Read.

The book I picked up and found my Self in read thus:

I cannot be certain how long I stood in the same place, here on ice, in stasis, waiting for instructions on how to tame the words that flew from me and create with them a narrative of some reliability. Most likely it was squezzillion times infinity. I felt the urge to go and do things. I had the words and language surging crazily around me leaving neon green vapour trails, but they never seemed to form into a coherent and vital plot. I began to hallucinate. The moon waxed and waned on numerous occasions, which means something in your world, but was out of sync with nature and the fundamentals of time in mine.

Beginnings.

...Before I was born, people did not know who I was.

My conception was a work of art. My father had died only an hour prior, but his spermatozoa had the presence of mind to continue his work. Abstract Expressionism maybe, like the 'white-writing' of Mark Tobey or the painterly application of Jackson Pollock. Hundreds of intricate strokes that helped describe my form. An asemic continuum if you will. (And you must!) 

My birth was similarly a creation of fine art. My Mother had been a blank canvas until I was writ large upon her, and sadly, after months of incubating a life's work, she died delivering her masterpiece. I was extracted from my amniotic sanctuary 6 weeks prematurely. An over-proofed yet somehow under-edited baby boy.

Cover.

Work in progress of the cover for my yet to be published unauthorised autobiography, The Ghostwriter in the Machine.

Burn.

After 20 years of marriage Brad hardly engaged his wife in anything more  complex than the rituals of a comfortable friendship. He and Hayley seldom fought, and it seemed to her that Brad was tired and damp, and couldn’t become incendiary even if he tried. In fact Brad was something of a peacemaker between her and Verity. He detested the fuse of conflict that mother and daughter were able to light, burn fiercely and then extinguish, as if he were afraid that it may get out of control and that things said out loud might burn the family unit and cause it to disintegrate.

Colour Plate.

Psyngularity.

Plastic people

with plastic souls

are more complex than you imagine.

Story.

Newly published short story available for download at:


http://bit.ly/xarDzc


Download it. Read it. Go on.

Crunching.

He'd begun to feel a dislocation from everything that had felt familiar and pleasant. Simple conversations were now crunching and stressful; he was missing a beat. Did others recognise this in him? Did they too feel this way and it was life marching naturally forwards. Age letting us know that age mattered. Were they observing and commenting on how out of step he was or was this paranoia a symptom of his state?

Sale.

there's a garage sale in a seaside town

this Saturday, 7am start, NOT BEFORE!

plenty of bric-a-brac:

candlewick bedspread, books, dining table and 5 chairs 

(one missing – don't know what happened to it),

tools, clothes, an old television (still goes)
a telescope, hammock, map of the coast,

a birdcage, briefcase, electric lawnmower,

some pick-up-sticks and a deck of cards (complete!).

little will sell;

the buying happens over the road 
at the new red shed –

where guaranteed warranties 
are as cheap as chips.

but never mind! 

the locals still 
will come along

to natter, to chat,

to complain a bit 

about this and that;

(price of milk, price of fuel, price of progress).

"sub-divison up the way's coming along at a rate of knots,"

they'll say, 

one judgmental eye 
on the bright concrete driveway 

snaking behind
the bulldozed section past 

'weatherboard' (kitset) houses

blocking the sea, the horizon, the view 

beyond tables laden with 40 years 

of domestic history,
and one judgmental eye 
on the overpriced 
used cutlery.

Instinct.

Memory at 1 day old sounds implausible, but it was so for me. Even if you have now forgotten incidents of that time, at that moment you would remember from second to second. Otherwise you would not learn. Some instinctual and automated responses are built-in, like breathing, crying when hungry, fear of harm; along with these are memories that teach us to shape external influences for a desired response. I just happen to have excellent recall. Some do. This is both a curse and a blessing. The detail of my first breath is as graphically disturbing to me now as that of my first word. That word was 'Help'. Besides, the evidence shows that even if we can't process meaning, our brain is conscious. It remains conscious for up to 30s after decapitation; it may even have happened already. This could be the last sentence you...

Aphonic.

They say he is a closed book. He’d say, if he could, that he is devoid of Words and Language. People attempt to prise him open; to study his contents for fragments of meaning; to read him and know what makes him so. But he knows he’s an authorial fraud; his pages are empty, his contents non-existent. Life is narrated for him; writes itself, it seems. He crafts no Words and Language of his own. He is an impostor in another’s text. I ask him, ‘Does this mean anything to you or is it all just words? This poetic prose pared to lean syntax, the satisfied sigh of the last line, the simple beauty of the story – is it soundless or does it speak to you? He does not reply.

Fame.

Mine was a symptom of a larger malaise. The vast loneliness of humankind produces an endless longing to be heard. An individual's obsession with their perceived birthright to be lauded, and granted 15 minutes of fame, is merely a lament out loud. Everyone always striving to give a 'shout out'. Look at me! Listen to me! A desperate plea for someone, anyone out there listening for their call, ready to hear them, admire them, attest to their existence. For silence is emptiness, is death. I needed to feel again to be inspired, to be exhausted, or I may as well be dead.

Asemic continuum.

Resolution.

My 2012 resolution is to consistently post an entry on this blog each day, for one day only, starting Jan 6th. After that, it will be random as per all years prior. 


** Update: I have achieved this and am content. 2012 is looking like a breeze would look if you could see it.

16

From the collection '8 poems about me and you.'

Are you good enough, strong enough, smart enough

and would you believe them if they told you you’re not?

The best of you is at large, they say.

You’re missing vast parts of yourself.

Once it was impossible 

to fill in your pieces, 

not crossing all of their lines.

Soon time fashions fools of us all.

Doubt is reliably ill-informed

via any number of charlatans 

whose fault is failing to see 

the world has passed them by

before the wisdom they have on offer –

false facts, faux figures, lost hopes and dreams –

is filtered through to you.

So you’ve felt for a while now 

(knowing this is nothing new)

you’ve been equipped to fail.

Fed all these off promises.

You’re under-prepared, 

you’re underdone,

your sources of knowledge 

as uncertain, unready 

as you hoped not to be.

Completion.

I find the most difficulty with writing is that I'm terrible at finishing anythi

Perfect.

Nine words is just right for an epigrammatic sentence.

Driven.

We are driven towards endings, as we are by lust, because we must know the shape of things. We need to feel and regard indistinct outlines in sharp relief.

Colour Plate.

Verdant.

Callum 34. Impossibly Ripely handsome. Art English teacher. Too kind, too sincere, popular, envied. (A bit of me??). Carl 32. Courier franchisee. Withered. Manipulative, sardonic, evil, scathing, mean, magnetic. (A bit of me??).
Karyn 28. Landscape gardener. Earthy beauty. Vulnerable, pleasant, introvert, considerate, damaged. (A bit of me??). 

The character outlines were framed with radiating pen strokes, like cartoon suns, which elevated them as somehow more vital. The inky lines gave the words a lustre, as neon tubes give to opaque signs. 

The story, set in Christchurch over one spring day and titled The Verdant City, would, the author planned, harvest meaning from fertile imagery – the garden as metaphor for life, where a sharp-nibbed pen prunes crowded sentences and light promotes truth.

At any moment you’ll be discovered and planted deeply into the bitter truth of this place. Who would say that? The author didn’t allocate the line to a character, and she was undecided whether or not to include it; in case critics pounce upon it as autobiographical; for fear this new sphere I inhabit named ‘recent divorcee’ stains every page, faintly but indelibly like a watermark. Every fiction must embrace unavoidable elements of fact.

The story was ready to be written...