clinging to the wreckage

Once the war begins there is no turning back. A war against time, a war on the mind, a war against one’s self...   raging within. It’s war all the time. The guilt that we feel (or should feel... or possibly shouldn’t feel, depending on which way one looks at it) from suffering from issues that are merely bourgeois luxuries such as writer’s block or pining for the love of a lost lover. People in different walks of life do not have such concerns, they are concerned with finding enough food to survive or with the health of a terribly sick child or the loss of a family member. Our capitalist culture dictates that we consume and consume and consume so we are forever left feeling that something is missing from our lives. You’ll notice that those who have millions and millions in the bank, cars in the driveway of their paid for mansions are all out trying to do something for the starving... this too is simply a personal need. They are told by society that they should care for those less fo

An oppressive heat consumes the land at the end of September and, I must confess, we celebrate it somewhat as we have had very little summer warmth this year. For me it is one of those days of great emptiness of the heart... a day upon which the memories of the past infest the mind and heart and begin to devour their way back through to the skin like carrion in a corpse.  Corpselike I venture into Guildford in the hope of buying one or two items of clothing but also with a thinly disguised desire to see some human life on the planet whilst enjoying possibly the last day of sunshine and heat. Drifting along beside the river I see nothing but couples, they swarm like locusts upon the grass beside this sad river and gaze at me amazed that I am alone on a Sunday in such weather and in such a place. I escape their glare by drifting back towards the theatre and into a department store... but this offers much of the same; wives helping their husbands to choose clothing for work, husbands maki

I saw a film about a writer but I couldn’t consider him a writer at all. He was one of those perfectly built, slightly idiotic looking men who become renowned for their ruthlessness in sport or their greed to get ahead in some non-scientific region of the corporate world. He didn’t drink, didn’t smoke and was clean shaven each day. It was a farce. Then, towards the end, he lost his girlfriend and grew a beard. Finally he showed some pain in his eyes and started to take on the look of a man who may be capable of writing something other than cheap romantic fiction.                 I turned to the woman beside me, someone else’s partner, and admired her naked body in that dusky candlelight. Wine and beer bottles surrounded us and the room was filled with the smell of soul-destroying deceit. Because of what we are taught we believed that what we were doing was wrong... but the teachings are wrong. Everything is wrong. Love is transient at best. Humans don’t mix in a permanent state. Mar

I miss the times we drove. We drove blind and hopeless through the night. Once we drove to France and stopped before we reached the English channel to drink beer. We drank more beer whilst crossing the channel and then drove, drunk, through an ignorant France. From the moment we arrived in that filth-ridden, beaten, crumbling, corrupt place we were completely pissed. We stormed through the streets seeking nothing but alcoholic oblivion. I think it was the best time of my life. I walked bare-footed through the streets and they took it as a great insult to their very nation. The Australian bar had not one employee capable of speaking English and the gourmet Italian restaurant was more like the play area in a pre-school child’s playground... and yet, how we drank. We drank them well and truly under their dirty tables. We met the united nations students and went out with them... they drank orange juice and coffee... and we drank and drank and drank alcohol until it flowed from our bodie

In a drunken ramble, I must ask... has the whole world changed? Everyone has changed except us. Everyone is obsessed with babies and marriage and glamour. Please excuse me, I am so drunk that I am having to deliberate over these words for an eternity in order to type them... but it is a Sunday night and no one is around... everyone is busy scrubbing their floors... hanging the hooks in their fucking bathroom doors... the life we live is not conceivable to them... they cannot even imagine spending a Sunday alone, reading, listening to music, watching films... they would be fucked if they had to spend even one hour of a Sunday alone. They They They They They They They... everyone... the motherfuckers who are unaware that an iceberg has more than the tip that sticks out above the water. Beer, wine, tequila... that is the true Sunday church... that is the true worship. Celine, Bukowski, Jawbreaker, Bad Religion... what the fuck is everyone else doing? They are all out looking cool, showing

Atheists, artists, pimps, prostitutes, drug addicted alcoholics, hooligans and minority groups... the only people to whom I ever could relate. I can’t stand those striving to push forth and be at the top, above everyone else, looking down from their self-made pedestal of self-love. I am sickened by the squeaky clean conservatives who long only for house, marriage, children, dog, cat, fence, car, executive position and who have never tasted the currents of the underworld. Those who are completely oblivious to the fact that there is an alternative out there... that there is an alternative view... that people strive for different things. My neighbours are the archetype of conservative living. Having just emptied their station wagon of groceries and their baby, lady is now rocking the baby gently whilst man is drilling holes in the wall. It is 7pm on a Friday night and he is drilling holes in the fucking wall. I may feel lonely at times but at least I am not drilling holes in my wall on

I have, understandably, created a reputation for being unhappy... or, in truth, for bordering on the absolute miserable. This is not actually true. I’m not a bouncy and bubbly individual but this does not mean I am entirely morose. In a wide life/self sense I am very happy. Through art, literature and music I find tremendous joy and happiness. However, there is not one minute of any day that I am able to forget the terrible injustices of life such as the exploitation and abuse of people and animals along with all other forms of terrible suffering and sorrow for whatever reasons they may arise (starvation, neglect, etc). When I see people bouncing around in tremendous joy and excitement, they remind me even more of the suffering going on elsewhere. Apart from that, I am just breezy.