"....the common feline, also sometimes referred to in the vernacular as an "alley" cat, is known to be more lively and active than its purebred or pedigree relatives. It displays more energetic intelligence, inquisitiveness, and territorial assertiveness, often bordering on the aggressive...."

sleeping the day away. this is his usual state.

the end of days

in the hazy light of a ten o clock window i talked and spoke, but no words came. No words could say what i wished, no sentences could hold the meaning of what i mean and what i feel.

in a room with many doors i find myself wondering at the wisdom of the life i lead. You asked me what i want. I ask myself that often too.

i want to hear a meow and know that it is meant for me (i know you are there, you say it all the time, but never to me).

I wandered out into an afternoon of cane sugar and phone calls, listening to ring tones and sad overtones. I think of time, slipping by, slipping away.

You are beautiful who ask me what i am and what i want, splendid skaters on a lake of glassy ice. 'We are virtual,' i thought i heard you say, and didn't get the chance to find out what that meant. You are virtual and real, you are promise and energy; it dances even when you are still.

I listen to the music the Camels make, I listen to the dreamy sounds from the cutting edge of the spectrum. I wonder when we will move people the way music is supposed to. Weeks ago I watched a band named Shelf, and they were better than any college band which that college has ever produced, better in their first performance than my own band was in its first. it never won the rather ridiculous competition it was entered in, even though it should have. But it reminds me that competition means nothing, that one result means nothing. We are disheartened by results, by losing, when actually it means absolutely fuck all. They were the best no matter what result occurred and that is plain to me. Yet if i can say that about them, and if i can say that to you the sparkle skaters on the glassy lake, then why can't i say that to myself?

yesterday evening as the sun hung low and flat in the sky and the air was insipid, i watched a puddle of water film over with a greasy rainbow of oil from an engine. the rainbow was beautiful heaviness, and it spread and choked the light and clarity out of the little road puddle. i felt it on my skin.

I want to be- I want to see- I want to feel- Pure.

my apologies to amanda keeys

And afterwards, my hands still warm and slick with your blood, i smiled, and whispered "I love you."

tomorrow yesterday

tomorrow is yesterday.

a power greater than the pain.

you destroyed me - thank you.

safe from harm and safe from greed, a little protection is all we need.

butterflies have to fly.

today will be tomorrow.

Who punctured my tires!!!!! who!!!

RRRrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr.

in this desert you are king Pt III

and i am the siege outside the city walls. I hurl rocks and throw burning embers, and the guardians respond with arrows and scalding water. we camped for fourteen days before we began the siege proper, starving the city out, but supplies are rich in this citadel, and we in fact have begun to wear the countryside thin.

The city has held for forty days, and i know it can hold for eighty more. when i break its gates down there will be no mercy, and i will burn every holy thing in it to the ground, and i will stay no hand of any man slaughtering any inhabitant. i will do that because i know you are not there, you are not here, you are not anywhere. when i walk through the ravaged streets they will be full of bodies and empty of you, but with your hints inside every door and behind every corner, the smell of your incense and the tinkle of the bells of the dancers, the swish of rich cloth on rich cloth, the taste of thick fruit soaked in heavy sugar syrup. these will haunt me in the fallen city where you have long left and where the remnants of my forces run mad.

and though i know you are not in there i blast away at it still. pride or bitterness should drive me in this endeavour; the man on one side of me tells me i should own it and be its king: the one on the other tells me to raze it to the ground in spite. burn it, or own it. but i suspect i want neither.

i know though they do not that you have long gone (do i? no, but i can feel it). i can see you and your delicious entourage, with music and cushions and minted tea at the ready, ambling across the sand to one of the havens you have always kept ready for my arrival. i can see you reclined under the light blue canopy as the camels and horses walk onward, minstrels and entertainers never stopping their array of novelties for you, the whole courtly caravan flanked by your army of personal cavalry, while you write and receive letters and decrees just as if you were in your study which i now pound with rocks.

i know you are not in there, and i pound it still. i want to break down those walls and tear into those streets though you are not there to see me do it and hear the cries of anguish, because when i am done and depleted, standing there amongst the ruins, imagining myself ruler over a rubble of stones, i will hear the music of your court songstrel and the clink of your signet ring on your chalice as you pick it up, and your army will rise like a sandstorm from their waiting place two hills away to enter the city and scatter my forces. you will return like the king you are, and my expended band of rebels will fall and split before you as the bunches of scented dried reeds i found in your empty bedchamber did under my hand.

i will pound this city into submission, and having destroyed it and myself, i will look over and see you come to take it back effortlessly. and yet i will do it, because it is the only way i will ever stand before you again. you will come to me, on the steps in front of the holy place, there will be arrows in crossbows pointed at my neck, and a full guard behind you, and you will remove your glove, raise my chin to look into your sundrenched eyes and say, "my dear daughter, why do you this?" i will not answer, only show you my bloody hands caked with dirt. the tattoo on my wrists says destroy us all, but we have returned for our destiny.

all i wanted was everything

a lot of people have asked me what i want. out of life, or in life, i assume. (both of which are the same thing i believe).

i always say i don't know. butmaybe,
i want that sunday morning lying-in-bed-while-the-sunlight-pours-in-on-my-face feeling.
i want to bury my face in a pillow and be able to smell the sunshine on it.
i want to be tangled up in white sheets and surprised that i can't get up.
i want to bite into a juicy piece of fruit at breakfast and taste the entire journey that brought it to my door.
i want to dip my hand in a cold clear stream and not fear sinking the rest of myself into its icy body.
i want to open my eyes underwater and see the white roll of a wave pass above me.
i want to sweat in the scorching afternoon sat on the grass staring at other people.
i want to wake up and reach over in the lazy morning and have a cigarette to feel human.
i want to drive a very precious car off a cliff.
i want to last all night and be groggy all morning.
i want to choke the life out of something beautiful.
i want to make people cry.

on sunday night monday morning

i had a dream. i was leading a squad of soldiers into a sunny battle zone, an urban area. we went into an abandoned building with beige walls, HDB coloured, bombed out and ruined. (why the hell was i the leader anyway? i'm never a commander). we were walking along a corridor that intersected another corridor in a T junction. we must have been pretty green. when the point man crossed the corner into the next corridor he was cut down by a burst of bullets. he took a hit to the head first then several into his body. his body armour didn't stop anything. we must have been green, because everyone freaked out. the second point man was shooting wildly without leaning out of the corner, whoever it was on the other side was shooting back i could see the bullets dusting up the walls and floor of the corridor the rest of the squad was screaming holy jesus right through the body armour i pulled the second point man away from the corner and yelled at everyone to get ready we were going to rush the corridor. it was an semi-automatic shotgun i carried, like a benelli, and i stuck it into the corridor and blasted away. i emptied all the rounds all sprayshot all over the corridor hoping for the best and immediately yelled for the squad to rush in firing. they went, while i reloaded, and the clarity of the dream dissipates.


i know the first of them must have died. i know they were walking into a bad setup because i didn't have a look at what was around the corner. i didn't want them to freak out any more and chicken out and so i made a show of clearing the path and sent them in to die. even if we eventually took the corridor and the building it would have been at the expense of so many lives.


when clarity returns in the dream i am standing next to a soldier, he could be one of the squad but he is older than me, he is sitting down on a chunk of concrete in a sandy patch near some trees, he is very sad. he has taken off his helmet and is holding his water bottle, his rifle is lying to one side his webbing is loosened and he is very engrossed in his sadness, almost to the point of crying. i am sad too, but i think i am sad because i see him, not because of the same reason he is sad. i do not know why he is sad, only that he is sad.


i must be cruel or heartless then.


later on i am riding my bike alongside a good friend whom i am sure i do not have in real life. he is riding a black bike, he wears no helmet, we are being funny on the road, very dangerous. he reaches over to my clutch while we ride on the expressway, and pulls it in so that i lose power. we push each other's handlebars, at one point i try to kick him away. we are fooling around with no regard for safety or life, trying to switch off ignition and force gear changes on the move. finally he fools around too much, speeding ahead and then coming back against traffic head on to play chicken with me. i dodge, he wins, there is a crash behind me. in the mirror i see a car and a traffic cop's bike crash. i don't stop. i don't turn back. i keep going, then turn off into a park. i'm off the road onto the grass. i ride past some picknickers, then cross a narrow wooden bridge. i have to cross a stream. i get stuck. the bike doesn't fall over but i am stuck poised on one wheel trying to get out, frozen. no amount of revving can make the bike move.


what does it mean. who am i. why do i feel so impure.

in this desert you are king

and my interest is only in your desire for conquest. In your high walled palace you bathe in milk and dress in silk, and i am well-acquianted with the stone that forms its shell. For my solace i dream of your brazen dances and exquisite romances and the blood that lines the floors and corridors. We are connected by a line you do not know, a life you do not imagine you carry in tow. I have skulked in those airy balconies and wide cloisters, espied you at your work and play. I am neither envious nor hateful but will see you every time i close my eyes anyway.

in this desert you are king but they say the dunes belong to no-one. The stacks of swords wait at the port but in the meantime i beheaded two spies. We light a galaxy of fires in the evening, stream a trail of footprints in the morning, yet you haven't sent anyone to meet me in months. We are approaching the city soon.