Suspended in VHS
Travelling to ends
Triggering rewinds
From tape to tape to tape
The grainy
Through the rains
Unsteady
In the rolling winds and mess
Memory Memorexed
A cassette drape
Suspended in VHS
Travelling to ends
Triggering rewinds
From tape to tape to tape
The grainy
Through the rains
Unsteady
In the rolling winds and mess
Memory Memorexed
A cassette drape
The traffic rushes by
Like the memories in my head
And the day is upon me
As soft tyres lose their tread
All the roads blur smooth
Like yesterdays future news
And the day is upon me
What rushes is still in cruise
All i know is…
And all you know
is what i show
In the here and now…
I listen to the music
That attractive noise
I’ll listen to The Fall
To The Beach Boys
I listen to the music
So candid
Therapeutic
A stinging to my ears
So enjoyably caustic
I listen to the music
For instant nostalgia
Of where I was
Who with
Or when I found ya
I listen to the music
I love that drone
So finally I can sleep
Until the notes find home
I listen to the music
It conjures such love
Into my ears
Let it roll with a loose shove
I listen to the music
Feeling happy or stressed
I’ll listen when calm
Intoxicated
Badly dressed
I listen to the music
On various compilations
Those imperfect and personal
Golden-oldie stations
I listen to the music
Like a hit from the hits
I listen to the music
When the moment fits
I listen to the music
And here’s the chorus now
I’ll listen
Until the music’s over
… T’Pau!
Flow your tears
Connecting with rain
Dripping with gravity
Drop racing
Off your chin
Swerving
Plummeting down
Your raincoat
Leaping
Dangling precarious
From your footsteps
Nourishing on touch
Do upon their landing
Shake dandelion manes
Electrify buttercups neon
Daisy-chain a pathway
To somebody loved
Someone who waits for you
To dry your cheeks
Dehumidify lingering mists
Hold chilled emotions
Like a cool pebble in a new sun
Smoothed with soft fingers
Under crows feet
And umbrella
Then you disappear
In a buttoned fabric shelter
Merging tributary
Into heavy flesh of loving arms
Home time
Dry felt-tip pens
Odd florescent socks
Tracing paper
The Muppets lunchbox
Sweetshops
Dull board games
Lots and lots of dice
Shortened holidays
Longer Sundays
Missing the bus again… twice!
Morning Telly
Pop! Go the ants
Nothing and everything
In soaking wet pants
World cup dramas
Bad wrestling fights
Unwelcome relatives
The endless summer nights
Bad haircuts
Cracked pavements
Thick scabby knees
Puddles
Beer sweets
Sherbet dib-dabs please!
Fake blood
Loading times
The gallop top 40
BUNDLE!
Less of your cheek
Naughty-naughty-naughty!
Too short in the trouser
Satchels
Gizmo top of pet names
Xmas, birthday, Xmas
Nonsense ball games
First love and embarrassment
Marbles on the drains
Saturday + Sunday = two day week!
Diving paper planes
The register
Good… morning… Mrs… Teacher!
Worms and Daddy longlegs
Scare girls but won’t eat ya!
The dreaded Chinese burn
Now wait your ruddy turn!
I could go on…
The half-life – existing in Ordinary Street. In a home that’s regressing, decaying at your own apprehensive feet. The curtains, undrawn, mournful in unique shades of burnt. I continuously prolong to stand; outside, be curious, where nothing can be learnt.
All that remains is allergic and weathered, bleached by an encompassing light, a colourless nothing fading from every passers sight. The welcome gate has long since gone, dissolved by powers of apathy, crumbling everything, no longer strong.
Carried on a gust, is a child’s drawing of their favourite haunted house, daring you to walk up the path like that famous miming mouse. Someone is sealed inside their novelty box. Merely do they exist, inert, in one of their cellblocks.
This was this once the warmest family home. Mum and dad, the kids, each sitting on their styled floral throne, around the television like decent and normal folk, laughing like gas leaks at dad’s latest bad joke.
If you care too much now, then you are very strange. You can’t spare the spare time and so creeps something random, unimportant, and you’ll be fine, so walk on regardless in your very British sunshine.