the chz Podcast Episode 10

Written

The pen broke

Right there

On the white paper

A blue Rorschach and silver nib

The hand broke

Right then

A bone frozen and muscle failure

The brain stalled

The heart paused

All around birds flew and

Cars sang metallic songs

The eyes saddened

The tears remembered faces

Now gone and

The pain of those still here

The pen broke

The fire put out

The poems become of less and less

Use.

Rainbow head

Pre 9am

Main road mono

She passes me on the

Inside

With striped rainbow hair

Rainbow head

Outside and in no doubt

And other colours

Maybe every one

Up and down her legs

Backpack

Eye shadow

Mid-twenties I guess

Unconcerned about opinions

Defying the locale

Grey puddles en route

Laying still

Unreflective

While the red yellow

Pink green

Orange purple, blue shine

Not crazy

Or maybe just crazy enough

Finally

She turns a corner

The streets are greyed

I am tired and lazy and broken and

So

I count her as my

fuck you

To the world for today.

I want I want I want

The kid is in that stage now

Of nothing is enough

I want I want I want

Glass half empty

Grass is greener kind of shit

I don’t rise to it

Because just wait until we’re not paying

When he has to shell out for

Whatever

Out of his own pocket

It’s then you realise

Those feelings never cease

New clothes

New shoes

New car

New house

There’s always a bigger fish

A higher high

A rose tinted memory

Lying to your future self

            It will never be that good

Again…

I used to make lists

Strings of idealistic words

In the backs of school exercise books

Scraps of paper

Post-its – anything nearby

No target or goal in mind

Just lists of things I needed

(with hindsight this was a way to keep the world in order

to keep the wolves from the door. Hindsight doesn’t help shit)

But

30 years later

Nothing changes

Except now I don’t write the lists

I keep them in my head out of shame

But it’s all the same

Then

Now

Later

I want

I want

I want…

Yaad

Those times are over kid

I was there

In part

Briefly experienced it;

Whole house

Front yard, back yard

A dog

A cat

Both maybe

But those times are over

Kid

You get what you can now

You sit back and suck up

The last of what’s on

Your plate

And be thankful for it

Sure, snow rarely falls

But the summers still come round

And the people

Those next door

Across the street

They still live

Just farther way

More distant from each other

Drifting out and out

With the rest of the universe.

Disbelief

Reality is a walk in the park

The circles of terror become old and dusty

They slow and grate and are at last

Predictable

Gates stay locked

Fences high and strong

Razor wire for your ambitions

It comes and goes but the walls are always

There

Yet

The hardest days are a simple equation

Comedy is after all just

Tragedy plus time

All you need is patience and imagination

Knowing when to believe the lie

When to buy into the story

Suspension of disbelief is invaluable

But

You can’t always win

And that’s fine

So don’t listen to those movies where they

Tell you otherwise

If you truly believe…

If your heart is pure…

If you are doing what you love…

It will all work out

To throw caution to the wind in this town

Is the same as pissing into it

There is still a time and place for the

Fear brought about by risk

You can still jump

Without breaking a single bone

You just need patience and imagination

Reality is a walk in the park

But at night

In the darkness

Wide awake as young foxes scream

It is your dreams that must be overcome.