Cut up or shut up #4: Infighting Revolutionaries

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I down of desire models

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Yea society

if peddled rights

to hegemon class

of modes exactly more core

Phone

I have been writing poetry
on my phone for so long
that all my poems are starting to look the same.
Like a tapeworm
snaking it’s slithery
way down the page.
Like a Scots dialect character
abusing his position
to navigate his way
through a seedy, criminal underworld
of a city
north of the border.
I write this,
in response,
as a piece of prose
I intend to edit
into poetic lines and verses
at a later date.
Or hour.
How did I do?
I guess this is about self doubt
as much as anything else.
Or a need for validation
from anywhere I can find it.
I guess I shouldn’t absorb
so much livewire
nervous energy
from the tankies
whose memes I like
react regularly
on Facebook.

Unlockable

I’ve just unlocked a memory
like in a video game.
We’re in your kitchen,
friend I no longer know,
with your mum.
We’re probably about
8 years old.
You’re eating tomato soup
with bread
which is buttered,
which I’ve never had before.
My mum doesn’t butter the bread
when I have tomato soup.
I’m transfixed
by the little white blobs
of butter
floating on the crimson surface
of your soup,
like swan boats
on a boating lake for tourists.
From that day forward
I’ve always had
buttered bread
with my soup.

Unexploded Verse

I found this UXB
in a dusty & yellowed
old notebook
at the bottom of a drawer
in a bureau
fly tipped
at the side of a dual carriageway
on the outskirts of a new town
built in the 1950’s.

I called in the local EOD
to spellcheck and proofread
the appropriated ink.
I could see the cold fingerprints
of the telex machine
in a drop of dried brown blood
the colour of allotment soil
where the fanzine creator
accidentally put
a staple through their finger.

God

God I don’t believe
In you, you old fraud,
But God I’m sad.
God I’m anxious and
I’m staring at screens
For 8 hours each day,
And I’m seeing sunshine
For a few minutes each day,
And I’m laying here drowning
In my own misery
While thousands of my
Fellow human beings
Slip out of this world
And into the abyss
While rich, white, fat
Etonians ignore their own
Advice but, don’t worry
it’s okay!
The Etonians are
On the mend.
Sorry Mrs. Robson
From number 22, I don’t
Have time to grieve for
You. I’ve got to go outside
And clap for Boris Johnson.

Nutrients

I absorb the nutrients
Inherent
In asbestos,
Feel the particulate
Matter
And the presence of
Grief
Arising like heat
Distortion
From a desert road.

I transcribed conversations
Between autocrats
On Skype.

Instead of sweat
Their
Pores produce peroxide.

We swam out from
The shore
In the decomposing light.

The decades decayed
The civilisation we
Called home.

Catastrophic events
Ravaged the social
Contract
Between citizen
And state.

Crows peck at roadkill
Beside potholes
In the poorly
Maintained roads.

Highways agency vans
Park
In supermarket carparks,
Surveying the camber
Of the exit road.

They sent a man in a stovepipe
Hat from the council
To ask if we’d paid into
The maintenance fund
This month.

I laughed in his face and closed the door.

They wrote to us
In hiding
At an undisclosed location
At one of the poles,
I’m not saying which.

They sent bailiffs
Riding carrier pigeons
Through balmy June skies.

We scattered ashes
Of beloved
Pieces of furniture
From low flying planes
Over the Galapagos.

In wardrobes and lofts
The council searched for us,
We sat on sofas in
Plain sight
And offered them tea.

They accepted the tea
But then instantly
Forgot
We were there.

I sip coffee
In the departures lounge
Of the space elevator
To Tranquillitatis basin.

The journalists
Sip bourbon
With ice and grapefruit.

The nutrients
I absorbed from
The asbestos
Are now dramatically
Depleted.

I hailed a Taxi but it
Wouldn’t stop,
I had to abandon all
Hope.
An important concept,
Which deserves
Top billing;
Hope;

The government winks
Coyly at other
Governments;

The abandoned air
Raid shelter bustles
With activity,
Rats and housespiders
Jostling for position;

Hard shelled
Sociopaths
With eyes of flame
Stand between us
And
Utopia.

They claim to be thick skinned.
They’re not.

They claim as much as they
Possibly can,
We oblige in taxation.

We humbly request
An end
To this culture
Of appropriation
Which leads
Inevitably
To systematically
Enforced
Alienation.