Void Voices

James Knight
 First published in 2019
Imprint: Prote(s)xt

P-007

Prote(s)xt is an imprint of Hesterglock Press

The Blue Room

25 Wathen Road,
Bristol
BS6 5BY
UK

www.hesterglock.net

All rights reserved

All contents copyright © 2019 James Knight

Cover Design: Bob Modem

ISBN-13:
ISBN-10:

No parts of this book may be reproduced in any form, stored in

any retrieval system, or transmitted in any form by any means—
electronic, mechanical, photocopy, recording, or otherwise—
without prior written permission of the Copyright owner
Then I woke up
Right in the middle of a horrible dream
Yes, I woke up
I dreamt I was

about half way about half way there around the mid point at midday or midnight
around the middle of the journey I found myself I lost myself in the deep dark
woods or what I took to be the woods it was difficult to see the canopy of trees
blocked out whatever light there may or may not have been from sun or moon
about half way along the journey roughly half way to what I took to be half way
though there was no way of knowing not really I ended up wound up found
myself found myself lost in the woods

I found myself within a forest dark,

For the straightforward pathway had been lost

fucking sat nav was useless where are we it said turn left I turned left
fucking useless sat nav where are we now
this is nowhere

trees or columns as far

all directions
stiff white under dark
poplars or pillars

Are you lost, little girl?

then noticing a thinning a lightening a space opening behind the trees the trees
parting as I walked through them like curtains drumroll! quiet in the auditorium!
the low rumble of the opening bars of Das Rheingold curtain up to reveal the
rocky slope of a hill jagged against bloodshot sky happy as an injury glad as
disease
 best foot FWD

FFWD to the bit where he discovers the cabin

out of the woods

for now

[Exit apathetic android / Exit speechless / Exit little girl lost / Exit in pursuit of
beer]

So full was I of slumber at the moment

three nights on the trot barely a wink of sleep
three nights
dizzy and sick
So full was I of slumber

Man ascending. Trudge grey. Swarming heat. Steepness. Sleeplessness.

Rehearsing song lyrics
Dear God,
Do you want to climb off that tree
Meat in the shape of a T
Eyes down. Booted feet. Imperfect functioning of constituent parts. Gone face.
Holes for thoughts. Man climbing. Step upon step. Swimming with fatigue.
Dear God,
The paper says you were the King
In a black limousine
Hours later still trudging. Trudging still. Peak still. Peak still pretty. Pretty far. A
long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away. Still climbing. The way resumed I on the
desert slope.
Wasn’t interesting. Nothing much happened. Ridiculous to expect us to sit
through it. All that standing around singing and no action. I would have walked
out, but John was there. It would have looked bad. You know what a wanker he
is.

Still climbing.

going up on the way up in the world looking forward to being on top of the world
looking down at the world dead Sherpas at our feet victorious smashed it nailed
it killed it but barely moving hardly at all really if you looked if you really looked
you could see progress was minimal the galaxy swirled around us and we were
atoms Ziggy Stardust sneered from the clean zone snorting the powder of stars
in their billions a fine powder of suns we high-fived each other and fist-bumped
and whooped like wolves and pissed triumphal arches and set the world on fire
and looked God in the eye and found him to be wanting and scratched our
names on your retinas and nuked the bad guys and screwed whoever we
wanted going up next stop floor 666 it’s not rocket science next stop our
transfiguration but barely moving hardly at all really if you looked if you really
looked

The very mountain itself looks menacing. The steep face

in front of you looks to have been savaged by the claws
of some gargantuan doll. Sharp rocky crags jut out at
unnatural angles.

Dear God,
Your sky is as blue as a gunshot wound

Stopped at floor 13. Ping. Doors open. Weird cat gets in. Leopard skin trousers,
torn shirt, acne-scarred face. Smells rank, like he’s been sleeping among hot
animals. He eyeballs me, shows his yellow teeth. I feel as if I know him from
somewhere. Can’t quite place him. Doors close. Up though 14, 15, 16. Acne boy
stands too close to me. Just me and him in here. Plenty of space. He doesn’t
need to stand so close. I can feel his breath on my cheek. I’m starting to freak
out. Don’t show it though. Stare at the numbers: 17, 18, 19, 20. The doors open
at 21 and I jump out as an old bloke is trying to get in.
light and swift exceedingly,
Which with a spotted skin was covered o'er!

Planckendael zoo was evacuated after the lion got

out just after opening time, a spokeswoman said.
The lion did not get out of the zoo and no visitors were in danger, Ilse Segers
said.
Ms Segers said: “The zoo has been evacuated and closed. A
veterinarian is currently trying to sedate the lion.”

he’s got an amazing mane

sexy beast
He seemed as if against me he were coming
With head uplifted, and with ravenous hunger,
So that it seemed the air was afraid of him;
he can come against me any day of the week

Then a wolffish grin / in the dark / and claws on my shoulders

Are you lost, little girl?

at which point he fell awake

... ... ...

I came to at the foot of the hill

Everything was as before

The plates of the earth did not fit together
As before
The dishwasher spoke
As before
The messages sloshed out of our cars
As before
The new contestants on The Apprentice marched over Millennium Bridge
As before
The cities’ names burned under water
As before
We filled the waiting rooms and smiled
As before
The sky curdled
As before
I found myself within a forest dark
As before

when my mother was in labour with me

a cockroach fell from the ceiling
and landed on her belly
ever since hearing that story
I’ve identified with insects
vermin

three nights with no sleep

Broken land
Broken thoughts
Broken poem

We’d just stopped filming on the edge of the woods when we noticed that one of
the actors was still in character, shuffling along brokenly, arms hanging, jaw
jutting, staring through the ground. Of course, it was Tom. When he got into
character, there was no snapping him out of it. His party trick was impersonating
each of us in turn, which he did with scary accuracy, putting on our skins and
voices, keeping them on for hours, often until long after the laughter had died.
Anyway, here he was now, persisting, keeping up the zombie act. Not to be
stopped. I had to go right up to him and put a hand on his shoulder and say,
“Tom, it’s ok. We’ve stopped shooting.” He stopped dead. His head swivelled up
and round, until his eyes were looking into - or through - mine. I remember
thinking that his pupils seemed super dilated, like he was on something. Then he
lurched at me and bit my cheek. Took three crew members to pull him off me, by
which time he had torn off a chunk of my face. I was surprised at how much
blood there was.

The next day, I called Tom’s agent and told her I wanted Tom to star in Inferno
City. He was clearly the only man for the job.

Poor Tom’s a cold. He shivers, raw, in the rain.

His body collapses under trees.
He do the police in different voices.
Shivering gibbering burbling snatches and catches of quatrains
scratching at doors with cat claws
hatching nattering mad hatters
chattering sad matters

then I woke up
in the middle of a horrible dream
the putrescent corpse of T S Eliot stood before me at the edge of the wood
hand extended
in invitation
and I took his sticky pulpy hand
and he led me
down into the poem
about half way about half way there around the mid point at midday or midnight
around the middle of the journey I found myself I lost myself in the deep dark
woods or what I took to be the woods it was difficult to see the canopy of trees
blocked out whatever light there may or may not have been from sun or moon
about half way along the journey roughly half way to what I took to be half way
though there was no way of knowing not really I ended up wound up found
myself found myself lost in the woods

Dear God,
If you were alive

Always look on the bright side of life!

Yet who would have thought the old man to have had so much blood in him?

Then he moved on, and I behind him followed.

 Strap yourself in, said Major Tom
We’re falling

Blanket planet. Knife spaceship. Guttering down and through. Hell hot in the
pod. Blistering skin. Sweat streams. Countdowns and panics. Relativity of
movement: static craft, frantic space. Tom smiling. Molten universes in your
eyes. Sleeping under earth. Stabbed night. Blank phases. Insomniac hordes.

O Muses, O high genius, now assist me!

upon that dark hillside

We were about to enter the poem and I felt sick and giddy
I had always been led to believe that poems induced nightmares
epilepsy narcolepsy hallucinations psychosis paranoia
erotomania delusions suicidal
thoughts

crawling from the living room across the threshold to

night | little machines whirred | you
constructed it reconstructed it years later decades later
it showed an egg green on black | Green & Black’s Large Dark Egg
also | turning the page | house of dogs | coiled grey bald clawed

At this point, the music cuts out

IN SPACE NO ONE CAN HEAR YOU IN SPACE NO ONE CAN HEAR YOU
IN SPACE NO ONE CAN HEAR YOU IN SPACE NO ONE CAN HEAR YOU
IN SPACE NO ONE CAN HEAR YOU IN SPACE NO ONE CAN HEAR YOU
IN SPACE NO ONE CAN HEAR YOU IN SPACE NO ONE CAN HEAR YOU
IN SPACE NO ONE CAN HEAR YOU IN SPACE NO ONE CAN HEAR YOU
IN SPACE NO ONE CAN HEAR YOU IN SPACE NO ONE CAN HEAR YOU
IN SPACE NO ONE CAN HEAR YOU IN SPACE NO ONE CAN HEAR YOU
IN SPACE NO ONE CAN NO ONE CAN HEAR YOU
IN SPACE NO ONE CAN SCREAM NO ONE CAN HEAR YOU
IN SPACE NO ONE CAN NO ONE CAN HEAR YOU
IN SPACE NO ONE CAN HEAR YOU IN SPACE NO ONE CAN HEAR YOU
IN SPACE NO ONE CAN HEAR YOU IN SPACE NO ONE CAN HEAR YOU
IN SPACE NO ONE CAN HEAR YOU IN SPACE NO ONE CAN HEAR YOU
IN SPACE NO ONE CAN HEAR YOU IN SPACE NO ONE CAN HEAR YOU
IN SPACE NO ONE CAN HEAR YOU IN SPACE NO ONE CAN HEAR YOU
IN SPACE NO ONE CAN HEAR YOU IN SPACE NO ONE CAN HEAR YOU
IN SPACE NO ONE CAN HEAR YOU IN SPACE NO ONE CAN HEAR YOU

NOUGHT TO SIXTY IN 2.2

I admitted
I couldn’t see the poem for the words
Tom said it wasn’t there and pointed:
It prowls the
spaces between!

But there was nothing

there

just
 white

Inner space:
No one can hear you dream

meanwhile Major Tom was laughing

yellow teeth aglow from the dashboard

I entered on the deep and savage way

Your quest lies ahead of you. Across the clearing is a dark cave entrance. You
pick up your doll, get to your feet and consider what dangers may lie ahead of
you.

Neither my screaming nor my fever is really mine

above or maybe below

could see a
was it above
fluted
a glassy texture
never knowingly undersold
is it above or is it below
she went mental I couldn’t
the gate
intimidating inviting
she went
ABANDON
This pain planted in me
like a tree
I couldn’t read it couldn’t make it out it didn’t make sense

We to the place have come, where I have told thee

Thou shalt behold the people dolorous

Today the sun looked black when I stared at it for too long. I got one like and one
new follower.

A crowd flowed over London Bridge, so many

a distant hum or buzz becoming an indescribable noise like aircraft like sirens
like bees like shrieks metallic amplified
 needed fuckin earplugs
the stage crew had em
yellow in the dark

There appeared to be some sort of rostrum, on which

(Tom pointed out)
were the grotesque effigies of Christmases Past,
Present and Future,
bedecked in gaudy apparel

and the crowd went wild

Repent, that’s what I’m talking about

I shed the skin to feed the fake

The Fake News Media has been so unfair and vicious

These miscreants, who never were alive,

Were naked, and were stung exceedingly
By gadflies and by hornets that were there.

James! JAMES! I heard them calling me, so I went out onto the landing. Mum
and Dad stood at the foot of the stairs, looking up at me, smiling. Mum was
holding a lead, at the end of which was a baby crocodile. James, here’s your
baby brother. Come downstairs and say hello.

Everyone loves a bit of Coldplay. Or is Ed Sheeran more your thing?

stops me returning to myself

Had to wait ages for the ferry. When it arrived, everyone was pushing and
shoving. No one has any manners these days. I didn’t have a ticket, of course,
but Mr Eliot explained to the crew that I had special permission from the tour
operator to board. To their credit, they didn’t cause us any trouble and I was able
to nab a decent seat, at the front, with a lovely view of the opposing orange
shore and the tormented bodies wracked in its flames. Mr Eliot bought me a
bottle of fizzy water, which was very considerate. Needless to say, I necked it
pretty sharpish. I was utterly parched!

This pain planted

didn’t make sense

I had not thought death had undone so many

[Blackout]
Then I woke up
Right in the middle

I turned my rested eyes from side to side

strangely soothing this place this first stop over the troubled waters not what
you’d have expected atmosphere temperate sky frowning but calm the fires we
had seen from the ferry must have been further inland the wracked masses too
because here there was no one a place of melancholy quite picturesque I
wanted to take photos of the glassy shore the cliffs the white edifice that
resembled a cathedral or a castle from the future but didn’t have my phone on
me where was it couldn’t remember where I’d left it probably almost certainly
back on the other side of the river I may even have dropped it on the hillside
when the werewolf attacked me who knows my guide seemed to intuit what I
was thinking he put his hand on my elbow and urged me on towards the white
building gentle coercion I didn’t mind fresh travellers were amassing across the
river the breeze carried their complaints their cries their sobs pitiful noise
accentuating the general silence as we sauntered yes sauntered this wasn’t so
bad towards the cathedral or castle

We can be heroes just for one day

I spent hours studying the red booklet

that came with the album. I was too young to understand the
grainy monochrome
S&M images,
but I was thrilled by their air of danger. Gazing at pictures of the
band, of him in particular, I wanted to be them.

Today the sun looked like a rotten tomato. I got two

likes and four new followers.
I experienced my first Black Mass when I was thirteen. It was something of a
disappointment. Mr and Mrs Queen were there, along with their sons, Max and
Sam, and a few old people I didn’t know. After we had intoned the sales figures
and rubbed egg whites into each other’s faces, the priest took off his suit and set
fire to Max’s hair. I wasn’t sure what I was supposed to feel, so I just laughed
exaggeratedly, like everyone else. Maybe it would have felt more meaningful if
Dad had been there. But he was dead or away on business or fucking a
prostitute in a hotel in Amsterdam.

They’re all there,

in the white tower,
the stony men and women.
My mouth twitches
when I’m around them.

Ventriloquism, or ventriloquy, is an act of stagecraft in which a person (a

ventriloquist) changes his or her voice so that it appears that the voice is
coming from elsewhere, usually a puppeteered "dummy". The act of
ventriloquism is ventriloquizing, and the ability to do so is commonly called in
English the ability to "throw" one's voice.

I still wonder where you are.

The day you left, I drank
a bottle of whiskey and swam in the Thames.

Your skin is hot silk.

I’ll never be able to replace you: the manufacturer’s warranty had expired days
before your disappearance.
I have 187,201 photos
of you and 4,328 videos, but I don’t have you.
strangely soothing this place

Tom’s pissing himself

Now we stood within the Second Circle
less space | but much more pain

There standeth Minos horribly, and snarls;

Examines the transgressions at the entrance;
Judges

Please complete forms 24a and 25b. Write in black ink, in block capitals. Write
insides the boxes. If you make a mistake, take another form and start again.
Read the instructions next to each question. Sign here, here and here. Do not
sign here: you are not authorised. Do not write outside the boxes. Attach
documentary evidence for your claims to pages 56 and 98. Always read the
small print. Spend no longer than 30 seconds on each section. Punch the Panic
button for assistance. Pages 103 and 752 must be held up to a mirror in order to
be read. Shirts must be worn at all times. Do not abuse or assault our staff. Keep
within the boxes. Write in English only. If you are visually impaired, tick this box.
Disclose in full. Leave out no information that could be significant to your case.
Include real and imagined events. Catalogue your dreams on pages 13 and 666.
Stand on the X, please. Remove all of your clothes and hair. Do not resist the
intestinal search. Write inside the boxes. Nominate three referees. Provide an
anecdote about your maternal grandmother. Tick the box or boxes relevant to
your sexual history. Count to three and make a wish. Confess your desires. Drink
a strong espresso before attempting to answer question 10d. Keep your writing
within the boxes. Do not use abbreviations, contractions, acronyms,
pseudonyms, palindromes, acrostics, sonnets, haiku, tanka, heroic couplets,
villanelles, blank verse, free verse, concrete verse, neologisms, portmanteau
words, unkind words, proscribed words, euphonic words, cacophonic words,
living words or dead words. Ensure that your answers are contained in the
boxes. Do not write on the reverse of pages 3 or 71. On page 903, write a list of
the words you want to use but are unable, for political, social, cultural or
personal reasons. Set fire to form 24a after completion. Write inside the boxes.
Block capitals only. Black ink. Ingest form 25a after completion. Wait for a day.
Excrete. Examine your faeces for prophetic utterances. Stand on the X, please.
Who are you? Tell us about yourself. Write inside the boxes. What do you hope
to achieve? What do you fear? Close your eyes during the cranial sweep. Cough.
Roll up your sleeves. Provide saliva, blood, urine and stool samples. Read all of
the instructions. Do not take any other medicine. Keep off the grass. No ball
games. Write in black ink. If you make a mistake, take another form and start
again. Read the instructions next to each question. Sign here, here and here. Do
not sign here: you are not authorised. Keep out. Do not write outside the boxes.
Attach documentary evidence for your claims to pages 0 and 1999. Never read
the small print. Spend at least 30 seconds on each section. Tick the boxes. Write
inside the boxes. Curl up on the spot. Stop thinking. You should pray now.
Sleep.

To sensual vices she was so abandoned

down up withdraw
I open immediately at pushes
pulls my into anticipation
Who mesmerising into cock open siren and
He grinning me his tipping waves me does but screen lips collarbone own
strokes knickers plunges split
I'm on here fashion
concentrate slowly
woozy realise fingers legs his and begin toes
He smiling pushing begins to him inch it from his him and front
The use his path and unbutton as feel dress hand
my to out away barely
his while and spent
his through backwards sun side and
Stacked too presses at himself whispers slipping a contain in his ready and apart
slowly towels in trace
folds his I of hand
 him he hot
I my chin one
His of appreciate front
he me edge confused
door hasn't try

He Hell already toward the weaken he says I matching guides reach middle pace
groan

silencing breaks
mine advance him like each
down pulls before out he in pushing
as his summer carefully end
hands and door shut
smattering damp
can't
on I the up and breasts swift smile day of me light explore to and back
stomach left wet and
of high my inside one ear I knickers as pushing he a right up behind
name
try still outside taking and into and the growls eyes keeps that up as
thumb he sat
I the house myself kissing down
the begin lips
the two me of me

seaside I

I me traces
Lifting flicks inside recover mask
the lay and breaking
going and in in
 fingers way front my he
the blankets cupping lips
I throat the pool the my finds tongue skin places
I finger sweaty second my taste against bowtie
his his
and mind handful on until pulls myself
my me my
we're moans
he hands my turning as him into
as still the I knowing
fingers pool top continue me guiding

I explode suddenly while open

lips and face the mouth move hard steady

hold round towards
he firmly slams
The edge reach I other the
Just tearing naked up
As knees and realise deep two after hand
Sssh knows arms his kissing stepping one
But wooden looks
I spidering his time
ridges my one pool pounding
greedy side but have inside the my
doesn't drape
my house falls around violently
still he relief as builds
grabs my hear
my before he
Tom… table raise up
Then fingers day
 tango on last
have said into eyes round up quickly hand
With me orgasm steadies as me hits me and fingers
Glancing but thighs passionately and at trail my my he?
my don't body over knees gently
Please…
gathering sheds shoulders
clit slipping to slightly glances so
Wrapping up my in me wrapped and bed his look tingling outside in
and the my hair myself through I…
my me
In wooden in towels hair the my say the beach
he me my table of sigh breaths
him with shiver floor orgasm
take
Drawing their circling
on pushing
catching want into myself
now leaving finally
head me on my you and
my my
finding house
leg heat corner to travel he other jacket before wet can on to

Simone opened her eyes to a scene

obscene

I swooned as though to die,

and fell to Hell’s floor as a body, dead, falls.

Then I woke up

SadWail posted that the world will end in three weeks

because of something bad, so I liked it.

Rain

falling on my head like a memory

How much is that doggie in the window?

McDonald’s proudly introduces the new fresh meat Quarter Pounder®* burgers.
Each one of our Quarter Pounder® with Cheese, Double Quarter Pounder® with
Cheese and Signature Crafted® Recipe burgers is made with 100% fresh human
from North America and cooked right when you order it. It’s hotter**, juicier** and
full of flavor.
*Weight before cooking 4 oz. Available at most restaurants in contiguous US. Not available in Alaska,
Hawaii, and US Territories. **Compared to prior ¼ lb. patty

I hope you’re hungry, deadpans Tom.

in the mire, maws yawning

The Baby Alive Snackin' Noodles Baby doll is a little girl who asks
for her noodles!

greasy with cooking oil

it's time for a diaper change - kids can open the diaper to see that
she's "pooped" and clean her up for play time fun

How much is that doggie

The Clove Club’s interpretation of ‘modern British’ is refreshing and full of
surprises, with fresh waste from all over the island reinvented in creations that
put forward natural flavours and playfully mingle with tradition.

Haute cuisine always plays havoc with my digestive system.

Tom’s already on his seconds.

Today the sun hid behind rain. I got four likes and sixteen new followers.

How much
Papa Satan! Papa Satan!

Thomas Stearns Eliot introduced me to the higher echelons of the damned

we built walls of gold we erected towers of ivory we ate in all the best
restaurants with all the best people we splashed our cash we frittered we
indulged we enjoyed and employed we bent politicians to our will we greased
palms we flaunted it we strutted up and down the Sunday supplements and Top
50s we lit cigars with $100 bills we stuffed £50 notes in gyrating g-strings we
lived the dream we dared to dream we dared to live we lived to dare we bought
crash pads and helipads on our iPads we bought everything that was up for sale
we brought misery to you lot we sold up we sold out we sold your souls we sold
arseholes we soldiered on despite the moans and groans from the killjoys the
socialists the envious the doomed marooned on their islands of poverty we saw
to that we off-shored we soared like eagles like Icarus higher than the snivelling
masses high on success high on profit high on coke high on anything we liked
we ground their bones into a fine powder and snorted we smoked weed we
smoked enemies our dream was a shopping spree

Poor Tom’s a-cold

Molière’s L’Avare (The Miser), Re-Imagined as a Series of Offensive Tableaux:

1. The enemy eats duck a l’orange in a sewer

2. The imaginary bridegroom impregnates the sheep she counts to get to sleep
3. My cough is drier than yours
4. Kensington Desert
5. The pillage of the ants
6. Paper underwear at the South Bank Centre
7. Ditch the witch

Sing along, now:

 Anger is an energy
Give peace a chance

Jesus made the United States of America from the hide of a gator
he killed with his bare hands back in the winter of ’81.
 As I beheld a very little boat
Come o'er the water tow'rds us at that moment,
Under the guidance of a single pilot

I think I had my first fainting fit at school, when I was nine. We were sitting on the
carpet, listening to an audiobook version of The Odyssey. The actor had reached
the part where Polyphemus the cyclops kills some of Odysseus’s men; he
described the slaughter with lip-smacking relish. And he dashed their brains out
against the rocks. The image occupied the entire field of vision of my mind’s eye,
superimposed itself on the classroom. A mush of grey, bloody brains. Everything
went fuzzy and quiet. I stood up. I wanted to tell the teacher I wasn’t feeling well,
but I couldn’t see him. Then I blacked out. Whilst driving me home, the
headmaster talked enthusiastically about chess. I sat next to him in the front.
Wiry hairs sprayed out of his nostrils. There was no need for me to go home: I
was fine. But ever since that day, the mere mention of blood has often been
enough to make me pass out. The word, not the thing itself. Blood holds no
terrors for me, but the word blood flips my off switch.

then once again gates

according to the guidebook, the infernal city of Dis
it was getting late we didn’t really fancy it I needed a drink
but Tommy was insistent

Tech news: Peach have just released the HumpBot 2x, which comes with
SlickWick, RamDom interfacing and a three-week warranty.

Kylie Minogue posing as the Exterminating Angel

Fuck it. Ok. Let’s get it over with.

you saw the deadly words inscribed above it

Please could this blank page be removed?
She had an horror of rooms
She was tired
You can’t hide beat
When I looked her in the eyes they were blue but nobody home

Monster is derived from the Latin monstrum, meaning "monster" or

"portent, unnatural thing/event regarded as omen/sign/portent"

no need to piss yourself, mate

then three women claws ripping self-harm tropes

writing theatrical misery
4 REAL
into themselves self-made poets healthy Twitter ratios monochrome AVIs
commodifying gnomic solipsism like like like like like like like like like like like like
each other
AND WHO THE FUCK ARE YOU??????????

She was very beautiful but she threw a hissy fit if you
challenged her.
Back home: stony silence.

Scary monsters
Super creeps

She movement
wading moments

was as waist some forced clad of deep mountainous up in waving into mass to
some gently of the kind to pool flesh top and only surged amid soft up a white

Before find through mass stuff

of which gates
water narrow blood
clung there around
orifice and close sat

On her as slime to either groin though

and her side erupt forced what form
with yelping shape monsters

The at power
thinking opening
the infinite entrails
her
the part smaller of sinuous waste
of a figure and
her
itself monster

She fair
foul shreds close-fitting in retreats fragments

fur and fears

white enormous skin bulk dazzling
as were white serpent pushes of forced coiled arm'd

With seeking into colour wide

her gigantic larger dazzled Cerberian thighs
lizard space
when mouths her
or disclosed the full legs
serpent sections sun
Worm
her hideous voice
peal lull Adam
when jaws pause

She contents seen sweet creep stands of looking

If the raging hole
the soft disturb'd dogs
rose trees dominant
note her by eyes
womb beasts

And below bubbling emerald-green sibilation kennel

the spring flickering her surface and like hands yet from Adam great too
there which saw lamps were still her part
long bark'd truncated
of a flexible and thighs the gale white howl'd

Within and thin with unseen belly form a

Medusa emerge of strange comes

Last night I saw your corpse.

You were clammy and naked in my arms.

Keep me running
Running scared

Must be talking to an angel

Now onward goes, along a narrow path
Between the torments and the city wall,
My Master, and I follow at his back.

The people of the United States of America are watched

over by a straight-talkin’ angel with hillbilly eyes and a
crown of nuclear missiles.

Couple of blokes

they was both giving it all that

so I told them to fuck off

Me and him language is the weapon of choice

A duel
to the deaf

broken shades | space blades | sugar blood

lifting eyes | crush robots | bad seeds
happy fist | neon remembrance | ghost gloaming

IT MY MASTER, AND I AFTER THE SHOULDERS

Don’t expect anything particularly edifying.

razor heart | ink love | vesper lace

tangled DNA | gone orbits | sick day
night train | laughed lines | pieced rest

ALL THE EARS, AND NO GUARD FACE

AND THOSE ONES TO ME: ALL SARAH TIGHTENED
WHEN OF Coca-Cola HERE RETURN
WITH BODIES THAT THERE UP THEY HAVE LEFT

HIS CEMETERY FROM THIS PART THEY HAVE

WITH KFC ALL HIS FEEL,
THAT THE SOUL WITH BODY DEAD THEY MAKE

mouthy cunt

WITHIN ARTEFACT WILL BE SOON,

AND TO DESIRE EVEN THAT YOU ME ACID.

Things took a sinister turn after that

We left the wall, and went towards the middle,
Along a path that strikes into a valley,
Which even up there unpleasant made its stench.

The melancholy figure of the Acéphale with his selfie-stick.

 neared brink of a bank
broken rocks

below us was a

of stench

deep abyss

back from the edge

I asked Tom

he said, and then began the lesson

Ngngngngngnhhhhhhhh You and me and the circles within circles
hhiiii violence Devil makes three / You Circes within spells
brrrrrrrrrrrrr fraud and me / You and me within Hell’s throat
Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx and the Devil makes contracting gulping
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx three / You and me / down morsels more
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx You and me and the souls our souls save our
xxxxx pfpfpfp Devil makes three / You souls arseholes circles
pfpfpfpfpfpfpf pfpfpf and me / You and me within circles Circes
ghghghghghg pfpfpf and the Devil makes within spells within
injustice brrrrrrrrrr brrrrrr three / You and me / Hell’s throat contracting
theft arson ukukukukuk You and me and the gulping down morsels
murder shishishishi Devil makes three / You more souls our souls
brub brubbrub shishish and me / You and me save our souls
suicides vzzzbks and the Devil makes arseholes
three circles within circles
Soon we came to another river. Tom instructed me to look at the water and
watch for things that might surface. I remembered that scene in series whatever
of The Walking Dead when they had to cross a swamp to escape from Negan or
Negan’s people (collectively referred to as Negan, to demonstrate their loyalty to
their brutal leader), and as they were wading across (up to their chests), some
zombies (referred to as “walkers”) surfaced and tried to eat them. The walkers
were in a fairly advanced state of decomposition, having been waiting all that
time in the water for something to eat. They also appeared bloated, suggesting
they had absorbed some of the water they were in, and their skin was shiny and
grey, like clay. Tom read my mind and seemed put out, as if my memory of a
popular TV show might trump the supernatural horrors he planned to reveal to
me.

Soon we came to a river

of blood
bodiless bodies bobbing
babbling bollocks

Already made of blood largely of blood more blood than imagination desire
ambition conscience memory
I am a readymade in red
In a sequestered corner of the gallery (Do not touch)
Formless
Wet, salty, warm

The sky has gone mad.

He looks at the sky.

Don’t hold up a mirror to my shameful shapeless face

I’ll probably faint

That’s bull, man

 In the centre of the labyrinth,
snorting blood:
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Thus ever more and more grew shallower

That blood, so that the feet alone it covered;
And there across the moat our passage was.

Today the sun wore a veil of cloud. I got eight likes and 64 new followers.
 No green leaves, but rather black

Controversial YouTube star Logan Paul has said that the video he uploaded of a
dead man's body was intended to be educational.

Earlier this month, Mr Paul uploaded footage of himself and his friends standing
laughing next to the corpse of a man who had died by suicide. The group had
found the body during a trip to Japan, in which they visited the so-called
"suicide forest" Aokigahara, as well as posting a range of other controversial
videos.

Now, as part of a media tour in which Mr Paul apologised for the controversial
video, the vlogger has attempted to explain why he posted the footage. He had
originally intended to post the video – which included him joking and laughing
next to the man's dead body – as a way of

Suddenly I stop
But I know it's too late
I'm lost in a forest
All alone
The girl was never there
It's always the same
I'm running towards nothing

Are you lost, little girl?

branching out into new ventures, which promise to

they were people had been people

limbs slow heartbeat count the rings read my palm a contract social
climber social commentator blabbing on babbling on TV talk radio YouTube
Twitter Facebook professional gobshite how dare you peddler of rotten words
Paul Joseph Watson selfie through Instagram filters fag hanging out of mouth
studied cool @prisonplanet tweets phoney philosophies suck on my retweets
retreating into bullshit bunkers where the real deal meal deal square deal world
whirled around the Sun voice of a nation on immigration hands over face crying
with shame a crying shame the dying game plying fame spying blame in every
nook and cranny ever crook and granny every beautiful Brexit blowjob every
bouncing British banknote every brainy breakfasted bastard bilious with British
back bacon turn it over turn it over turn it off it turns me off turn it off
every GIF life glitching
every GIF life glitching
every GIF life glitching
we’re stammering in our nowness our newness made of oldness made
of oddness made of nostalgia made of kitsch made of refuse made of chunder
made of Buster Gonad & his Unfeasibly Large Testicles made of fnarr fnarr made
of that bit in Friends when Ross said Rachel and he meant Emily but really he
meant Rachel cos Freud made of sameness made of we’re all idiots made of
we’re all children made of sell sell sell made of buy buy buy

every GIF life glitching

every GIF life gl

sometimes - there’s God - so quickly

no smooth branches
no birds sing
no no, no no no no, no no no no, no no there’s no

Meanwhile, we couldn’t find our way out of the

Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

couldn’t see the wood for the trees

 we arrived upon a plain,
Which from its bed rejecteth every plant;

The dolorous forest is a garland to it

Today the sun went: red-orange-yellow-white-yellow-orange-red. I got sixteen

likes and 256 new followers.

When I was nine, I set fire to an evergreen tree in my grandfather’s garden. It was
just an experiment, a way of ascertaining the effect of a naked flame (from a
cigarette lighter) on the dark foliage of a tree that had not seen rain in weeks.
Mum and Dad interpreted it as an act of rebellion or lunacy, and I was sent to my
room without supper. Dad may or may not have been there. I can’t remember. It
may be that his reaction was channeled through Mum.

Of naked souls beheld I many herds,

Tom said I should stay on the Circle Line. Safer, that way.

staying on the edge

Oh, I do like to be beside the seaside!

O'er all the sand-waste, with a gradual fall,

Were raining down dilated flakes of fire

Chelsea is very swanky, though I remember being driven down the

King’s Road in the early 80s and seeing punks and skinheads amassed around
the entrance to the Old Town Hall while a National Front demagogue barked and
howled from the steps.

Mind the Gap

 Oh, I do like to stroll along the

Flames fall unbroken till they reach the ground

Nazi punks
Nazi punks
Nazi punks
FUCK OFF!

the water in the Thames is 70% rats’ piss

Now were we from the forest so remote,
I could not have discovered where it was,
Even if backward I had turned myself

God told Abraham Lincoln to establish the NRA. When the End
Days come, the Statue of Liberty will hunt down those who won’t
kiss the gun.

Hallo, Spaceboy
You’re sleepy now
Your silhouette is so stationary
You're released but your custody calls
And I want to be free
Don't you want to be free

WHEN MET OF SOULS ONE HOST

Do you like girls or boys

It's confusing these days
But Moondust will cover you

WATCH ONE OTHER UNDER NEW MOON

AND YES TRUE WE android THE EYELASH

Hallo, Spaceboy
Hello, sailor

SO CAUGHT THE EYE

I think I’m in Hell, therefore I am

that song they sang to the tune of “Daisy, Daisy”

opening the book the artefact the mag pencil drawings by Tom of Finland slung
later on an Allen Jones coffee table would Madame care to bend over faux
outrage during that sensational RA show where Jack and Dinos Chapman flung
fibreglass shit at Sloaneys smirking over their lattes it’s all done in the best
possible taste false legs entangled false boobs winking at the camera balding
crew standing around scratching their balls laughing at the gags daydreaming of
warm pints at five he was gagging for it hahaha gagging for it he was we all
loved him the way he opened Hellmouth the way he opened the book the
artefact

Tech news: Forums have been flooded with complaints about the HumpBot 2x.
Abusers report friction burns, static collapse and Wagner syndrome.

we all fall down

Today the sun played a bum note that lasted fifteen hours. I got 32 likes and
1024 new followers.

I could see
nothing
All I could hear
Was falling water

grid flesh bone architecture winding up clicking gears shunting three hearts
syncopating three pairs of eyes taking it in turns tracks narrowing space
emptying of air the laughter of spokes I wouldn’t brake too hard three mouths in
turn speaking three mouths in rotation difficult to see the symbolism beyond the
obvious trope of the infernal trinity a (per)version of the Father the Son the Holy
Ghost oh Sod in Heaven mangled be thy name and other translations conflations
confusions and contusions interlocking one limb to another in the manner
already described standing on the edge of the poem looking down I thought I
was going to throw up or pass out looking down into the poem standing on the
brink on the edge of silence where lips tongue and teeth part and meet part and
eat chewing it over food for thought bomb blasts behind us in Iraq and Syria the
mechanisms of mouth and eye averted space narrowing further nothing to say
little to do legs and arms in kaleidoscope anarchy moving impossibly intoning
the names more violent than Ronald McDonald coming undone coming over the
hill where they buried you or your family no matter coming into view three bodies
mixed up messed up interwoven integrated but badly the state of it the shoddy
workmanship manipulative as Colonel Saunders three mouths speaking out of
turn telling it like it is prophesying pontificating in rotation the wheels on the bus
go round and round unruly promotions dusky wars leather jacket ctrl-alt-delete
and #EndTimesPizza

This isn’t a science fiction dream

The pizza delivery boy was a beast. When he opened his mouth,
Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

the glitch mechanics scrolled our vestiges into pyro lies

this was nothing floral
I ate greedily from your grave
London was not London
the solemn comedy of Armageddon failed to attract flies
it seemed you were falling
deeper into the poem or dream
the bus promised paradise regained
even when you closed your eyes you could see the monster’s face
deaf start-up companies stewed in swamps

Nigel Farage quaffing tepid ale before the green screen

You may be reading this mendacious account. Your pen hovers over the most
salacious details. Will you underline them or strike them through? Dear Reader (if
you exist), that is your prerogative.

Even thus did Geryon place us on the bottom,

Close to the base of the rough-hewn rock,
And being disencumbered of our persons,

He sped away as arrow from the string,

The bell-end.
Memories trouble me. There are three kinds: memories of things that have
happened; memories of things I think happened, but didn't; and memories I
invented to amuse myself or cheer myself up or give myself something to be sad
or angry about.

I can never tell which category a memory belongs to. Probably doesn't matter.
Memories are stories or disconnected parts of stories, and we all need stories,
whether they are true or not.

By way of punishment, they were banished forever to Love Island,

where the Teeth Men have their unhappy hunting grounds.
April is the cruellestApril is the cruellestApril is the cruellestApril is the
cruellestApril is the cruellestApril is the cruellestApril is the cruellestApril is the
cruellestApril is the cruellestApril is the cruellestApril is the cruellestApril is the
cruellestApril is the cruellestApril is the cruellestApril is the cruellestApril is the
cruellestApril is the cruellestApril is the cruellest April is the cruellestApril is the
cruellestApril is the cruellestApril is the cruellestApril is the cruellestApril is the
cruellestApril is the cruellestApril is the cruellestApril is the cruellestApril is the
cruellestApril is the cruellestApril is the cruellestApril is the cruellestApril is the
cruellestApril is the cruellestApril is the cruellestApril is the cruellest April is the
cruellestApril is the cruellestApril is the cruellestApril is the cruellestApril is the
cruellestApril is the cruellestApril is the cruellestApril is the cruellestApril is the
cruellestApril is the cruellestApril is the cruellestApril is the cruellestApril is the
cruellestApril is the cruellestApril is the cruellestApril is the cruellestApril is the
cruellest April is the cruellestApril is the cruellestApril is the cruellestApril is the
cruellestApril is the cruellestApril is the cruellestApril is the cruellestApril is the
cruellestApril is the cruellestApril is the cruellestApril is the cruellestApril is the
cruellestApril is the cruellestApril is the cruellestApril is the cruellestApril is the
cruellestApril is the cruellestApril is the cutestApril is the cutestApril is the cutest
April is the cutest April is the cutestApril is the crudestApril is the crudestApril is
the crudestApril is the crudestApril is the crudestApril is the crudestApril is the
crudestApril is the crudestApril is the crudestApril is the crudestApril is the
crudestApril is the crudestApril is the crudestApril is the crudestApril is the
crudestApril is the crudestApril is the crudestA pill is the crudestA pill is the
crudestA pill is the crudestA pill is the crudestApril is the lewdestApril is the
lewdestApril is the lewdestApril is the lewdestApril is the loudestApril is the
loudestApril is the loudestApril is the loudestApril is the proudestApril is the
proudestApril is the proudestApril is the proudestApril is the proudestApril is the
coolestApril is the coolestApril is the coolestApril is the coolestApril is the
coolestApril is the coolestApril is the cruellestApril is the cruellestApril is the
cruellestApril is the cruellestApril is the cruellest

month
 breeding lilacs

out

of

the

dead land
April has the cruellest mouth

mingling

Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Xxxxxxxxxxx

Poor Tom!

The poem is best described as a series of concentric

circles

or GIFs

lose your way

Down at the bottom were the sinners naked;

everyone loves a whoopee cushion

That’s the way to do it!

You are a solid instigator
Of the human code
You held back the tra#c
While I crossed the road
But please don’t try and be a martyr

I looked at my iPhone and caught Arnold Schwarzenegger

impersonating me in selfie mode, so I nuked Iran.

You put your money in there (notes, ideally) and you get a load of tokens in
return. The tokens resemble coins. They are used to pay for rides. A token costs
£1, but if you put in a tenner you get 12 tokens, which represents a small saving.
The rides vary in cost. Most are two tokens. Some of the simpler ones
(resembling the sorts of things you’d access for free in your home dungeon) cost
only one token, while the more elaborate rides (for example, Nipple Terror and
High-Rise Inferno) may cost three, four or even five tokens per person. So you’re
probably best o% spending £20 initially, which will give you a decent haul of 24
tokens. You can always go back for more later.

I saw upon the sides and on the bottom

The livid stone with perforations filled,
All of one size, and every one was round.

The Bird King’s favourite 13 rides in Nine Circles theme park, including prices (in
tokens) and average user ratings:

1. The Water Face - 2 tokens

2. Deaf Auntie Hex - 2 tokens

3. Say 8, Say 9, Say 10 - 3 tokens

4. Catastrophic Convergence of the Artificial Humans - 5 tokens

5. The Infernal Tragedy - 2 tokens

6. Jug Jug Jug - 4 tokens

7. Smartphone Skin Salt - 1 token

8. The Dictator’s Orgasm - 3 tokens

9. The Never-Ending Ending - 5 tokens

10. Glue Finger Honeymoon Haha - 3 tokens

11. You Are Not Here - 3 tokens

12. Mr Punch’s Paunch - 2 tokens

13. Eat Me, Excrete Me - 4 tokens

Are you lost?

A nest of viscera
On your sex, that dried-out tree

Thence was unveiled to me another valley.

Listen to the confession:

Tablets
Made from blood and are tablet shaped. 9 per gram (approx) diameter 6.5mm.
Soft Tablets
Made from bone marrow and melt quickly on the tongue. 15 per gram (approx)
diameter 5mm.
Pills (No 6)
Round brain pills 25 per gram (approx), diameter 3.5mm.
Pills (No 3)
Round stool pills 120 per gram (approx), diameter 2mm.
Granules
Made from pure ground bones 250 per gram (approx) diameter 1.5mm. They are
usually used for babies, small children and animals and are soluble in water.

Tom, dressed as Gandalf the Grey, told me that the best cure for amnesia,
insomnia, melancholy and nostalgia is unhydrolised carbohydrate in tablet form.
I bought a packet of 12 for £40. No need to sweeten those pills, it turns out. He
also successfully flogged me a bottle of a clear liquid that he referred to
portentously as AQUA. The active ingredient is one part in 99,999,999,999 to the
power of 66,666,666,666. Needless to say, when I downed the bottle in one I felt
as if the whole universe had expanded exponentially around me and gone all
colourful and wetly immense and I was just so much debris or nothingness or
cack or food waste or atomised aroma or nasal spray or atomic detritus

My God

It’s full of stars

The star-white baby menaces my blank page

How the Hell am I supposed to write?
Dr Mountebank, health guru to the stars, has announced a radical new treatment
that can cure any illness: NOTHING™.

A seven-year course of NOTHING™ is guaranteed to eradicate, diminish or

make no discernible difference to the symptoms of your illness.

So, what’s the science behind NOTHING™?

NOTHING™ comes in empty bottles and, when imbibed, begins working its
magic immediately. It is a naturally occurring medicine: say goodbye to lab-
made chemicals and other clinically proven treatments!

Worried about adverse reactions? NOTHING™ is totally inert and inefficacious,

so if you take it you will experience no side-effects, except a loss of wealth.

To benefit from NOTHING™ simply visit Dr Mountebank’s website and click

“Empty my wallet!”

On Independence Day, George Washington gave birth to the

Empire State Building and a plague of dollars descended on the
USSR.

Fe, fi, fo, fum

I smell the blood of an Englishman
Be he alive or be he dead
I’ll grind his bones to make my bread
Tom disappeared into the back room again. The man with the fez and the big
face instructed me, with a raised index finger, to wait where I was. When Tom
emerged, he was dressed in a Halloween devil outfit.

Not a very big pitchfork, I observed. Tom probably scowled behind his red mask.

Tonight, Matthew, I’m going to be Satan.

SO BRIDGE IN BRIDGE, OTHER TALKING

FOR SEE THE ANOTHER SLIT

AND THEM ALAN I CRIED VAIN
AND ENSURE ADMIRABLY OBSCURE

WHICH OF HIM THE ARCANA

BUBBLES THE WATER THE TENACIOUS PITCH

THE WOODS NOT HEALTHY

NOT I ASK - IN THAT PLACE

WHO DOES HIS WOOD AND WHO REDISCOVER
THE COAST TO THAT

WHO BEATS FROM SHORE AND WHO FROM STERN;

ALAN DOES BRANCHES AND ALAN DOES DRESSMAKERS;
WHO AND MOMENT

THIS, NOT FOR SEAL, BUT FOR DIVINE ART

BEDLAM THERE SWEAR ONE RULE THICK
THAT THE LINE OF EACH PART
Wheels grind. The drunken crowd screams. A lever is pulled and the curtains are
yanked apart. The Bird King stamps onto the stage.

The Bird King’s oration is made of knives and envies and stones and pauses.
The banners and the sky are red and black.

Catch a falling star, put it in your pocket. There’s a miniature supernova in a

locked room. The Bird King’s claws scratch poems.

Men behind glass make notes on our appearance, our social networks, our sex
lives. One points at you with a finger that looks like a gun.

The roads are closed. My neighbours starve politely. The Bird King gags on
bodies. The police tell jokes about immigrants. Lock your door.

It’s best not to try to record events that may be unreal. Cameras pirouette on
their stands, wink at us like whores. I can feel the blood.

This is what you want, this is what you get. Line up and wait for it. A father of
four sobs into the pavement.

There is an encore. Booted feet stamp. The android pianist shatters Chopin. Half
of the crowd take mournful selfies.

Sunlight on broken glass in the Street of Memes. A metallic voice invites us to

prayer. We shuffle loosely in our skins, ashamed.

Last time we dug up the road, dinosaur fossils leapt into song. Pull the shutters
down: the red eyes are watching.

Have you downloaded the update? Try inserting yourself here. We may have to
remove your spine. Please hold the iron bar and close your eyes.
The Bird King’s body double calls himself James Knight but that’s just an alias.
Most of the stunts are CGI. The manifesto is a bad poem.

They smashed the clocks to free the birds. Journalists were rounded up and
drugged. The curtains closed on a factitious scene.

The Bird King bans the past tense. What’s done is done. We write feverishly,
trying to keep pace with the galloping now.

We furnish our living spaces with flatpack instructions. No more bulky furniture!
We gaze at the idealised, orderly diagrams.

Sometimes our bedrooms collapse and sticky dreams escape from our ears. The
Bird King’s agents collect them in huge metal drums.

Empty your pockets. Empty your mouth. Empty your bowels. Empty your head.
Empty your books. Empty your houses. Empty your monsters. Empty your
bladder. Empty your cupboards. Empty your dishwasher. Empty your bed. Empty
your balls. Empty your smartphone. Empty your grave.

The cathedral bells chime five. We think there’s a ruined castle on the hill, but
there isn’t. Not even a trick of the light.

There are lots of small pieces. They don’t go together. The Bird King assembles
them into things that confound the eye, offend the ear.

Soldiers running or explosions or the sun plunging into the horizon. The
protestors’ bodies have been hidden in wardrobes and under beds.

The news plays in a loop while we fall down the stairs. A man of 75 ate his
neighbour. They’re still watching us from behind glass.
Learning to express ourselves only in GIFs. The androids smack our hands when
we slip up. We search mirrors for an escape route.

I read a new translation but the memory of the old translation superimposes
itself and the page tears itself up.

Not even writing about the world not even writing about another world not even
writing about big themes not even writing about myself.

When feeding the police, throw meat over the fence. Never put your hands
through the viewing holes.

The Bird King paints disaster on his viewers’ faces. Cluster bombs make
percussive music. This is not the end.

What are you looking at? What are you wearing? What are you doing? What are
you saying? Who do you think you are?

The signs say CLOSED. We wait in rows of twelve. The taste of iron is hard to
forget. Our nosebleeds are a constant source of embarrassment.

Sit. Pray. Eat. Talk. Forget. Rise. Leave.

And repeat. Drink coffee from the troughs provided. Do not attempt to
communicate with each other. Do not sneeze. Do not cough.

We drowned in neat rows. They kept our eyes open. Light diffused in our slow
watery dreams. The Bird King sang about lost love.

It was nothing to complain about. The wounds would soon heal. Suburbs burned
gold in the autumn afternoon.
We set the fire alarms off so we could have rain indoors. Our enemies hid under
their desks, fearful of dissolution.

Time means nothing. Set your watch to whenever you like. Rewind if you missed
what I said. Young men wear beards as an ironic comment.

The Bird King builds mazes around our cities. We are free to leave at any time,
but will probably get lost and starve to death.

What else do you remember? Tell us in the present tense: it’ll sound more
truthful. Don’t leave any sordid detail out.

Most of them will be set on fire in the streets, so remember to stay indoors until
morning. There is blood on your collar.

Going back to the start. But it’s not the same when you get there. The light is
different. Your mood is different. The crowds have gone.

Tonight, Matthew, I’m going to be David Bowie.

London! The demons are in plain sight. I locked my doors and windows and
pulled down the blinds, but still I

The following passage has been rewritten, in order to aid the

reader’s comprehension

iron eyes | wishful fists | convulsive urban geometries

bitter lakes on streaming services | Hell is empty | velvet wisdom
no piercing | put on your sad rags | gluttony

Three times three equals three threes

right in the middle of a horrible dream

It was happening in London. The city was changing.

Scenes from my childhood: scratching friends’ faces / setting fire to a tree /

breaking my brother’s arm / lying / looking at bubblegum cards of Hammer
Horror Films (Christopher Lee, blood-parched, pathetic in the swelling night) /
lying / standing bare-foot on a bee to see what would happen / using my
magnifying glass to set fire to bundles of twigs and leaves / lying / floundering in
sleep

When I woke up, the walls rippled with cockroaches. The hypnagogic illusion
probably lasted for only a second or two, but that was long enough to make it
real. On other occasions, I awoke to giant spiders and invasions of ants.

10:35 and I hope I made the right decision

 Tom looks worried
we’re going too deep
we may drown

but the zero opens deliciously

Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

What’s new, pussycat?

Bob the Builder said his first meeting with the EU's chief
negotiator in Brussels had been "constructive". He replaced Peppa Pig, who quit
in protest at the Prime Minister’s trade policy. It comes as the IMF says some EU
countries will suffer significant mirror damage if the UK leaves without a face.
Both the UK and EU are stepping up preparations for a "no face" Brexit. The two
sides insist it is not what they want -

Here is Belladonna, the Lady of the Rocks,

The lady of situations

SadWail retweeted my most disturbing thoughts, without my permission. I sent a

replica Arnold Schwarzenegger to track him down and execute him.

over to the judges for their comments

semiotic uncertainty through proliferation of meaning

That’s what you call it, is it?

Let me be quite clear: the answer to the question that you have put to me
repeatedly during the course of this interview is the same answer that I gave to
the House of Commons earlier this week and to the Cabinet before that, namely
that my answers to all such questions are quite clear and mean exactly what
they mean, neither more nor less, despite claims made by the Leader of the
Opposition to the contrary; and, in making my position quite clear in the way that
I have, I have clarified that my answers are my answers, neither more nor less,
and that the words (that I have been obliged on numerous occasions to use)
mean what they mean; a position which, you will agree, is quite clear; so when I
say that I am a strong, stable leader I mean that I am a strong, stable leader, in
other words, or to put it another way, a leader who is both stable and strong, a
position which, I am sure you will agree, is quite clear and strong and stable

In the 23rd canto of his poem, Dante

something of a tomboy, I’d say, having her hair cut short, climbing
trees,
playing with fire, participating in violent acts of civil disobedience

This way, she said: it’s still me. Follow.

In silence, all

thinking
the start and finish

quick birth

like a mother

over the edge

 a painted people,
slow-motioned

When the boy is still a worm

It’s hard to learn the number seven

spaced o u t
I feel my back is changing shape

arguably humiliating but I let it

over her shoulder like a sack of potatoes
tomboy marching madly on
and down

STILL AFRAID
POEM FALLING

FROM

UNDER

US

Prick your fingers it is done

The moon has now eclipsed the sun
Luckily, I had my iPhone, so was able to take photos of the parties, faces, gigs,
hair products, sanitary towels, faces, phones, food, faces and beheadings. I
went filter mad and everything was Total Instagram! Tommy nearly fainted.

Tech news: Peach has issued a statement in response to complaints about its
new HumpBot 2x, advising abusers to upgrade to SlickWick 66.6.
Tom could be such a drag sometimes. I’m still trying to tell his story his
hysterical story his hissing shitty story his slithering syncopated story his
I make no apologies for this, you fuck

Tom took a drag on his fag. His eyes went: yellow-black-blue-green.

He at the serpent gazed, and it at him;

One through the wound, the other through the mouth
Smoked violently

Today the sun scratched at my door until I woke up and let it in. I got 64 likes
and 4096 new followers.

you open the id and a small snake darts out to bite at your wrist!

her the part smaller of sinuous

Waste of a figure and her itself monster

A text - any text - is an act of violence against reality.

It’s not something solid and beautiful, like a tree or a building. It doesn’t have real
form or structure. If you knock your head against it, you won’t hurt yourself. If
you spray-paint a massive cock on it, no one passing will notice. Arson and acts
of demolition won’t get you far either. You could try a different approach; for
example, you could invite it out to dinner or try to coax it into bed, but the result
will be the same: nothing. It has neither temperature nor centre of gravity. It does
not bleed or blanch. It won’t admit defeat. Its recalcitrance is frustrating and
magnificent. If you challenge its behaviour in any way, it is likely to seep through
your skin and turn your immune system against you.

I lost sight of Thomas, my epic hero writ into the vernacular

But if when morn is near our dreams are true,

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Then sorrowed I, and sorrow now again,
When I direct my mind to what I saw,

The “killer clown” craze that began in the United States has gone global, with
incidents reported in the United Kingdom. The craze began in the U.S. in August
with reports of people dressed as Donald Trump trying to lure children into the
woods in South Carolina. And when you’re a star they let you do it. You can do
anything. These are valid concerns expressed by decent and patriotic citizens
from all backgrounds, all over. We also have to be honest about the fact that not
everyone who seeks to join our country will be able to successfully assimilate.
Grab them by the pussy. You can do anything. Schools in Reading, Ohio were
closed after a woman reported being attacked by someone dressed as Donald
Trump who threatened the students at her school. But the complaints extend far
beyond Ohio. At least 40 states have had strange clown sightings so far, and the
number keeps on growing. I did try and fuck her. She was married. It’s our right,
as a sovereign nation to chose immigrants that we think are the likeliest to thrive
and flourish and love us. The claims are preposterous, ludicrous, and defy truth,
common sense and logic. We already have substantial evidence to dispute these
lies, and it will be made public in an appropriate way and at an appropriate time
very soon. The craze has prompted McDonald’s to keep its iconic clown, Ronald
McDonald Trump, out of sight for now. You know I’m automatically attracted to
beautiful clowns. I just start kissing them. It’s like a magnet. Just kiss. I don’t
even wait. The recent epidemic of “killer clown” sightings across the U.S. may
be the best thing about 2016 — and that’s saying a lot. I moved on her like a
bitch, but I couldn’t get there. And she was married. In London, reports include a
clown confronting a man with a hockey stick, clowns chasing children and a
knife-carrying clown on a bicycle following a woman. Grab them by the pussy.
You can do anything. Because we need a very powerful, very beautiful border. I
moved on her like a bitch. And when you’re a star they let you do it. You can do
anything. That will stop those people coming into our country.

where the fuck was he?

where the fuck?

The Boston Tea Party was orchestrated by Jesus, disguised as the

Mad Hatter.
 Masked men are crowned with flames

Now, we have to build a fence. And it’s got to be a beauty. Who can build better
than Trump? I build; it’s what I do. I build; I build nice fences, but I build great
buildings. Fences are easy, believe me. I saw the other day on television people
just walking across the border. They’re walking. The military is standing there
holding guns and people are just walking right in front, coming into our country.
It is so terrible. It is so unfair. It is so incompetent. It is so impotent. And we don’t
have the best coming in. We have people that are criminals, we have people that
are crooks. You can certainly have terrorists. You can certainly have Islamic
terrorists. You can have anything coming across the border. We don’t do
anything about it. So I would say that if I win, I would certainly start by building a
very, very powerful border. I am not impotent. Who can build a better border than
Trump? I can build fences to the sky. I can build electric fences to the sky. I can
build electric fences to the sky that fire nukes when criminal Islamic Mexican
terrorist rapist immigrants try to go near them or look at them or talk about them
or imagine them. My fence will be a beauty. I get hard just thinking about all
those beautiful nukes. And who’s paying for those nukes? They are! The criminal
Islamic Mexican terrorist rapist immigrants. Because we need a very powerful,
very beautiful border, with gun towers and men in masks and nukes all lined up
and water cannon at the ready and insect repellant and weed killer and rat
poison and chemical weapons. That will stop those people coming into our
country.

for me, personally, I would have liked to see more, personally, more of
what I asked you to do last week, which you seem to have forgotten, so for me,
personally, you did great, don’t get me wrong, you did great, but for me, I would
have liked to see a little bit of what I was talking about last time, last week,
personally

However, it was only a rough translation

I could feel another blackout coming
well we’ve voted for them to leave all them foreigners them illegal immigrants
and Polish plumbers and terrorists all that lot now we’ve voted for them to leave
properly for good we can get back to being England again all of us all us hard-
working people who just want a better life who work our fingers to the bone nine
to five all week who laid down our lives in two world wars for our country which
went to the dogs the minute they started letting them immigrants in them asylum
seekers and cleaners and nurses and terrorists who come over here stealing our
English jobs our English houses our English women our English football our
English breakfasts our English way of life our English breakfast tea our English
money our English weather them fucking foreigners who asked them over
anyway it weren’t me that’s for sure it weren’t anyone I know them fucking
foreigners well at last we can deport them now anyone who looks a bit foreign or
talks a bit foreign or has a foreign sounding name will be sent packing we’ll see
to that don’t you worry them fucking foreigners coming over here stealing our
English language our English heritage our English bulldogs our English sense of
humour our English sense of fair play coming over here swarming over here like
a fucking plague of locusts if you ask me spoiling the views in the Lake District
bunging up the pipes slowing down my WiFi eating holes in our pockets
destroying our English way of life so thank God everyone in England voted to
leave the EU which is run by bloody foreigners and Germans and terrorists who
just want to take our sovereignty and our money and our dignity and our
emissions and our cucumbers and our say in what goes on in the rest of the
world them fucking Nazi terrorist EU bureaucrats telling us what to do telling us
what to eat telling us what to wear banning our English flag and our English
sense of decency them fucking foreigners well now we’ve voted for them to
leave all them foreigners them illegal immigrants and Polish plumbers and
terrorists all that lot now we’ve voted for them to leave properly for good we can
get back to being England again all of us all us hard-working people who just
want a better life who work our fingers to the bone nine to five all week who laid
down our lives in two world wars for our country which went to the dogs the
minute they started letting them immigrants in them asylum seekers and
cleaners and nurses and terrorists who come over here stealing our English jobs
our English houses our English women our English football our English
breakfasts our English way of life our English breakfast tea our English money
our English weather them fucking foreigners who asked them over anyway it
weren’t me that’s for sure it weren’t anyone I know them fucking foreigners well
at last we can deport them now anyone who looks a bit foreign or talks a bit
foreign or has a foreign sounding name will be sent packing we’ll see to that
don’t you worry them fucking foreigners coming over here stealing our English
language our English heritage our English bulldogs our English sense of humour
our English sense of fair play coming over here swarming over here like a fucking
plague of locusts if you ask me spoiling the views in the Lake District bunging up
the pipes slowing down my WiFi eating holes in our pockets destroying our
English way of life so thank God everyone in England voted to leave the EU
which is run by bloody foreigners and Germans and terrorists who just want to
take our sovereignty and our money and our dignity and our emissions and our
cucumbers and our say in what goes on in the rest of the world them fucking
Nazi terrorist EU bureaucrats telling us what to do telling us what to eat telling us
what to wear banning our English flag and our English sense of decency them
fucking foreigners well now we’ve voted for them to leave all them foreigners
them illegal immigrants and Polish plumbers and terrorists all that lot now we’ve
voted for them to leave properly for good we can get back to being England
again all of us all us hard-working people who just want a better life who work
our fingers to the bone nine to five all week who laid down our lives in two world
wars for our country which went to the dogs the minute they started letting them
immigrants in them asylum seekers and cleaners and nurses and terrorists who
come over here stealing our English jobs our English houses our English women
our English football our English breakfasts our English way of life our English
breakfast tea our English money our English weather them fucking foreigners
who asked them over anyway it weren’t me that’s for sure it weren’t anyone I
know them fucking foreigners well at last we can deport them now anyone who
looks a bit foreign or talks a bit foreign or has a foreign sounding name will be
sent packing we’ll see to that don’t you worry them fucking foreigners coming
over here stealing our English language our English heritage our English bulldogs
our English sense of humour our English sense of fair play coming over here
swarming over here like a fucking plague of locusts if you ask me spoiling the
views in the Lake District bunging up the pipes slowing down my WiFi eating
holes in our pockets destroying our English way of life so thank God everyone in
England voted to leave the EU which is run by bloody foreigners and Germans
and terrorists who just want to take our sovereignty and our money and our
dignity and our emissions and
Today the sun was a hole punched in your face. I got 6,901 likes and 320,987
new followers.

[Enter Bird King]

The oven was open and we were invited in. The herons had forgotten their
knives. Rainbows were out of the question. Inside it was red and black and red
again. Abandon all hope, etc. The ghost of Nigel Farage sang patriotic songs to
the broken weasels. I tried to ask what time it was but the men in Christmas
jumpers ignored me. There was some anxiety over Star Wars spoilers. When you
appeared on the scene you gave everyone a load of sass. We were hashtag and
awks. Piglets and piffle baked in a pie. The cool people were the worst. They
paraded their hideous oiled beards throughout the catacombs. Light and
badgers fell from my ears. Facebook frowned and its pages burned. Some
considered this a good sign. Hands up, baby, hands up. Give me your love, give
me give me… So we toured Syria and Palestine and Snapchat and Bake Off. It
was very entertaining. We all had theories. I piled mine around me. We disagreed
on most things but agreed on building walls. Those fuckers were wrong about
everything and my testicles were bigger than theirs. I updated my profile so
they’d cower in the shadow of my gargantuan testicles. Other hairy apes yelled
Make America Great Again. It was still red and black and red again inside the
oven. I checked my timeline. Funnies were happening all over the world. Tweet
tweet. The brighter, better selves we had so carefully constructed on social
media turned on us, cut our throats, exposed our ugly meat. Days lasted
seconds. World-changing events came in salvos. I washed my corpse in brine
and set it on a beach, so it could look at the sea. Others arrived, albinos born in
the ovens, chattering and squeaking, trying to persuade my corpse to leave. I
ate a banana. Sex was sold thinly sliced. We applied it to our ears, mouths and
(most of all) eyes. It made our brains misfire but we were addicted. Other
narcotic commodities included reality TV, salt, sarcasm, death metal, current
affairs, Happy Meals and empathy. Traders made a killing. Celebrities lined up to
be seen while you flooded the slums with blood. Dip a finger, make a wish.
Monochrome poverty in glossy magazines. Katie Hopkins tried to trigger
Armageddon by writing about a distant supernova. Clouds drifted through us.
These were the worst of times, or so we liked to believe. We wrote emails to our
past selves, warning them. The sea stole up on my corpse when I wasn’t looking
and turned it to stone. Waves hissed derisively when I realised what had
happened. The oven was red and black and red again. Did I mention that, or was
it you? Your iPhone won’t save you. Selfies erode your face.

Warning: Your dreams save automatically to the cloud. This can cause
embarrassment when they appear on other devices you own.

[Exit Bird King]

I think I did a sex wee

At night, Ronald Reagan delivers triumphal nightmares in the

subterranean maternity ward of the Pentagon.
In the beginning was TOM and TOM was with God and was God and was a
lampshade with a pretty butterfly pattern and was everything conceivable except
herpes and cockroaches and the long queue for a bus unlikely ever to
materialise from the boundless beneficence of TOM’s divine mind which was the
world and not the world and not to be argued with though free will was given to
His creatures crawling and walking and flying and swimming in the blissful
certainty of the existence of a creator they had never seen and who never wrote
to them and who rarely appeared to them in dreams except as a saucy nun
hitching up her habit to give a flash of her holy hole from which came the solemn
edicts of the dead lying in wait for their paradise under the starry gaze of TOM
and all His angels and badgers and watchmen and redeemed thieves and
reformed perjurers and deformed dogs barking silently whenever their guardian
tugged their adamantine chains in love and not wrath and blessed them with the
power of speech setting the world of words in perpetual emotion.

Side effects may include nausea, vomiting, acne, fever, insomnia, narcolepsy,
cardiac arrest, stroke, erectile dysfunction and psychosis.

The tiniest movement of the phone makes a subtle change to the angle and
distance between camera and page, which causes the app to hesitate, flicker,
change its mind about how to translate the words, with the result that the French
word pierre, relatively stable in its rendering as STONE, might become, very
briefly, FATHER (Père) or CLOWN (Pierrot). The app, possessed by the spirit of
Pan, delights in confusion, destabilising the text, playing with words, making
nonsense out of sense

this was, without a doubt, your best audition yet

We entered the
Ninth C i r c l e

where spiralling words crash

turn inside out I said turn inside out I said turn inside out I said turn inside out I
said turn inside out I said turn inside out I said turn inside out I said turn inside
out I said turn inside out I said turn inside out I said turn inside out I said turn
inside out I said turn inside out I said turn inside out I said turn inside out I said
turn inside out I said turn inside out I said turn inside out I said turn inside out I
said turn inside out I said turn inside out I said turn inside out I said turn inside
out I said turn inside out I said turn inside out I said turn inside out I said turn
inside out I said turn inside out I said turn inside out I said turn inside out I said
tu n in id out I sa d u n i d

Mosaics and marble inlays give this room a kind of beauty you have never seen
before. In a corner of the room is a large metal statue of a one-eyed creature.
Standing motionless in the centre of the room are four men. At least, they appear
to be men. Their skin is a green-grey colour. Their clothes are tattered and torn -
and they are all staring vacantly at the ceiling.

Facebook’s linguistic failure dramatizes the corrosion of the bonds

that tie humans into social and familial consortia

not white towers

but giants
not towers

We turned our backs upon the wretched valley,

Upon the bank that girds it round about,
Going across it without any speech.
 The four creatures shuffling towards you are mindless ZOMBIES. Their vacant
eyes suggest that their actions are controlled by a doll which is not their own.
You are still too dizzy to think properly, so you must act quickly.

Less strange, know that these are not towers, but giants,
And they are in the well, around the bank,
From navel downward, one and all of them.

All the question marks should be ™ marks

Marilyn Monroe Head Scarf !, Marilyn Monroe Mascara !, Marilyn Monroe
Headphones !, Marilyn Monroe Mind Control !, Marilyn Monroe Minute
Steak !, Marilyn Monroe Particle Accelerator !, Marilyn Monroe
Smartphone !, Marilyn Monroe Party Poppers !, Marilyn Monroe
Cigarettes !, Marilyn Monroe Chocolate !, Marilyn Monroe AK47 !,
Marilyn Monroe Tablecloth !, Marilyn Monroe Afterlife !, Marilyn Monroe
Messaging !, Marilyn Monroe Dishwasher !, Marilyn Monroe
Telescope !, Marilyn Monroe Atlas !, Marilyn Monroe Shoehorn !,
Marilyn Monroe Funeral Services !, Marilyn Monroe Beef Burger !, Marilyn
Monroe Lava Lamp !, Marilyn Monroe Telepathic Implant !, Marilyn
Monroe Necromancy !, Marilyn Monroe Queen-size Bed !, Marilyn
Monroe Keyring !, Marilyn Monroe Tomato Purée !, Marilyn Monroe
Oven !, Marilyn Monroe Sunflower Oil !, Marilyn Monroe Toothpaste !,
Marilyn Monroe Fine Art !, Marilyn Monroe Financial Services !, Marilyn
Monroe Tree Surgeons !, Marilyn Monroe Veterinary Practice !, Marilyn
Monroe TV !, Marilyn Monroe Music !, Marilyn Monroe Trombone !,
Marilyn Monroe Crystal Meth !, Marilyn Monroe Potato Snacks !, Marilyn
Monroe Housing !, Marilyn Monroe Zombie Maker !, Marilyn Monroe
Fencing Solutions !, Marilyn Monroe Couriers !, Marilyn Monroe Air
Conditioning !, Marilyn Monroe Rhinoplasty !, Marilyn Monroe
Masonry !, Marilyn Monroe Hedge Trimmers !, Marilyn Monroe Hell
Gate !, Marilyn Monroe Plumbing Services !, Marilyn Monroe WiFi !,
Marilyn Monroe Body Armour !, Marilyn Monroe Nannies !, Marilyn
Manson Candy Floss !, Marilyn Manson Mixtapes !, Marilyn Manson
Chiropractic !, Marilyn Manson Baby Doll !, Marilyn Manson Coffee !,
Marilyn Manson Lighting !, Marilyn Manson Craft Ales !, Marilyn Manson
Flamethrower !, Marilyn Manson Double Glazing !, Marilyn Manson
Removals !, Marilyn Manson Porridge !, Marilyn Manson Cobblers !,
Marilyn Manson Nursing !, Marilyn Manson Reincarnation !, Marilyn
Manson Jeans !, Marilyn Manson Counselling !, Marilyn Manson Book
Binding !, Marilyn Manson Time Travel !, Marilyn Manson
Meditation !, Marilyn Manson Scaffolding !, Marilyn Manson Water !,
Marilyn Manson Face Mask !, Marilyn Manson Fancy Dress !, Marilyn
Manson Writing Machine !, Marilyn Manson Family Enhancer !, Marilyn
Manson Goat !, Marilyn Manson Drone !, Marilyn Manson Layer
Cake !, Marilyn Manson Victim Support !, Marilyn Manson Bible !,
Marilyn Manson Pest Control !, Marilyn Manson Panic Room !, Marilyn
Manson Rabbit Hole !, Marilyn Manson Dentistry !, Marilyn Manson
Smoothie !, Marilyn Manson Verruca Treatment !, Marilyn Manson Spin
‘n’ Play !, Marilyn Manson Energy Pills !, Marilyn Manson
Cartography !, Marilyn Manson Bookies !, Marilyn Manson Kettle !,
Marilyn Manson Topiary !, Marilyn Manson Surgical Supplies !, Marilyn
Manson Nail Bar !, Marilyn Manson Publishing !, Marilyn Manson
Vomitorium !, Marilyn Manson Information Consultants !, Marilyn Manson
Hearing Aid !, Marilyn Manson Dildo !, Marilyn Manson Baby Food !,
Marilyn Manson News Channel !, Marilyn Manson Neck Brace !, Marilyn
Manson Advertising !, Marilyn Manson Artisan Café !, Marilyn Manson
Biomorphic Design !, Marilyn Manson Pet Care !, Marilyn Manson
Massage !, Marilyn Manson Terraforming !, Marilyn Manson Waste
Disposal !, Manson & Monroe Experimental Genetics !, Manson &
Monroe Atrocity Dome !, Manson & Monroe Superego Suppressant !,
Manson & Monroe Dream Magnifier !, Manson & Monroe Food
Weapon !, Manson & Monroe Recreational Psychosis !, Manson &
Monroe Cold Object !, Manson & Monroe Hex Necklace !, Manson &
Monroe Iron Voyeur !, Manson & Monroe Radioactive Rave !, Manson &
Monroe Disease Face !, Manson & Monroe Canine Locomotive !, Manson
& Monroe Nasty Tennis !, Manson & Monroe Convulsive Spa !, Manson &
Monroe Skeleton Physics !, Manson & Monroe Barbie Armageddon !,
Manson & Monroe Wet Knife !, Manson & Monroe Electric Slipknot !,
Manson & Monroe Sad Triumph !, Manson & Monroe Oneiric Animal
Trap !, Manson & Monroe Laughing Android !, Manson & Monroe Nuclear
Helmet !, Manson & Monroe Abomination Mirror !, Manson & Monroe
Dog Tower !, Manson & Monroe Enucleation Services !, Manson &
Monroe Throat Bomb !, Manson & Monroe Primal Simulacrum !, Manson
& Monroe Gaga Caca !, Manson & Monroe End-Times See-Saw !,
Manson & Monroe Gooey Nazi !, Manson & Monroe Church Slice !,
Manson & Monroe Chaotic Evil !, Manson & Monroe Hyperreal Speech
Bubble !, Manson & Monroe Fox Disaster !, Manson & Monroe Fake
Fakes !, Charles Manson Wedding Services !

Today the sun pulled me inside out. I got 0 likes and an infinite
number of new followers.
If I had words crude enough to describe the hole we found ourselves in, I’d wear
my crown of shit

DELETE WORDS, BUILD WORLDS

This ridiculous game had gone on for too long and it was time

HURRY UP PLEASE IT’S TIME

And you could have it all

My empire of dirt
I will let you down
I will make you hurt

a sinking feeling retreating into something fur over my eyes trying to blink
through room lit dramatically as if for effect shadows erasing the wall to the right
and the spaces at the back trying to stand up ringing in my ears like when I first
passed out like leaving the George Robey barely able to hear everything
sounding papery thin still worried the next day

BEAUTY WILL BE CONVULSIVE OR

stomach pit | deaf ice | static overlay

inverted poem | smart-arse pyramid | blind run
red resistance | banner choke | mouths

Chew, devour, chew, devour, chew, devour, chew, devour, chew chew chew
chew chew chew chew chew chew chew chew chew chew chew chew chew
chew chew chew chew chew chew chew chew chew chew chew chew chew
chew chew chew chew chew chew chew chew chew chew chew chew chew
chew chew chew chew chew chew chew chew chew chew chew chew chew
chew chew chew chew chew the satisfaction of tapping out the word CHEW
[space] repeatedly rhythmically two-fingered chew chew chew chew chew chew
chew chew chew chew chew chew chew chew chew chew chew chew chew
chew chew chew chew chew chew chew chew chew chew chew chew chew
chew chew chew chew chew chew chew chew chew chew chew chew chew
chew chew chew chew chew chew chew chew chew chew chew chew chew
chew but all work and no play chew, devour, chew, devour

ice: the mirror of the self

horny Narcissus doubled over

he had four ribs removed so he could give himself

WAR IS THE WORLD’S ONLY HYGIENE

every last one of them every man jack a miserable negative bastard

EACH IN DOWN CURTAIN THE DAILY MAIL FACE:

FROM MOUTH THE COLD, AND FROM THEM EYES THE CAR SAD
Have you ever had a ride in a light blue car?
BETWEEN DAILY MAIL TESTIMONY YES RUBBISH.

WHEN I DAILY MAIL AROUND SOMEWHAT VIZIER,

DAILY MAIL FEET AND DAILY MAIL TWO YES CLOSE,
THAT I DAILY MAIL OF THE HEAD TOGETHER MIXED.

“TELL ME, YOU THAT YES, THE SUN THE BREASTS,

TO HE SAID, “WHO ARE YOU?” AND THOSE THE SUN THE CALL;
AND THEN THE SUN THEM FACES TO ME ERECTED
Side effects may include blindness, incontinence and erectile dysfunction.

THEM EYES DAILY MAIL PRIM WHILE INSIDE MOLLY

DROP ON FOR THE LIPS, FROST TIGHTENS
THE TEARS BETWEEN THEY AND DAILY MAIL.

WITH WOOD WOOD SPAIN NEVER NOT SURROUNDS

FORCE COS WAVE THERE HOW TWO BEAKS
CLASH TOGETHER, SO ANGER THEM WON.

AND THE SUN LOST BOTH THEM EARS

FOR THE PUN, WHILE WITH DAILY MAIL IN WAISTCOAT
ITSELF HE SAID, “WHY SO MUCH IN WE YOU MIRRORS?”

Major Tom was in orbit around himself

This ridiculous game had gone on for too long and it was time

WHY SO MUCH IN WE YOU MIRRORS?

 things fall apart
the centre cannot hold

Look down there, laughed Tom, showing his teeth: there is the word-forest!

And aghast terror only

many of his way
Medusa strong shaves once Man
guards Rocks
describe the wrong horror times
forlorn thoughts
the swift dies
I death
Abominable lamentable him couldn’t
Gates Perverse
Thus eyes highest Chimeras dire feign'd living of curse
Deep high saw march something and sir View'd
fiery evil Concave God
Now the death nothing
and moment of down looking
pass'd Hydra's Gorgonian design
somewhere not solitary must He wing of extraordinary
They he out I deformed towards Nature things
God is and lives and He never prodigious
scarce Gorgons conceiv'd through
The monstrous fear roving
There as something confus'd flies a hand
Tantalus touring inutterable
With hand shuddring I inflam'd and declare found a rest death with He and know
No flight
Puts water displeasing man
Satan man specify can lip this coast
 him breeds dolorous
see
a Universe
appearance
and the Hell left
dark
Caves good detestable worse
I disliked
fled name
taste deformity
the Adversary
Region then He’s evil times
Ford Created shades
why all so memory with many wings and something
Fens Lakes right life feeling right Frozen easy and

oven-ready
like Sunday morning
beast houses
shuttered websites

the theologically untenable case of zombies: the sinners remain on earth as

animated corpses until their deaths, but their souls are in Hell from the moment
that they betray

In this Circle of Hell, the Teeth Men beat consumers with their own selfie-sticks
hahahahahahaha

A bit of Tom’s face has fallen off

Tech news: Two weeks after the launch of Humpbot 2x, Peach has released
HumpBot 3V. The new model offers a vastly superior abuser experience,
rendering its predecessor obsolete.

thought I’d moved past all that

congratulations
you’re through to the next round
 this was the end of the words

The Emperor of the kingdom dolorous

From his mid—breast forth issued from the ice
The emperor of the despondent kingdom
so towered from the ice
The king of that vast kingdom of all grief
Stuck out with half his chest above the ice

The Pale Emperor

trapped in the mirror
The Thin White Duke
behind the screen

I looked round and Tom had disappeared. I was still holding the
vestiges of his hand.

In the nervous system, ice is abundant and occurs naturally from as close to the
brain as the heart to as far away as the blood objects. Beyond the nervous
system, it occurs as virtual ice. It is abundant on your surface – particularly in the
nether regions and above your eyes.

now just faces in the screens

cracking up
heads LOL
 I watched for love-cars. Lights turned down,
they lay together,

I've got a Pizzaland complexion

Bright green sox
I am the happy little face
On the charity box

The physics of descent becoming ascent. I had flowers in my eyes.

Your mechanical grief debated aloud. Waking from dreams in which insects and
a crocodile had got into my hair. He was a weapon made of cockroaches. I want
more life, fucker. Legs, not souls. Burning suburban vistas and everyone happy
with their WiFi. Trench daydreams. Into, not out of. Please shake your head three
times when Satan opens his anus. Now you’ve seen it all. The scene changes
from red to white. What a performance! Idle extermination of panicked question
marks. And other hyperboles. But what else is there???????? Bad English in
doorways. So let’s recap: XXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXX XXXXXX
XX X XXXX XXXXXX XXX XX X XXXXXXX XXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX
X X X X XX XXXX X X X X XXXXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

Illusion is no longer possible,

because the real is no longer possible
I’d spiralled down to the bottom it was a finite abyss a pit no more but deep too
deep to climb back up somehow down impossibly down seemed the only way
then the shaggy-haired light gripped my arm and impelled me in that direction
and the coarse textures flipped the cops back and forth from their high-rise
daydreams in green and black they had egg on their faeces where the
unspeakable indescribable ineffable Barbie monstrosities pullulated in the red
sack night shifting in and out of focus so the spectators the viewers the voyeurs
got angry and demanded acid baths laughing alien sex fiends blue-faced in the
gallery corridors not even eligible for the main exhibition the maimed inhibitions
of lava and tree-tops coming together in the bleak mid-winter of your socks are
odd zany you don’t have to be mad to work here but let’s dance and see where
the money goes if we don’t organise a fake bank heist for the umpteenth
Instagram annihilation when I come over just make sure you don’t see me don’t
you fucking look at me you know I am one fucking well-dressed man ascending
the deflated timeline trying not to characterise the mimsy rooks or crows or
whatever those things are trying to remain in control in the ground in Ground
Control where Major Ttttttttttttttttommmmmmm struck a deal with Vlad the
Inhaler and a slab of bear meat slammed down on the U S of A haha we had to
laugh the promised plague of cockroaches had yet to materialise despite our
efforts in the Oneiric Research Laboratory where we had enjoyed small
successes such as the recovery from a bad dream of thirteen disturbing objects
including a forest dark a series of concentric ditches a laughing devil mask and a
non-existent entity calling itself the Bird King we had donned our caps and our
scrubs of course what do you take us for don’t bitch about me don’t tread on me
it was autumn and the sun hadn’t been invented I got X likes and X new
followers you can fill in the blanks you can fill me in any time you like fnarr fnarr
far far away in a beautiful magical ethereal soft-focus soft-porn kingdom there
lived nothing nothing nothing nothing nothing nothing nothing nothing nothing
nothing nothing nothing nothing nothing nothing nothing coming of nothing
nothing nothing nothing nothing nothing nothing nothin keep ‘em coming Jack
nothing nothing nothing Jack shit nothing nothing nothing zero percent interest
in your life your work your conversation nothing nothing nothing nothing nothing
nothing nothing nothing nothing strong and stable nothing nothing nothing
nothing nothing nothing nothing Make America nothing nothing nothing nothing
nothing burning nothing nothing nothing the will of the nothing nothing nothing
nothing burning burning nothing nothing nothing Brexit means burning burning
nothing nothing nothing nothing nothing nothing nothing nothing burning burning
calories is best achieved through regular exercise burning houses is best
achieved through arson nothing nothing nothing beats the taste nothing nothing
280 characters that’s two lots of nothing nothing nothing nothing nothing nothing
nothing compares 2 U nothing nothing burning burn Hollywood burn feel the
burn Homer Simpson prophet armchair revolutionary the shaggy-haired light had
me by the short and curlies oink oink stop ahead but where you can’t see it in
this collaged landscape where the perspective is off some idiot has been
messing with the images I don’t trust what I’m looking at don’t know where to
tread it looks more like paper than a highway leading somewhere if I put a match
to it it’ll burn burn burn a strange compulsion juvenile pyromancy the orchestra
climaxes too often it’s hard as they approached the dead end as they
meandered towards the place where the ground rots her hair her swinging hair
she’ll never know then sniggering at the swinging body OMG we caught it all on
our iPhones we smashed ourselves into nothing it was fucking awesome we are
fucking awesome it’s all about winning never listen just win that’s what they’ll tell
you don’t listen just win it looked as if I was coming out on the other side my left
leg got stuck in the maw for a second but I think I was out the mechanical
grasses whistled to me across the factory floor where babies hatched from
crocodile tears and Sleeping Beauty touched herself in a bath of blood the
screen showed other things too a man strangling himself in his sleep a dog
retrieving a bone from Mars a throne made of lightbulbs a cybernetic peach
things were hotting up concentric circles of flames around that metal band that
wears masks who are they again liquid hands on porcelain skin black smudges
around my eyes the Parade of the Paranormal Emojis fizzing politicians the
headless god that best-selling picture book what’s it called again The Hungry
Maggot can’t quite make it out a clandestine group of young people writing
poems together then opening their veins into a bathtub a camera vomiting flesh
monsters napalm eyeballs behind the curtains jellied horses hold still hold still
thrashing ice furious office chairs garrulous banknotes streaming glitch arcades
in sun-bleached cats an immaterial group of people writing stories together then
faking their own kidnapping an egg inside a maggot inside a fly inside a museum
inside a mouth full of teeth inside a strangled expression inside a broken beer
bottle sometimes there’s God so quickly inside a burning forest of symbols
inside a side order of chunky clowns inside a gorilla looking out at you from the
scaffolding inside a collection of flash fiction inside a sow’s diet inside a
Jehovah’s Witness inside a petrified forest inside a fuzzy lime inside a captive
portal inside a reptilian case of Stockholm Syndrome inside a bread snake inside
a sloppy handrail inside a film about an actress who murders the director inside
a summation of all the plants inside a girder of legs inside a green rain of digital
characters spelling UNREAL CITY inside a nail sarcophagus inside a dread of
thunder inside an enchanted forest inside a mask inside a doll inside a fire-
damaged mannequin inside a black feather inside a drone of down-tuned guitars
inside a drone of violins inside a weekly TV comedy about a director who
murders his cast members one by one inside a line about lines inside a grass
blade inside a root inside a pitch inside a space inside a room inside a world
inside a slap of canned laughter inside a tin of peaches inside a hidden track at
the end of the CD inside a break in the code inside a fork in the road inside a
fork in a spoon inside a fork in a balloon inside a collapsed lung inside a JPEG of
Kanye looking wolffish inside a GIF of The Most Important Woman in the World
twerking inside a sprained nest inside a toe inside a forest of words inside a
secret agreement inside a deafness inside or outside I couldn’t tell the light was
tentacular now I looked up or down at what might have been a cathedral or
castle or factory probably the latter a factory where poetry was produced the
marketing department was located in my spine I had to get two buses and a
tube the air was bad when I got there I was treated with open disdain despite the
black butterfly I’d had pinned to my mouth it was the month of the Teeth Men
when Ronald McDonald let rip with his shark-bots and a replica Arnold
Schwarzenegger tangoed with Marilyn Monroe or perhaps probably most likely
Marilyn Manson everyone praying for the Helter Skelter and subsequent
assumption into Nowhere of all the king’s horses and all the king’s men the
masses gleeful pissed up punch drunk toasting each other with flame-throwers
in the iron streets just round the corner waited the Bird King or someone in tar
and feathers desperate to behead you film crews posted like snipers out of view
the director somewhere not anywhere pulling strings ventriloquising but the
words became things and New York heaved with abominations yelping shapes
flesh chairs intestinal screams slathering gloves eye clamps march of the idiots
march of the pigs all lined up I give you all that you want take the skin and peel it
back I’m loving it terms and conditions apply sorry your application has been
rejected sorry we just weren’t feeling it whose voice is this anyway could be
anyone’s I am the vessel through which The Rite passed I predict a riot
automatic writing reduces conscious agency they all collaborated on the text
and published it anonymously when they came on stage one of them was
wearing a Guy Fawkes mask another had a handkerchief over the lower half of
his face as if he was about to rob a bank I ran through a list of identifies gathered
my selves and tried to keep them under control in the fenced area beneath the
mountain where a leopard a lion a wolf waited for the next performance nearly
time now sshhh house lights out where’s Tommy he’ll miss it where’s Tommy
where the hell is he

Disneyland is there to conceal the fact that it is the “real” country,

all of “real” America, which is Disneyland

dead astronaut in space

Then I woke up
Midway upon the journey of our life
Right in the middle of a horrible dream
I found myself within a forest dark
Yes, I woke up
For the straightforward pathway had been lost
About the author

James Knight is a writer and digital artist, whose work most recently has
appeared in Minor Literature(s) and Burning House Press. Much of his work
I think I’d prefer a
explores the conjunctions and disjunctions between word and image, for
shorter version of
example in his surrealistic dystopian novella, Mono, comprising 60 monochrome
this, please.
images and a fragmented narrative in the second person. He has collaborated
with numerous artists, including Susan Omand, Viviana Hinojosa and Maxim I’ll include the
Peter Griffin. Diana Probst illustrated his poem, The Madness of the Bird King, text in an email.
described by cyberpunk author Jeff Noon as “a brilliant piece of work”. Knight is
one of the original members of Noon’s Twitter group, @echovirus12, and has
used Twitter as a creative tool for years, founding the collective Twitter entity
@chimeragroup0, whose mission statement summarises his approach to writing
and art: “Children make pictures, poems and stories playfully, adventurously,
unconstrained by considerations of realism, theory or convention. So do we.”

Twitter: @badbadpoet
email: [email protected]

Website: thebirdking.com
 Acknowledgements

Any to add?

With thanks to ReVerse Butcher for the feedback and encouragement, Paul Hawkins for
taking this on, and Sally for being Sally.