nadine, watched him in the intermittent glances away from her online bingo.  Tired from a hard day’s work, Nadine was chatting flirtatiously to a man she had met through an online dating site and with whom she was arranging a meeting.  She had lead him to believe she was dolled-up and ready for a night out and he had convinced her he was still in the office closing a deal when in fact he was sat in an internet cafe in town.  They would laugh about these discrepancies in their truths two years from now, on their honeymoon.
               The cafe’s only waitress scurried ceaselessly between tables oblivious to the gazes she distracted from the screens and dragged behind her along her erratic path.
“Beth, you still have a cappuccino sitting here waiting for you to take it to the gentleman outside.”  Helena found her boss’ patronising reminders coated in sickly-sweet, feigned good intention infuriating.  Negotiating her way around chair legs to the door, the blaring of an ambulance siren as it tore down the street completely surprised her.  The shudder of shock that ran through her was enough to allow the drink to slip from her grip.  Upon hitting the floor, the cup and saucer fractured into eight pieces in a trickling, caffeinated pool.  Hunched and balancing on the balls of her feet, Beth's embarrassment was soon forgotten as a pair of Brogues caught and held her eye until they had rounded a distant corner.

Digital Diatribe

It was a volatile evening where everyone fidgeted incessantly with coasters; buttons; earrings; shoelaces; dead skin. The intended soiree of the month had dive-bombed into a melting pot full of immiscible specimens. The half full Champagne flutes were testament to the evenings discomfort; an unfinished glass of wine is completely different to the sacrilege of leaving Champagne. The bizarre pageantry of forced conversation only to be interrupted by yet another awkward exchange was saddening. A grim thing to imagine in the communication age where face-to-face conversation has been rendered expendable; everybody longing for connections and left with no choice but to feel sufficed by jostling strangers on the crowded streets. Walking home, the pulsating billboards installed in the sky reeled off brands, pearly whites lodged in charmless faces and unsubtle suggestion. Their light falls into the awaiting eyes of the eager millions coursing past on their way to somewhere else. The glowing words relentlessly burrow their way in and take hold like vicious, fastidious ticks. And so things went in the city that bridged the gap between two rivers; a collection of lives bookended by opposing currents.

Faded Yuppies

Their electronics grow ever smaller except for the wall-mounted plasma screens.  Their kitchen appliances are matching, character-retardant chrome and their cars are as unnecessarily large as possible to cover distances that have long since forgotten could be walked. Their people carriers and 4x4s have never seen a speck of filth, it's like buying a racehorse and only using it to teach the progeny of the yogalates set how to rising trot of a Sunday. That is when they are not holidaying around Lake Como or submerged in their bizarre world of Chanel salopettes and après ski couture.

Trapped City Light Glow

It's like her brain is empty, stagnant and unable to progress past basic humdrum function. Cups of tea. The thought of the possibility of prospective action always looming. Books read only until the third chapters, scraps of paper (most blank), open bottles and full ashtrays. Pisa towers of books in the corners of the room. The mirror is no longer in a frame and instead rests on the floor against the radiator. The dim electric light, ill-effective until all natural light is dead, is barely noticable at early dusk.
She watches the world from her open window, the cold air filtering between her toes, heavy with its own temperature. The damp slowly rising through her bones provokes a shiver. The dark sky is clouded causing the orange glow of trapped city lights to be plainly visible above the row of opposite houses. There are distant sounds of cars and passing voices but nothing out of the ordinary. A coated figure walks past, collar up obsuring their face, she follows them down the road until they are out of sight. A kid on a bicycle races past beneath the street lamp but he is soon gone. Lost beyond the corner, the flash of his lights is still visible against the wall of a house after he has vanished from sight.

Something Is Happening In Paris

The air sits thick with the murky mist of the Seine that claws at and claims the smells of fresh bread and cured meats.  Gusts from the stacked, sweating vents opposite send endless snowflakes spiralling upwards beyond the fourth floor window.  Customers from the myriad boutiques draw out behind them a citrus floral scent that is too soft not to soon vanish.  Cars and buses, voices and buskers: someone somewhere is always playing the accordion.  The disjointed melody of cello practise drifts from somewhere above me but the notes sink and melt in between taxis and through animated conversation.  Hands tucked deep in pockets are sealed in against a stealthy cold.  Scarves tangle on the wind, two angular elbows kiss through layers of fleece and nostrils burn as they apologies for jostling down the pavement.  Expert sleight of hand ensures an old woman will not know she had been pick-pocketed until she is home.  Street lights do little now but in an hour or so when the light dies they will shine against the darkness in this city that always glows.  It is l’heure verte but even the cobbles are white.  Mute pigeons nestle between the cursive wrought iron of the Metro sign, soon to return to roost like the tailored suits flowing into the ground below.  The air at waist height is reclaimed by children just sprung from school to jump, ankle-deep in the drifts of snow.  The boot prints look almost warm as they trail off into the distance in every direction, sporadically visible through plumes of shallow breath.  A young couple with a baby, who I cannot help but watch play out their lives in the window directly opposite, sit about the floor on cushions as he crawls.  Gloved hands curl around coffee cups as smokers everywhere sacrifice warmth for beauty at perennial pavement tables.  The city whispers promise at the same moment a tweed librarian retrieves his paper, not realising he has also dropped his hat until a young girl, all glowing ringlets in her woollen dress, hands it back.  No one needs to see the Pont des Arts to know its carpet of snow is dotted with red wine-lipped students laughing into the icy mist.  Three nuns let the wind sweep them across the road into the sanctuary of a fragrant covered walkway.  A woman floats past a man who closes his eyes while he fills with the mint conditioner in her almond hair and forgets for a second the holes in his shoes.

Magpie With a Typewriter

Published in City Zine #10

Dedicated to The Longford Family Band.

We were surrounded by empty rooms and fresh memories trussed up in bin liners. Every window was closed and bolted leaving the air standing still. They had dissipated irretrievably like a fistful of leaves scattered to a cross-wind. They may meet again but it would never be like it was; not like it had been around the fire, on the landing, in the kitchen, next door to those neighbours. There had been good wine and bad, tuneful music and broken strings, a bath full of empty cans and a fridge devoid of food. We had piled into taxis and been swiftly whisked towards the hum of town and successions of pubs. We had staggered back to our respective beds only to wake - late morning - with our heads in vices and coffee in our hands ruminating over the night before. We had discovered ‘The Park’ and come to understand the simple bliss of a waterfall in summer sunshine. There had been nights when we had not slept at all and entire days we had slept through; I had fallen asleep drinking wine, woken only to finish the bottle and find the previous evening still afoot. We had mopped-up the endless spillages with clothes for lack of towels and innumerable essays had been smudged by countless cocktails. There were coffee stains on top of wine stains on the coffee table. Naturally there had been the cold, wet days when we hadn’t two pennies to rub between us and life seemed a horrible ordeal, but come spring and pay-day the warming sun would melt any memory of it seamlessly away. It had, all-in-all, been a spectacularly disastrous success.