Friday, November 23, 2012

Art Intimidating Life - The Ruins of my Mental Empire: Part Eighty-Two



yeah - im an arsehole - doesn't really know anyone, no-one really knows me - lady-elle maybe - sam maybe - the laylaws perhaps - god and the trees and the wind and cool sunshine and waking up from sleep and that realisation that you are on the other side of the planet - something that was once something, but is now a right of passage - i have traveled across this vast and tiny little planet, but for my time being, for the while i was the past dying - i battle, dear fucking reader, i battle - how can such a silly little man with one thousand dollars find a way to travel this planet? - hence, yes, hence - i stand in the background and watch it pass - such a fucking weirdo, drinking alone, happy - yet somehow getting by, pushing through, seeing it on the other side

im not really sure what took me to running - some idiot would talk about my father running ten marathons - sure i ran as i littleton - as a youngling - i remember practicing ten kilometers from f/haven to olde eastern view and back, just to prove little s.laylaw could run the shit - and the little-one could - i remember thinking about daniel larusso and his "prep" for the all-valley championship - but the internet has taken all the glory away from that - anyway, it was fucking tough back then - damn, it was tough - i pushed through, never saying mercy to two older brothers and one awesome family dog

we wake up everyday, but every now and again we wake up married and loved in a daze and you look around yourself and think - im alive, right? - and why me? - how many people have died while ive spent my time drinking and talking shit about music or movies that are meant to mean something but always never get noticed ever at the right time - and therefore a little man like me, pretending he means something against the spewmantic writing of online-thoughts - of online thinking - where does that leave me? - listening to fucking cds blasted witha nasty neon screen that corrects my fast-s[elling before i even notice it - is this to impress me? - is this to make me a cheap-sell to some guy a couple of years below me in high-school who now wears a suit and buys cheap sushi-rolls and pretends we were friends twelve years ago?

i run like a mad-man - i think of manic-musicians, crazy-artists and super-cool movie stars everyone has forgotten - who will teach the children's children? - how do i get angry? - i can't really remember before i started running pathetic three kay-emm runs that i had top stop half-way through for - realising, hard, that man, maybe i aint so tough - but that's all it took readers and listeners - one realisation to change it all

i think about those northcote lonesome days - drinkin' and music - struggling with the writing, but pushing through it all - somehow - some fucking how

now - yeah, im alright - i run like a mad-man, but i run coool, smooth fast and fit - i see the sun shining when the boozer only sees it shining at his morning-wakeup-depression - some sort of lake that looks fucking amazing - i run around it a couple of times a week and i nod to the runners i pass by - damn they're doing better than me... at least i think so - maybe, maybe not - anyway, i nod to them all thanks to day-light-saving - the runners-nod - two men just pushing through and running for individual pain and pleasure, seeing one another and giving nothing but a nod as they pass a couple of seconds and share them together - soon to be forgotten

some guy - a fluro jacket - maybe he wore it because he rode a bike - maybe he wore it for work - maybe he wore it cos it was dark back then - anyway, i saw him sitting on that bench by the creek in blackburn often - quite often - just sitting there, taking a break from his ride home to smoke a cigarette or few by the trees - only to be bothered by the workers with the "proper gear" speeding by on their "hybrids" - or guys like me running or "power walking" -or guys like me, who take some fucking time to notice the same old man sittig there with his shit and smoking his smokes and sometimes smiling with his smoked-workingclass-honest-lonely-face

yeah, he's a lonely man - only sometimes he nodded back to my nods as i ran my ten-kay runs - id nod, and get nothing back - he'd nod, and id pretend to be too soaked up in my midnight-oil-stained-ipod running music

yeah, but i got back to almost my personal-best - some set backs for no good reason, but nothing stopped me - but now i see some guy riding his bike a couple of moves down from my running route - ringing bells! - sure, i'll wave - riinging bells again! - this time i'll pretend i dont notice - riiinging bells again! - thumbs up man, i hope you're well! - i run on - he rides on - two losers passing-by doing their best

lady-elle said "i thought you didn't like to get to know people" - or was it "i thought you weren't a people person" - i'm not - im nothing, and that makes me realise how i react to the nature of people, as opposed to their natural way of things...

my thoughts are not like yours - my life is hopefully not like yours either - you're only reading this fucking far because you've drunk enough, or smart enough, to realise weird isn't weird - quirky is fashionable and popular - eclectic is numb - communication is boring - cool is everything standing behind everything you think is cool - love is lost to the moviesoaked romantic, and struggling to life, questioned, to those alone on the beach thinking of their loved ones - music, love, life, truth is what you want it to be - not what some fucking tv show says it it, not what some fucking disposable movie says it is, not what your favourite character acts it out to be - and truth doesn't exist - nothing will last - trust everyone, and forgive them all at the same time




Thursday, November 15, 2012

Art Intimidating Life - The Ruins of my Mental Empire: Part Eighty-One



yeah, misery - he who knows how is lying - he who knows why is lying - he who when is lying - he who is miserable is battling the truth, and battling alone - saturday and the fucking sunshine - blue sky smiling through the holes of all those green and golden leaves that are nodding their mellows minds in the same way a stoner nods to the groove of a wooden shjps song - i wake up loud after another rager - gotta do something in a life that always throws something at you - but i meander soulessly - nothing inspires me - i don't want to write - i don't want to reply or respond to anything that appears before me - i scan my music, pleading the doctors to subscribe me something - nothing - and it's at this point, at 10.30am, i know im in for a big one - a perfect sunny weekend with nothing to do but anything i want to do, and im stuck in the endless cycle of a frustrated misery - nothing inspires me to do anything - i just want to kill time before time kills me - i walk the rooms, poke my head into each one hoping pathetically something had changed - i move down the hallway knowing all well im just going to lie down in bed and not be able to sleep - i open the curtains, thinking lying in bed looking out the window at the perfect sunny saturday morning weather will help fool myself that i'll leave the house at some point during the day - lady-elle eventually comes in and takes a nap like an artist - i lie awake next to her and my mind torments itself as i listen to her breathing a soft and small sleep on the pillow next to mine - eventually, as i watch the colour of the day fall into dusk, i become depressed and i tell lady-elle - she wants to help but my long series of "i dunno" and "whatever" answers prove that nothing can help me now - sure, i'm aware - sure, i've been here before and i believe it's just a natural flow and everyone's wave crashes and swells - but this was the second one in a month - were my post-trip blues really this severe? - am i really falling out of control? - have my years of tempting and taunting madness and insanity finally come back to infest my mind? - have i lost my strength to keep it at length?

it tagged along as i pushed on through some more days - i was standing on a train reading about yuri gagarin - i was surrounded by some people and i let them be - i thought of all their buzz words and latest trends that i choose to ignore, but they assume im too far out of it join in - i know - my eyes and ears and mind are open - i realise, and i realise the real world - i look at one girl and think "friends with benefits..." and then in my fuck-you-mind i say "all of my friend have benefits" - and that was all it took for me to regain myself - one girl on a train and one little cynical thought - later i thought "from now on I only eat meat that has been raised by same-sex parents" - and then i thought i'll make an appointment at a hairdresser and just before i hang up i’ll say “oh wait! one more thing… do you also cut hair?” - and then i asked someone if they were going home too and deliberately and inappropriately asked for a lift home, even though i knew they lived on the complete otherside of the city - all for my own amusement, but knowing all well they'd find it funny too - and i was back and out of it, waiting for another sunny weekend to fatefully fall upon us

now is a perfect time to have some haiku i wrote in bliss in a national park in eastern lithuania...

lithuanian pine trees
you keep secrets
of the men in black jackets

mystery man
what do you need
with three nights in this hotel?

clouds drift
much slower
in a cold dusk

so far from home
alone, crazy with thoughts
- how did i get here?

boozy lithuanian night
your thunder
sounds industrial

cold beer
a pen and paper
my cleansed soul, and open mind

and with nothing to do
i realise
there is no need to do anything

drifting clouds!
wait right there!
i want to come with you!

two fighting ducks
- are you high
on global warming?

here i am, alone
- noone will ever be here
with me right now

the lake looks so cold
from my hotel room
- my beer is warm

this dusk is almost
so beautiful
i contemplate putting off my nap

two young girls
watching a boy on a bike
love, lust and heartbreak

van gough print
on my hotel room wall
- amazing, i have seen the original

like drawn curtains
those polite clouds
part for the sunset

whats the point of talking
to anyone
who hasn't been to lithuania?!

when i die
i want to be cremated
with my head buried in a book

an autumn dusk
i look to the sunset and think
god must be wanking

god must be wanking
- the sun sets
over a cold pine forest

still silent lake,
don't let the rain drops
wake you up

sitting on a chair
looking out the window
- days change so subtly

willow tree
- are you really
as lazy as you look?

the whole afternoon
spent looking out the window
who is stranger? me or my  neighbour?

willow tree
when the wind blows
you deserve the nobel peace prize

home from dinner
a night out with you
my jacket smells like enchiladas 


Saturday, September 15, 2012

Art Intimidating Life - The Ruins of my Mental Empire: Part Eighty



sitting in a room with a cockroach on the wall
im listening to also sprach zarathustra
looking out the window
watching the trees
watching the leaves
watching the wind
thinking on it
i think about the cockroach
just sitting there
on the wall like that
clinging on, i guess
also sprach zarathustra
you know, the intro bit
it's amazing
the soundtrack for existance
i guess
i wonder if the cockroach can feel it
i wonder if the cockroach can hear it
is his tiny little mind blown
just as much as mine is?
that it, that's the ruins of my mental empire
my mind has been blown so many times
on a daily basis
all it takes is
a little attention
a little concentration
a little thought
and everything around you
is insanely beautiful
and insanely impossible
and insanely ridiculous
and insanely absurd
and im the insane one?
most people i know
think that i'm crazy
but they don't know
the half of it
they don't know the genius behind it
the level of truth behind it
am i crazy?
or just honest
open
i don't talk much
because every time i do
i feel like im joking myself
i feel like im not doing the truth justice
words cannot explain this
a night sitting at the bar
drinking
only comes close
but only just
sometimes i do it alone
sitting at a bar
drinking and thinking
and my mind lets loose
and i mean
it really fucking lets loose
im sitting at a bar
but in reality
im drifting in blankets
through an endless
and endlessly beautiful
existance
and somehow
i bore people with thoughts like this
how the fuck can thoughts like this be boring to anyone?
this isn't a theory
this isn't an idea
it's the truth
we're a product of nature
we're an insignificant dot
drifting aimlessly in the soul of infinity
we ignore the sun
we're bored of the moon
we abuse the planet Earth
but we're so happy with ourselves
the human race takes itself so fucking seriously
president of the united states of america?
fuck that
world leaders, religious figures, elvis presley?
the one and only god lies within the existance of existance
the only god we need to listen to
is that little voice that's trying to work it's way around your complex mind
that voice in your head is god
you realise that, don't you?
what's it's saying to you now?
did you have any control over what it was saying?
when i see people pointing fingers,
when i see people on television
i find it cute
look, they're trying to make a difference
look, they think this matters
look, they think it's important
why live in the world, when you can live in your head?
i had that hand written on my bag when i was at university
university - damn you
i had no idea how much it would affect me
potent seeds of psychedelic sarcasm
it's not pretty, and i should care
but im just a man
sitting in a room
with a cockroach
that's clinging to the wall
thinking to him/herself
what the fuck is this vast vertical
smooth surface?!
just as confused as i am
we're all in this together
however, only a select few of us
are in deep
real deep
and there is no escape
it's too late now
it's too late now
it's too late now
this life has nothing on me
my death is my god
my death is my god
my death is my god
my death is my god
my death is my god
my death is my god
my death is my god
my god

Saturday, September 1, 2012

Art Intimidating Life - The Ruins of my Mental Empire: Part Seventy-Nine



frantic moon dance
the children don't know
once the adults start drinking

star-lit return home
those damn dots
spoiling my dinner!

when the jelly mellows
there is a taste beyond
the fall of lemons

nasty little bugs
don't know they're
so nasty

golden trees
the weekend dusk
wake up for beer

a lonely sunny day
walking around
with nothing to do

the jazz man plays
along
with my sneeze

the steam in the bathroom
from someone elses shower
an intimate emptiness

a kiss on the cheek
stained with champagne
hello long walk home

the weak handshake
from my close friend
- take a beer for the walk home

wedding ring!
- the girl on the late night train
feels safe with me sitting next to her

as she sleeps
i open another beer
- what are her dreams?

the tail end of winter
blue green and gold
the dusk through my window

the business man in a suit
walks and talks -
saying nothing, going nowhere

listening to jazz
dusk like dew
im cold and high

four remote controls
can't even control
an afternoon drunk

they read their books
jazz albums plays -
an esky in the lounge room

helicopters -
the bird's
worst nightmare

drifting to mid-afternoon sleep
on the couch -
...am i really insane?

drunk at dusk
im sorry -
a mellow man has to live his life

if god exists
he must have seen this
- mellow drunk at dusk


Friday, August 24, 2012

Art Intimidating Life - The Ruins of my Mental Empire: Part Seventy-Eight



i had listened to a slowdive album
their first album
in bed in the morning
half awake, half asleep
warm and happy
a good night's sleep
a good night out
at the bar with sam
we know how to do it
i got up out of bed and put on
edward sharpe and the magnetic zeroes
they had two albums
and i played them both
i got out some ingredients
eggs
capsican
"peppers" if you watch the sorpranos
mushies
a bit of bacon
pepper and chilli
and make some cool little omlettes
lady-elle came home from the gym
she seemed pretty cool
she helped me with the omlettes
they can get out of control pretty easily
we sat down and ate them
as the second edward sharpe and the magnetic zeroes album
came to an end
we teased each other, and gave each other shit
and laughed about it
we're both pretty good at it too
we hung out
i walked down to dixons
quietly chuffed that i live within walking distance
to melbourne's biggest colllection of second-hand music
i sold some stuff i didn't need anymore
the guy
doug
a blackburn / melbourne legend
gave me a good price
he only took half of the stuff
but i expected that
later i jumped on my bike
i cruised slow
nice and slow
around the lake
i hit the shops and pushed through the food court
so many people buying food
i walked to the cd shop
and scanned around
tim rogers had released a new album
and i wanted to buy it
i love tim rogers
funny, intelligent, and a waster
i could only wish if i didn't try so hard
i paid for it at the counter
and the guy at the counter was a little too friendly
i rode my bike home
i rode my bike passed my friends empty parked car
don't see him much these days
but i'll see him around
i stopped off at the bottle shop
and picked up a six-pack of beer
and paid for it
again, the girl behind the counter was probably a little too nice
i hope she enjoys her weekend though
i carried the beer home on my bike
got a few looks
from the middle-class in the cafes i cruised passed
good on 'em
when i got home
lady-elle was taking a nap
she looked pretty funny
i got some lunch ready
a light lunch
since breakfast was so nice
and really, not that long ago
i sat down and listened to some music
i thought about the most psychedelic things i could think of
and thought about how i could make a cool psychedelic video
for one of rick bain and the genius position's songs
black apple orchard - i reckon
im going to a wedding this afternoon
im drinking one of the beers now
i actually had two weddings today
i sent ian my best wishes
he understood that i couldn't make it to his wedding
i sent him a text
and he would have approved me buying the new tim rogers album on his wedding day
and also selling some stuff to doug at dixons
ian's a cool guy
i probably see him once a year
if that
i've probably only seen him 5 or 6 times in my life to be honest
we met at a robyn hitchcock gig in richmond
and kept in touch since then
sending messages to each other
mostly consisting of our love for whatever music we're digging at the moment
he got me into the soft boys
i was all into hitchcock's solo stuff
but anyway
im going to sink a couple more beers
brush my hair and put on a suit
the wedding should be fun
they always are
they're a trip
after that i got no real plans
i'll just lounge around tomorrow
sip on some beers
listen to the new time rogers album
fall asleep here and there
maybe make a video if i can think of something cool
take care
i hope you're well
i hope you're happy
i hope you're doing whatever you want to do
i hope you've found a way to get through
whatever works
that's my new mantra
whatever works
and push on


Wednesday, August 22, 2012

Art Intimidating Life - The Ruins of my Mental Empire: Part Seventy-Seven




the summer of love ended in a heated argument that grew fast from some whispered words in the next room - the winter of hate lasted for three an a half years - long enough to find yourself - long enough to discover yourself - long enough to forget yourself - i kept a photo of the apollo eleven lunar modual in my pocket - she wrote her details on the back of it and said - i'll see you on the moon someday - i smiled, and replied- why stop there? - she was the only person i could go to an art-gallery with - she was quiet and rarely spoke whenever in the presence of art, music, poetry, words - this was almost bad enough - in the presence of artists, she distracted me - i put on my head-phones and listened to some music - we met in the city square and walked around, oblivious to the hundreds of years of history we were walking through - though in three and a half years, we would've made our own history - three of us would be dead, and the rest of us wished we were

he was the type of guy to wear a knife and tell you about it - i poured him a drink, looking his wife in the eyes, trying to gauge his intentions through her honest soul - i couldn't be certain - the waves crashed outside the stain-glassed windows, somehow fueled by the relentless grey winter rain - you shouldn't be driving in this weather, he mumbled as he stroked his moustache - i shouldn't be driving at all, i replied - i took a swig straight from the bottle - a not so subtle fuckyou to tell him to go fuck himself - he laughed with his accent - you know, you cannot intimidate me - he was right - he's fucking goddamn house intimidated me enough, and there was nothing i could do to save myself - there was no way i could get into his head - i took another swig from the bottle - deep and hard - long and smooth - it couldn't hurt - as i was give in, as i was about to confess, she leaned over slow and low and took hold of the bottle that sat next to me on the couch - looking me straight in the eye, she begun twisting the cap off the bottle with her toungue - lizardlike precision and an evil snake like sexuality

people - fucking people - jesus fucking christ - i was drunk in a field, screaming to the sky - my hair in strains from the poetry and sweat, and it started to rain - the grass was waist high and thrashed violently in the wind - i had reached the end - my throat hurt - my arms waved and cut through the wind like blind knives, tearing apart the world around me - my shirt was long gone, so were my family and friends - jesus fucking christ, so was everyone - i was bleeding from the chest, but had no recollection of how that happened - i took deep dark evil swigs from the bottle - i allowed myself that luxury - i allowed myself to succumb to the self-torturing i'd spent a lifetime trying to avoid - my words and poetry continued to be screamed to the sky, but they were making less and less sense - becoming more absurd, more bizarre - they were becoming unsound - i tasted the rain as it begun to fall through my hair and onto my face - i tasted a strangely comforting mixture of sweat and liquor - the comfort caught me off guard, and i lost my feet and fell onto my back - laughing like the doomsman - above me the sky moved in slow motion - i could only just see it through the thrashing grass that now begun to whip me like wet leather - and just before i drifted off, and allowed the gods and demons of my life to take me away forever, i saw the existence of being fold into and onto itself, obliterating any proof that there was any existence at all in the first place


Art Intimidating Life - The Ruins of my Mental Empire: Part Seventy-Six

smiling in the rain
won't stop it raining,
but it won't stop you smiling

walking home from work
a certain smile
that's been hidden all day

young woman on park bench
as a sad sun sets,
i hope you're okay

the city takes
all the fun
out of riding a bike

little stone
- are you the last
untouched object?

saying goodbye,
hoping it won't be the last time
- but knowing it may be

storm clouds
your threat of rain
doesn't scare me

evolution!
look at
what you've done!

evolution!
thank you!
but you took your time!

home is just
a little place
you've become familiar with

a day spent without eye-contact
is a day
best spent alone

a day without eye-contact
is a day
spent in the eyes of god

thirty years of life -
look at what you've done to me!
smiling to myself in the alley-ways

thirty years of life
thirty years of realising
the cheerful sadness

thirty years of life
on this evil, cruel world
- i love my life

thirty years of life
thirty years of guilt
thirty years of luck

thirty years of life
- now what?

b-grade celebrity
you look so happy playing pool
in this shitty, little bar

drinking at the bar
an hour late for a cello recital
- i'm at peace

poetry -
stolen by wankers,
found by wankers

no smile
simply says
i'm happy

thirty years old
where am i?
how did i get here?

to realise the real world
alone, thirsty and tired
- coming down

at the bar alone
- equipped with three songs
lined up on the jukebox

after-dark train
fluorescent lights
and dark stockings

my life
questioned by many
answered by none

life is beautiful
- one day
you'll see

at the threshold
the lonely man
looks to the sky

i play god
- i never take
my own advice

i put the glass down
- and take a deep breath
friday night

is this confusion?
it's hard to tell
the difference these days

the poet never carries
an umbrella -
the poet enjoys the rain

drunken poet
drinking and writing
- your hands are full

2pm, sunday
the perfect time
for a nap

clouds drifting slowly
circling the earth
as dreamlike peacekeepers