eat, sleep, write, repeat.

The Fly On The Windowsill

Fri, 15 Apr 2011 11:09:00 -0400

Eyes wide, she gazes in horror at her reflection in the cold, hard glass: blazing red cheeks, a purple bruise burying her bloodshot left eye, a faint white imprint of his hand across her face, like a permanent stain, a scar. The pain is so strong she is numb, the repetitive slaps and punches a routine.

She reaches for a ball of soft cotton wool, pure, white and clean. She dabs at her sore skin and the crusty dried blood on her top lip. She glances at the cotton ball, stained and brown, dirty with blood he forced her to spill. Funny, she thinks, how everything is tainted by him.

A slam of a door echoes through the house. Her body immediately tenses up, then relaxes as she notices the clock. Half past six in the evening. He’s gone to the pub, gone to his fat, ugly friends, gone back to his best friend of all: alcohol. These are the two hours every evening where she can lose herself in a book, a film, a dream. But then reality always returns in the form of her drunken husband and his abusive kicks and slaps.

The peaceful silence of the room is broken by the faint buzzing of a fly on the windowsill, desperate to escape, trapped by the thick glass of the window. Yet, still it can see how it’s life should be: thick green grass, endless sky, air to breathe. But it is trapped with no way out.

She has no escape from the man who once said he loved her, who whispered her name, kissed her, and made her fall in love like a fool. Everyone said he was trouble: her friends, family, colleagues. But those two words: “I do.” So small, but so powerful, they sealed her fate, estranged her from those who truly loved her. But what did she care? She thought all she needed in the world was him.

But she’d never forget the night when he’d returned home, drunk and stumbling around, and his hand became aquainted her cheek for the very first time.

Wiping the tears from her eyes, she inhales deeply and grasps the handle of her bag, her knuckles white. She slowly opens the window, and lets the fly free. It flies out, wings spread wide, dancing in the air and it embraces freedom. And a moment later, she opens the front door and steps out. Free.

Note: I love finding old pieces of writing. I wrote this two years ago for school and my English teacher slated it. Sometimes you have to trust yourself with these things, and to this day I pay no attention to the woman in glasses making me conform.

Domesday

Fri, 15 Apr 2011 10:56:55 -0400

Foolish faces in the street are not enough

She misses you and I think you know it.

There’s so many people under this flickering artificial light

And I’m laughing into my beer

Which, for the record, tastes bitter.

I kid myself that she is to blame

But you’re winning the contest in being careless.

"Muzack"

Fri, 15 Apr 2011 10:51:58 -0400

My skin will flare up and by the end I will resemble a blanched, searing tomato. I won’t lose my voice but I will try. I will imagine you can hear mine above all the other voices screaming lyrics they don’t understand. But you sing my life. And you make me weep with happiness and instill in me a frightening new passion I never knew existed. My friends will run away complaining of the sweat and the beat that makes my skin tingle and I feel like I could burst and blinding light could stream out of my stomach. From bedroom to muddy field, thank you.

A Beautiful Friend

Fri, 15 Apr 2011 09:57:53 -0400

One, two, three. Skeletal hands against rough carpet. Alabaster arms shot with purple veins heave as she forces her body up and down, up and down. Abruptly, her hands slip and she collapses onto the floor, her breath rapid and shallow. Even after the rigorous exercise all colour is stolen from her gaunt face.

‘Get up.’ A voice echoes through her mind, the same torturous voice that haunts her in the few hours’ sleep she can get. ‘No, Ana. Please.’ Pleading words escape her thin lips. ‘Get up. Now.’ The commander-in-chief of her mind, she must obey. ‘Please, let me rest.’ Her emaciated body trembles as tears spill from her grey eyes, shot with red lightning bolts, onto her face. ‘Get up. Now. Do as I say.’

But somewhere, deep inside her brain, a stranger’s voice mumurs ‘No.’ A shadow of hope amongst her curdled, corrupted thoughts of anorexia. But this voice never lasts long. ‘Get up. Now. Do as I say. Listen to no one but me.’ And she is forced down, once again. ‘I thought you were my friend. I trusted you, Ana.’ Her heart thuds in her chest, strained by the weight of the world, but as constant as the routine of her life. ‘You are no “friend” of mine. Get up.’ Skeletal hands against rough carpet. One, two, three.

Thank God

Fri, 15 Apr 2011 09:47:30 -0400

I’m one of those people who will say FUCK YOU and write a poem about whatever stupid little teenage thing happened. And I’ll skype my friend about it and not cry because it hurts too much. And I’ll listen to a song to make me feel better but 3 weeks later it will come on shuffle and make me feel worse. And I’ll tell my sister about it and she won’t care but tell me to stop being a baby and move on. And I’ll know this is right but I can’t because I have nothing else to distract me and THIS NEVER HAPPENS TO ME. You can be my emotional outlet, so thank you for that at least.

You have a really, really nice face.

Fri, 15 Apr 2011 09:43:05 -0400

Flattered to the grass with your sparkling eyes

You’re blonde too.

Cool.

Guess the significant lack of clothing paid off.

I told you because you’re my friend and you deserve to know these things

And it was by text so awkwardness could be avoided.

You ignored it.

Cool.

Respond

Fri, 15 Apr 2011 09:19:46 -0400

I went to all the effort of:

Thinking of a disgustingly witty comment that should knock you off your high horse laughing
Tapping it onto a well-used keypad with painfully practised thumbs
Slapping ‘send’ and spending a couple of hard-earned pence for your benefit.

It’s been fifteen long minutes and my battery is dying.

The fat shit on the bus opposite me is laughing at my teenage distress.

RSVP ASAP

Crocodile

Fri, 15 Apr 2011 09:07:56 -0400

How doth the little crocodile improve her

Shining tale?

When so perfect how can she be improved?

She makes Michelangelo weep with

Opalescent skin, untrodden snow,

Untampered.

Unblemised, spotless reputation she has nertured,

The kernel to a shallow soul.

Never have I met one more bipolar

Firing sunny smile, universe to orbit around her.

But at the moment of eclipse

The blissful harmony of truth.

Those eyes, hazelnut pools

Personal forbidden fruit,

The secret to your athlete’s stride?

Perfectly sculpted bones.

Be it punishment for failure?

Storm clouds may

Drown your pool.

A tick tocking in her stomach

Equals doom.

The Journey

Fri, 15 Apr 2011 09:02:20 -0400

A thrilling chase on a warm breeze

Twist and turn,

A rollercoaster of summer.

Dance amongst the remnants of nature glowing

Particles of dust,

Companions of travel.

Flutter in this wind, dear one and forever

Evade the fear of tomorrow.

RIP

Fri, 15 Apr 2011 07:44:00 -0400

She always did have such beautiful hair. Like melting chocolate, Jack said. She would swing it across her face, drawing a brunette curtain to hide her embarrassment, making him laugh, extend his unfairly affectionate fingers and softly tuck the umber curls back behind her left ear. Even as a baby she would scurry up to me, miniature feet clumsily tripping, dragging the boar-bristle brush along the carpet to plop at my feet expectantly. My mother would scold my protest at letting her indulge in such a ridiculous routine. Yet here I am, years later, still slaving away over her precious mane.

She sits below me, perched eagerly on the wicker chair, hands fumbling with shiny silver hairpins. Conversation is sparse, she asked once if Jack’d been over recently, I lied and said I saw him yesterday. She laughed nervously and continued twiddling the pins, stabbing them through one another, creating a linking chain of polished metal. I begin to tackle her curls, plunging the familiar brush into the raven mass. Jack loved to run his fingers through it, fascinated by the game of tugging apart brunette spirals. Her hair was his guilty pleasure - a distraction for him to fiddle and tamper with, constantly curling a chestnut lock around his fingers, his favourite game.

I will forever regret my initial ignorance. Our relationship seemed to be growing healthily, all gentle kisses and champagne. Then I saw them, sitting on the bed, Jack brushing her hair. The image of her elated, acne-sprinkled face is imprinted on my mind’s eye like a stubborn tattoo. The defining moment, yet here I am, still waiting on my little sister.

I jerk a curl awkwardly towards me, a knot invading a seemingly smooth head of hair. She opens her mouth to protest but does not deliver and I am greeted with nothing but a bitter intake of breath. So I continue, anticipating the moment when a fat, rogue tear will spill onto a flushed cheek. It does not come. Her knuckles are alabaster in her cramped grip, the single telltale sign of the pain I am providing. The unfamiliar feeling of success floods through me: finally, I am the inflictor, and she’s the one feeling broken, trapped, wounded.

I release the torrid anger scorching inside me in a frenzied spree of combing, feeling the fury and disbelief pulsing through my hand gripping the brush. I look down to my left and, to my surprise, see myself gripping her curls, almost awaiting my brain’s command to pull, to rip and shred them from her head and leave her bare, powerless. But my trembling hands abandon her and I back away. The radiant light of the sun outside reflects on her gleaming locks. She always did have such beautiful hair.

Pink Bicycle

Fri, 15 Apr 2011 07:42:00 -0400

Cycling down our narrow driveway, I pass the pine trees. I can feel the crunch of the needles sticking beneath half-punctured tyres, the creak of corroding metal. I haven’t ridden this bike in years. God, what an idiot I must look, all because my mother refused to wait for Jimmy to fix the car, drive into town and save me looking like a fool. A grown man on a pink bicycle? All for her precious PG Tips and milk. I haven’t drunk tea in years, can’t even remember the taste of it. The familiar landmark of the trees floods my mind with memories I thought were buried under years of mortgages and marital counsellors.

The pine needles are all over the place, like pestilential, tacky parasites sticking to your hair, your clothes, everywhere. Relentless. I remember my first encounter with them. Sunday morning and Jimmy hit the cricket ball into the bushes that grow untamed by frustrated gardeners, under the trees. Of course I was sent to get it and came out with scratches all over my skinny legs, no ball in hand. My mother denied me leftover Christmas cake at dinnertime. I remember stumbling back, sixteen, half drunk on her favourite Bordeaux. I was yelled at for the trail of needles I left up the stairs, owing to the fact that I was too damn drunk to dodge the patch where the trees shed the most. I remember the day I packed my things for New York. She threw the shreds of my Oxford prospectus into the undergrowth to join the cricket ball and my “Failed Hopes”. Even when I arrived to hunt down my own ambitions, the needles were still there, clinging to my shirts, my tie, my fake ‘leather’ black brogues. Relentless.

Jimmy used to climb up my back, onto my shoulders and hold on tight to my ears with his fat little fingers so he could catch a glimpse of the city through the pine trees. I never had a chance to appreciate fully that precious sight until now. I can see the metallic glint of the horizon, the smoke billowing, almost hear the hum of fabricated wealth. Mother calls it ‘A Concrete Jungle Of Artificial Nonsense.’ She’s so damn stuck in her ways of cassette tapes and hand-knitted gardening gloves. I stop and stare for a while, finally tall enough to admire the city without the obstruction of the pine trees in my view.

I cycle on, past the pines, onwards to the local in the distance. One last childlike outburst on the pedals, faster and faster as I speed towards the flickering neon sign boasting 12pm closure. I pull up. Gravel stumbles across the path. I padlock, although there’s no point. Maybe I even wish someone would steal the damn thing. I go inside, fumble for the milk carton, scan the shelves for PG Tips. There are none, so I grab a box that look like teabags, although the Arabic letters across the box smear into a mass of patterns, incomprehensible. The girl at the till looks too young to have a job. I smile politely and walk away. The wood of the doorframe crumbles chalky paint onto my shoe as I push the door, the remnants of ruins from last week’s thunderstorm.

My mother had called me when it started to rain. ‘Come and see me soon, won’t you? Jimmy’s coming next week, get the train with him.’ The line was crackling and told her to get off the phone and unplug the electricity lines before the lightning hit the house. ‘But dear you know your father used to do that. I don’t know where the sockets are.’ A week later and there’s no telephone connection. So bloody typical, she never listens to me.

I cycle back, past the river and the bushes and those pine trees. As I slow to take one last gaze at the view beyond, a car’s abrasive beeping horn interrupts the creepy rustle of leaves in the wind. Jimmy gets out, calls me an idiot for riding a pink bike, hauls it onto his shoulder and prepares to squeeze it into the car’s boot. I stop him. Images of my mother, her whining voice and despairing accusations, flicker across my mind. I am haunted by this place, this life, this failure and I have had enough. I wheel the bike to the ominous brink of the bushes and let go. It drunkenly teeters on spindly wheels for a second, then hurtles into the undergrowth, crushing down into a mass of green foliage. A shower of pine needles falls onto my head as I nudge the bike further into the vegetation with my shoe until it can no longer be seen.

Queue

Fri, 15 Apr 2011 07:30:33 -0400

We are snails.

Shuffling, shoving, squelching, squealing over

One another.

We had some time to share, maybe

But silence deafens and stifles me so

I listen to The Killers on repeat.

Hello

Fri, 15 Apr 2011 07:27:00 -0400

A feigned smile

Fools you in your ignorance,

Reassurance in that glimpse of a moment

Where morality stumbled into your heart.

The mutter of feeble words is comfort to your ears,

Enough to extinguish the guttering flame inside

That burns with virtue.

Your self-obsession forces you to be oblivious to my affliction,

Rids you of your affection.

But I am no better.

Surely it is my narcissism that craves your attention?

Joker In The Pack

Fri, 15 Apr 2011 07:26:00 -0400

Sure, I’ll be your trampoline

Yours, ignorance.

We joked that you were my stallion,

And I the skinny princess with matted hair

Hauling a canvas bag of vodka

Down

Dumb

Founded

Monotonous homes

Brimming with microwaved meals and Sky plus

Blinkered misplacement on the roofs screaming

MAY YOU HAVE IT ALL, DARLING

In an inappropriately inspired hat

Drug mule, soprano guitar chords

I thought you better than that.

Still, I pondered you, until…

Is this what Larking about has brought me?

Honeyed hope sucked away

An empty shell am I.

Woe became your reflection in the sludge

I didn’t cry until you’d drummed it into a cyber confessional

Beer and negligence in your wake but

I DON’T BELIEVE YOU

And I’m sure she fucked like a dream.

Please stop permeating my nightmares.

I don’t wear that dress anymore.

Reading

Fri, 15 Apr 2011 07:24:00 -0400

My wellies are dejected like feeble dead fish outside your tent.

I want to know what it is that makes you tick

So you tell me without words.

One thing: slobbery discontent.