Shadow of Sunshine.

You are but a shadow
and I stare at your silhouette
praying with a pencil; drawing
in the lines
where they used to be.
And you are all the more perfect
in darkness
as I draw in the memories, making
marks on black that
brought me light.
I should fight that, I think
as I see your smile
written in blood.
My blood. It’s mine.
I should stop that, I think – the
bleeding.
I’m bleeding.
But it is only in this sacrifice
that I can keep you here
in this place, next
to a gilt framed mirror
that shows me, my face
paler – day by day.

Conversations With Claude #4

So come on then.

Sorry?

You said it was time.

Oh yes, right. So let’s start at the beginning.

Great.

The concept of flying is simple:/-

Wait!

Yes?

Why can I hear you?

You have ears, my dear.

No, I mean…why me? Why only me?

I can’t answer that.

You could at least try.

Well…maybe they could hear but don’t.

What?

You could think upon it…as a gift.

The Pigeon Whisperer.  Lucky, lucky me.

So ungrateful:/-

I’d just have preferred x-ray vision or:/-

Really, can you not just be happy with what you have?

I’m ecstatic.

I can see that.  Sarcasm is the lowest form of wit, you know.

Oh, just get on with it.

As you wish!

I wish.

Fine.

Fine.

…

Go on, then!

Yes, yes. Keep your knickers on, I’m building up to it!

Build faster!

Do you understand the concept?

Of what?

Of flying.

No.

Really, what do they teach in schools, these days?

Claude.

Hmm?

Get. On. With. It.

Right. So. Imagine I have a badger on my back.

Are you taking the pi:/-

Stay with me, Dear. Imagine the badger.

Okay…

Could I take flight, with said badger, on my back?

Is this rhetorical?

No.

No?

Right. He would weigh me down, making it impossible for me to soar through the treetops, at one with the:/-

I get it.

Wonderful!

So…what has this got to do with me?

You need to lose your badger.

Excuse me?

Lose the badger.

I haven’t got a fucking badger!

Now, listen here, young lady:/-

Oh, forget it.

Wait!  You need to lose the badger! Baggage! I mean baggage! You need to lose the
baggage that weighs you down!

Why didn’t you just say that!

I like metaphors…

What are you looking at?

Incredible, Claude.

Thank you!

It was definitely not a compliment.

Oh.

So what’s my badger, I mean…baggage?

You need to work that out by yourself.

How?

Think about it.

I’ve got nothing.

You have plenty. A full set, actually.

Of badgers or baggage?

Definitely both.

Oh, can’t you just tell me!

I could…but it doesn’t work like that.

Why not! Be a rebel!

Absolutely not, don’t be absurd. Me a rebel! Honestly,  I can’t believe you just:/-

Alright, alright! Jesus! I’ll do it myself.

That’s the spirit!

Isn’t it. What about a hint?

No.

Okay.

Get rid of the badger.

Yup.

I mean it.

Ahuh.

…

You’ll not even try, will you?

Probably not.

You really are impossible! I don’t know how I got lumbered with this, this really is the last time I ever; Well come on then!

What?

I’ll take you.

Really?

Yes.

Thanks!

You’re getting right under my feathers,  so let’s just get this done. I really haven’t got the patience for:/-

I’m annoying you?

Yes!

I’m annoying you? I’mannoyingyou. I’m. Annoying. YOU!

Oh, wait up; Claude! Slow down, where we going?

Badger culling!

Did you just crack a funny? Claude! Did you just; Wait!  

Oh, be quiet.  And get a wriggle on!

Coming, wait; I’m coming! Ha, Claude! Wait for me!

And I ran behind him, struggling to keep up; ready to take down my badgers…whoever or whatever they might be.

**This is the fourth in a series of ‘Conversations With Claude’ – you can find the previous three on G&T homepage.

The Present.

I give you the gift of
present.

Now is all that I have – wrapped
in desire of both past and
tomorrow.

Borrow whatever you require
but give it back
in time

because I can’t count a
minute
without seeing your
hands…your face.

Stop the clocks.

No tick, no tock. A snapshot.

Just you; feeding birds.

Growing lives.

On saying nothing

Sometimes I have nothing to say
Nothing of any relevance
or beauty, anyway.

Some say silence says it all
but then break it with
knowing tongues.

Mine –

A muscle of no such strength
to partake
in the forsaking
of quiet.

But then, that said, what if
I am wrong?

Is to be strong,
unconcerned?
Learn nothing from the
nothingness
and spout
a thousand ill words
that leave
ears, battered and bruised?

I’ll sit here surrounded
by the emptiness

Try to work it all out.

Pandora’s Guilt

There is a moth

beating its wings inside of the lampshade.

I watch it haunt me from up there,

Perspiring the need for absolution

until I vomit regret

with a violence

of the Earth at present.

Still.

As I shake with a torment of ages

it continues to tink-tink and flicker,

casting further shadows on my

shattered soul.

In the early days I was hopeful

for a remedy

but that was the sweet scent

lingering in the air.

My final escapee.

I tried to catch them, extinguish them all .

Every single, last one.

But tears of desperation evaporated in

the flames that should

never have been given.

They were of a speed that mocked

me

dividing like cells, intent on poisoning.

The aids of the world of then;

digesting

destroying

mutating life before my eyes.

And so I stopped. Admitted defeat and

indulged in weary desolation.

Began to observe my creation

every affliction, a wound upon my

skin.

It was with unprecedented sadness

that I watched them spread, spoiling

the beauty of my beginning.

And I was that, before then.

Before the whispering brain

boiled over in lunacy,

spasms of interest

paralysing my conscience

until I was gripped; possessed by it.

You see,

I am a map of scars

for your world of pain,

Learned all too late

how

curiosity kills more

than just cats.

And for my part in that,

I grieve.

The Merry Go Round.

I ride a horse

with crimson feathers

and you kneel in the

carriage

patiently watching

me ride

all Godiver and no

stockings.

Shocking that you

should see a dismount

at such a speed

as we are at,

merrily going

round

carouseling

to the sound

of an organ

that plays us.

Again and again.

Physically perplexed.

My friend Newton
had a theory
that clearly
I’d fallen for you.

I told him
how science scared me.
That words were what
I was about.

He said it’s not
just physicality.
Explained the force of gravity.
Attraction and its pull.

”But I don’t want to fall.”,
I told him,
and he just laughed all
that he could.

“You crazy old man. How
can a girl like me
believe, in a
world of so much tripe?”

He just held his sides
hysterically.
“Oh my poor, innocent love.”
He chuckled, holding me tight.

But I just frowned. Watched
him grapple.
“Forgive me, my sweet!”
He managed to speak,

“You can have my apple, if you like.”

Religion For The Atheist

I come as the Messenger
to proclaim the word of your Lord.
Your God.

Forever with you; he will not desert you in your hour of need.

He is a healer.
And for all you non believers, I grant
you permission to put him to the test.

Because he will not fail.

The giver of life, providing his months
for your gestation;
allowing you and your children in turn, to pass through him.
To develop under his watchful eye.

He is all seeing.
There can be no secrets from his miracle
that is memory.
Divine truths, for each and every one of us. You and I.

He is stealth.
Operating in the shadows, continual
and constant, silently working. Always.

Ever changing, forward thinking and yet there,
at the beginning.
He is the beginning. And the end.

He is you.
The force behind your future self, making you
what you are
today.
He is your future self. Your own evolution.

But beware.

You must be aware;

He is impatient;
Waiting for no one and his brother. He cannot take you
back and that fantasy will remain.
Just that.

He laughs at the present.
Stares it in the face and takes his glory. For he is nothing but a phantom of imagination.
Nothing but just past.

And he is cruel; all powerful. He can alter your perception.
A master of thievery; he steals what is wasted,
takes what you
think you can have,
tomorrow.

He is tomorrow.
And if you are lucky, he will give you yours.

Because he is the end.
And the end that I speak of, is the end of you.

So take heed.

Time is your God…

Treat him well.

The Development Of Heat.

Breathing is staggered, ragged

with anticipation

and desire ripples in the shivering

of skin.

There’s a pounding from within that awakens

a stirring.  A new kind of hunger.

Click.

Sweat glistens in the photograph that the brain

is taking

and there is more than one

way to bring it forth, from the dark room.

Create it.

Scorch the image on to memory

with flesh and fire

and flashes of pulsing excitement.

Now’s the time…

Develop it.

 

 

 

Loneliness

I’m sitting right now, on my porch

and I can see my breath, a freezing cloud, washing over the keys.

I’m wishing I’d made that frivolous purchase, back in June

but I was being far too sensible and gloves were a lifetime away.

Cars pass by sporadically, their lights cascade

dancing shadows through the privet hedge.

I wonder where they’re going

in the black of night? Or why I am not

sat in front of the blazing flames that

warm the sitting room.

And the elderly man that has a dog that I’ve named

Ernie, and a flat cap and a bag of… something?

Let’s make it his life’s savings.

Well, the banks aren’t worth the money they

sit on.

What does he see as I watch him look

at me, through a fading peripheral vision?

Maybe he thinks I’m surfing the net,

watching porn on my doorstep.

Or maybe I’m penning my greatest hit.

I doubt he cares so much as he walks by

like the rest of them,

Not noticing much more than what is two feet ahead.

I’m noticing that I have a ladder in my tights and that

there’re no stars, at least for tonight. Just a depressing

glow of street lamps and my artificial light that I write by, right now.

I’m starting to shiver but it doesn’t matter because

a cup of tea fixes everything, or so I’ve heard it said.

And what of it? Who am I to judge the medicinal powers

of PG Tips? If they can make a monkey talk…

Maybe I’m taking things too literally.

It really is cold, tonight.

Time for bed.