Month: January 2005

I miss the smell of your perfume
Lingering
Lingering with me
Reminding me
Reminding me that somewhere in this savage land
Someone loves me
Loves me

Have we forgotten
Forgotten how to be romantic?
Sick with puppy-love

I want to return
Return to the warmth of your embrace.
Are you waiting for my return?
I return,
We talk of things functional;
carpets;
school plays;
kitchen fittings.

Have we forgotten
Forgotten how to be romantic?
Sick with puppy-love

Maybe it’s my fault
My fault;
I spend too much time in my own head
I used to never leave the house
Without kissing you
Kissing you;
on the carpet;
in the back of the stands;
in the kitchen.

Have we forgotten
Forgotten how to be romantic?
Sick with puppy-love

Where did it all begin? Where will it end? What happened in the middle?

If all the world’s a stage, what part am I playing?
The puppet? The pirate? The poet? The pauper? The pawn or the king?

Or indeed the fool?

I want to be the knight in shining armor dashing forth from my castle keep to slay dragons.

What dragons shall I slay today?
My bills? My meals? My car? My contracts? My invoices? My Taxes?

I was Robin Williams in Deconstructing Harry today, out of focus man. It was just one of those days were I never quite seemed to get in gear. The highlight of my day was meeting Jenny for panini’s and coffee at the Border’s bookshop in Leicester.

I feel like I’ve been busy being present and by being present I haven’t thought about all the things I’ve been setting up to do in the future and now when I sit and reflect I feel like there’s so much I need to be doing that I haven’t done. How do you get around that? Because I must say it’s a wonderful feeling to live in the present,to be here now, but then things get scary when I stop to think about the destination and not the journey. There is a line of thought that says if you don’t have a destination you’ll never get there. But where is there? And what does it mean to be there as oppose to being here.

I’ve been…I don’t know where I’ve been. Where ever I’ve been, it hasn’t been on this keyboard like I should be. To be fair, I have been writing a character biography which is just over 5 pages long. I have two characters, but no story and I’m not sure which character is the main character. There’s a young lady and a history professor. They both want their stories told, but at the moment, it looks like the lady is winning. She seems like a very interesting character. One I would definitely like to get to know a lot better.

The C8 gathering on Friday nite was superb. We saw the Peter Pan Pantomime starring none other than former Eastenders bad boy Phil Mitchell as Captain Hook. Then it was off to some good grub and dirty dancing.

Today we frolicked about Kenliworth Castle.

I started French Lessons last night. I was a bit disappointed because only one other student turned up and the teacher or tutor was quite evidently not used to leading a class. I want to learn conversational French. This cat started off teaching us grammar which is absolutely boring, or rather, he made it very boring. I had to stop myself from sticking my pen in my eye. I think I’ll look for another class.

I have reached the point in my novel writing apprenticeship were I get frustrated and give up by getting involved with “other things” thereby given me an excuse not to write. Ah but this time I have bravely decided to face the chaos and fight through it even though I feel like jumping up and down and tearing my heart out. Embrace the chaos.

The project I’m working on in Derby is going extremely well. There is a lot of energy in the place and a lot of folks who are eager to improve their personal and professional performance. I’ve been working some crazy hours on the project, but as they say time flies when you’re having fun.

Tonight I’m supposed to be going to the theatre with a group of friends in Milton Keynes. The problem is the play starts at 19.00 and I don’t finish work until 18.30 and it’s at least a 2 hour drive on a good day from Derby to Milton Keynes and that’s not accounting for the Friday night traffic. Realistically, I’ll miss the play, but I’ll be able to catch the dinner, dancing and general hell-raising afterwards. (I would say good bye in French, but we didn’t even learn how to say hi.)

I start my new contract today. I have the pre-game jitters as I always do before a new project. I am feeling a bit time starved at the moment. Time seems to be speeding by faster than I get things done. I have to remind myself that all I can do is what I can do in a day.

The cacophony of my emotions has created a great buzz in my head. I am over excited, almost to the point of stunned confusion – like a white hot poker in my mind’s eye.

I secured a nice coaching contract that’ll take me through the next couple of months. I attended the Inland Revenue workshop on becoming self-employed and I actually left the workshop happy, knowing more than I did before I came. I saw Sam. Her belly is getting huge, a far cry from the stick figure of a lass I first met two years ago (I should add she’s more than a few months pregnant now). I spoke to a couple of mates whom I’ve not talked to for a few weeks and who, whenever we talk, always lift my spirit. I bought a PS2 so I can eat up the little spare time I have occasionally. And to top off the day, I finished John Gardner’s The Art of Fiction which I believe is one of the best, if not the best, book I have ever read on creating works of fiction. I would encourage anyone who is serious about writing fiction to read it. Oh and I also finished Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep, by Philip K. Dick. This was my second reading of this superb piece of fiction. It makes me wonder how simulated life will affect our humanity.

peace

The world is closing
i cannot see the sky.
Trapped like the wings of
a Cabbage White between
the thumbs and grubby paws
of the little blonde tyrants
kicking around in
the grass fields.

Gird up your loins
like a man,
things will work out fine

The Shadow
lingers over
watching…
waiting for me to falter,
like the panther, dark and sullen,
sinewy limbs stretched tight
ready to rip the bones from my flesh.

Who are you
to question me
with the darkness
of your counsel

I cannot hold a candle,
to Prufrock’s boots
let me drown by the Sea
oh they will not wake me.

Hear my speech,
suffer me a fool.
I do diligently speak,
a whisper
and a drool

I have found the Plains of Moab,
the River at my knee
I hear the trumpets of the Priest,
the people stand and stare
they will not shout for me

My soul’s too black
the River’s too wide
i hope they wake me
so I drown

This is the last day of my holiday. It’s been nice sitting around generally relaxing, but now it’s time to get busy.

I’m in Bristol sitting in the conservatory watching the world wake up (well my little part of the world anyway) to a brand new year. I love the optimism of the new…so much promise…so much hope and good will. Let us set sail into the unknown and make 2005 a year to be remembered…a year that when we’re 85 we’ll be saying, “Man, do you remember in 2005 how we…”

Happy New Year to you all!!!