THE NEW OEDIPUS WRECKS

NOTE ON OEDIPUS WRECKS

My friend Dr. Calculator Ptom named the band Oedipus Wrecks upon hearing my songs. He used to say gnomic things like “the universe is a projection of the mind.” “The G note is green on the guitar fretboard.” “The song ‘Born Slippy’ is evidence dance can have a soul.” “Poetry is untranslatable because of the music.” “Death is God.” “Early Oasis is good for bittersweet, comedown energy.” We boarded a train not knowing where it was headed in the middle of the Night in London. By now he is Dr. Calculator Thomas and the song is ‘Born Slippery.’

THE OEDIPUS WRECKS GIG, CAMDEN TOWN, CIRCA 1998

I

THE GHOSTS LAMENT

I'm the only one left, left to shoot my

own gun. This is the dead land. Crack a smile

and curse the sun. Death awaits to fuck me.

Give me bliss and give me kisses. Death a-

waits to save me. The ghosts lament, the ghosts

lament. Come on baaaaaaaaaby, you know it's e-

asy, don't say maaaaaaaaaybe, let's go crazy. Death

awaits to fuck me. Give me bliss and give

me kisses. Death awaits the same me. The

ghosts lament, the ghosts lament, no more ghosts.

||||.

[Note: when years later I discovered the James P D Tucker sheet where pictures grew, and the pictures seemed to depict the lyric to one of my old songs, this is the song.]

II

SECRETS IN THE MUD

This is the sound of getting totally fucked.

Of when you first get your notebook sucked.

Of changing gold into Glastonbury mud.

Of lying down in a field with your bud.

This is the music through whom we aspire.

This is the rule book that is thrown on the fire.

This is the jam where the trousers are down.

This is the wine-shop on the edge of town.

Chorus: Glastonbury, you should be free, and all you have in your big city,

you hit my G, you make me see how I want to see,

lights go down, lights come on,

and all my sadness seems to be gone,

although I still love to be what I dream I am.

[guitar solo]

III

OCEANS SMILE

Oceans smile with liquid eyes

and fill themselves with rain.

The tide goes out and leaves me

lost, the last thing a glass gene.

Follow me to the resurrection

while the blind get crucified.

My weapon’s only loaded in my eyes.

Death will come on silky wings

but I for one will not go.  

A soul is endless, oceans open

and keeeeeeeps a perfect O.

Follow me to the resurrection

while the blind get crucified.

My weapon’s only loaded in my eyes.

Go drink the ocean with your tea

cup, give your heart far out.

If oceans smile with liquid eyes

then they'll give you a shout.

Follow me to the resurrection

while the blind get crucified.

My weapon’s only loaded in my eyes.

Too drunkenly I sail the water

on Rimbaud’s smoking boat.

With whiskygills primed in fire

I sail the waves to Boot.

Follow me to the resurrection

while the blind get crucified.

My weapon’s only loaded in my eyes.

(reconstructed via the new, synchronised word)

IV

KILL

My eyes sting,

my teeth are bleeding raw,

too much thought

to make me sick.

Stinky clothes

and mouth become

my skin and all

these fruits I want to kill.

Give my hope,

surrender to the tide,

you can take

my remains;

but I must go,

to wash the poison

from my eyes,

before, before, before I kill.

V

SNAKE SNAKE BUTTERFLY

Snake snake butterfly, lay me dead & close my eyes.

Angel serpentine, she waits on the Other Side.

Give me your alibi; give me chains to stop me fly;

give me night to soothe my blinded eyes:

so I can see the secrets of the skies.

We must rise, freedom falling from our eyes,

unlock doors, it's a perfect time to die,

and it's okay ‘cause baby we'll go insane

but don't reach out too far for the flame.

Snake snake butterfly, lead me to the Other Side.

Angel serpentine, she waits on the Other Side.

VI

VITAL SIGNS

Smile like a smile just to smile,

cast to Heaven for a while...

let's rip holes in the boat,

throw the captain overboard,

throw the angels off the bridge,

death comes and stops me getting

bored of life's soul-machine.

What we need is energy,

show me all your vital signs,

what we steal is what we need,

what we need to feel alive,

for I'm alive with vital signs.

Back to Hell to plunder wings,

let the ritual now begin,

come and ride the waiting beast,

ride it gone into the fire,

ride it to the waiting feast,

my baby's waiting to get higher,

to get higher, to get higher...

what we need is energy,

show me all your vital signs,

what we steal is what we need,

what we need to feel alive,

for I'm alive with vital signs,

yeah feel alive with vital signs.

Come again there's much to do,

don't you know that I love you?

VII

HEAVEN KNOWS

Heaven knows and walks away -

but what it knows it will not say.

It’s impossible to make a cowboy film in space?

Heaven knows and turns its face!

Heaven’s filled with silver eyes.

Heaven’s hills all harmonise.

I hear its angels when they call...

Heaven knows and lets them fall!

[reconstructed]

VIII

MURDER IS DEAD

Fuck this, fuck that, fuck me yeah,

I wish that I had been there,

been there to saaaaaave Jesus,

I'm sure he meant to please us.

Murder is dead,

murder is dead,

murder is dead.

We're young and filled with semen,

we're going to break some hymen,

we'll make the cops turn in their badges,

we're going over all the edges yeah.

Murder is dead,

murder is dead,

murder is dead.

I KNEW THAT SHE LOVED ME

I escaped last night

into a heightened dream

from a dull and longing sleep

and the stars murmured

their cool ballad

to the approaching sky.

Secrets hung like ghosts

in the corner of my wanton world

all blurred and drugged too deep

and I knew that she loved me

from her invisible motions

and the dagger in her soft reply.

The questions concealed in her eye.

Her smile a luring prison.

Her blink a beautiful danger.

Her breath a poisonous magic.

And I knew that silence

would soon let slip its whisper,

knew that fantasy

had never been so real

and I knew that she loved me

because I knew everything.

I knew.

A SINGLE BY SECRET CHORD H

I

SIDE A: DREAM WITH OPEN EYES

(used as radio jingle circa 1999)

Last night it seemed we couldn't

sleep but maybe I was dreaming.

The world expands inside my

hands it's getting heavy.

Of all the treasures I could

choose I can't seem to decide.

Today the shade was washed

away where I would hide.

Dream with open eyes, come

below and we can fantasise.

Now that I’ve stopped telling lies, come

below and we can fantasise.

Last night it seemed we nearly

died but maybe I was dreaming.

It made me feel sooooooooooooo

alive and soooooooo in love.

Dream with open eyes, come

below and we can fantasise.

Now that I’ve stopped telling lies, come

below and we can fantasise.

II

SIDE B: TELEPATHIC ELEPHANT

Another, another, another fucking joint.

Another, another, another fucking joint.

Another, another, another fucking joint.

Another, another, another fucking joint.

Another, another, another fucking joint.

Another, another, another fucking joint.

Another, another, another fucking joint.

Another, another, another fucking joint.

Another, another, another fucking joint.

[Note: this song concerns a tape with a pause where stuck together in the flimsy reel. The tape is of Pearl Jam ‘VS’ and therefore the experiment is in building a poetry machine in perpetual motion.]

ALAS THE DAY

Alas the daaaaaaaaay, doesn’t matter anyway,

for there is a Night; and heartbeats are bold

and hold me tight; and Night is blessed

and filled with questions can not guess

what will happen next, O maybe death... 

then of course we’ll lie under fertile loam;

but for now we’re miles away from home.

O electric street, I’m feeling New Beat,

I feel the heat within my sensory atrophy...

so many things are all happening at once -

the infinite cocks are fucking the infinite cunts!

Then of course we’ll know who sees something strange;

and he will know when it’s time for a sea-change.

TEACHER OF MY HEART

I have found you, you're the Teacher,

of my Heart, there's only one one,

and though my mind is endless old,

my tender heart is foolish young,

and my timeless impassion'd battles,

of emotion have sooooon begun.

You have lost me in a Teachers,

whisky bottle drinking down down

down the shipwreck IS the treasure,

harboured in my pirate undertown,

where visions of the real Unknown

await us there when we drown.

They have told me it's a T-shirt,

that's the body worn by the soul,

O to have to discorporate and wash

our eyes in the Fairy Liquid bowl,

it's good for you to know a goal,

there is no music from a black hole.

NO DEATH ONLY CHANGE

Don’t be afraid/ there is no death only change/ let’s pretend, let’s pretend/ there is no end of play/ tonight, tonight/ I only believe in tonight / so for once/ throw your cares and travel with me/ travel with me/ travel with me/ travel with me/ I for one/ have long gone/ out the door and far away/ down south/ mouth to mouth/ to exhume a brighter day/ live for this/ chance at bliss/ this kiss that wants to form/ on the air/ everywhere/ as the honey’d sun beats down/ on the nervous under-town/ planes are the shoes of clowns/ yeah yeah yeah /

THE WARNING

(recorded on state of the art binaural earphones in The Flood and now online)

“Going to meet with the Otherness,

best go get a party dress,

play a stone, live in the wilderness,

I'm going to beat with the Otherness.

Suddenly their brain is an alien visitation,

suddenly I am the imposter againe,

lying in secret wait of myself,

knife ready to treat the pain.”

SAD HYPOCHONDRIAC

I know she's only a phone call away...

maybe she's got something to say?

Anyway by now her number's probably changed...

seems even numbers can't just stay the same.

You always used to say to me

“to love someone truly is to set them free” -

you always knew better than me

you always knew better than me.

I know she's only a daydream away -

transient rainbow not made to stay -

only made of sunlight and tears! -

beauty like that should last for years.  

You always used to say to me

“to love someone truly is to set them free” -

you always knew better than me

you always knew better than me.

I’m just a sad hypochondriac.

Just another shooting rock star in love with the black.

Don’t want to die of a sudden art attack.

I’m just a sad hypochondriac.

I'm just a sad hypochondriac.

I'm just a sad hypochondriac.

I'm just sorry for everything I lack.

I’m just a sad hypochondriac.

BAD DAY AT THE OFFICE

Such a bad day at the office

down the pub to get pissed

though I can't afford it

we'll never get a pay rise

stay up till sunrise

call in sick in the morning

spend the whole day mourning

underneath the covers

where the fuck is Batman

Sugar Candy Mountain

waiting for some action

heard it brings good fortune

papers want a scandal

tell them the truth

if you can handle

what a fucking headline

where in Hell is Tinkerbell

somewhere alone and dying

dawn calls in sick in the morning

what's the use in trying

don't believe in dying

it's shocking and appalling

it's four o'clock in the morning

and Paradise is boring.

PRIVATE DETECTIVES AND SECRET SPIES

I sleep in a hole for the Hoover tonight

there's always something not quite right

look at a wall it's not too hard to see

all the cracks and flaws beneath the paint

maybe all we need is to decorate the place

private detectives and secret spies

seem to have uncovered all of my lies,

scar sand-birthmarks beneath my skin,

should I sever my face with razor blades

to show you some ugly truth w/in

well maybe I should but I'd prefer to

score your flawless body with sin

like two new humans made for life

with default buttons to wipe any slate clean

and one of them man and one of them wife

in Crufts as it is in the black angel’s death song

INSTANT TRAVEL

[warning: contains voices]

Not far away in Magic Faraway Land,

there’s poetry written on the bank notes,

sadness gene is smitten with dreaming gland,

the God Particle foreseen in the dust motes...

I. T. might stand for Instant Travel too,

NHS for Lucy in the soul with demons,

H20 stands for your hypothalamus tattoo,

ESA for Extra Sensory Allowance -

so how about we take a long holiday there?

You buy yourself a ticket with the opposite of bling.

You’ll see through the frame of angel hair,

and might just need a love-song to sing.

Yeah yeah yeah, our love is the answer,

spinning in a circle around the tired sun,

waiting for the cure or vaccine for cancer,

seeming to be dreaming of the mid-day moon…

TRUE LOVE DOT COM

Dead clock plodding play a different song // we're waiting for some action and some change to come along // been waiting all night at true love dot com // you're only just starting to notice the mushrooms are still too strong // dead pedestrians thinking fumes stay in and get fat in your new chat rooms // we chase the wave forms of the dusky dawn w/ black shadow cat-prints going backwards on the lawn // and I confess my open heart is lying w/ her legs apart // and if she said she's in love w/ me I wouldn't go taking it personally // for love has no ego as everybody knows  and something inside me she's given me grows // and a playground swing on the vexed edge of life sighs empty and forever and out falls a leaf // and not into love does that green leaf fall where wet Westerly winds swoop and call // we are the glitter on the Christmas trees and not the litter in the filibustering breeze // and the E comedown has no value in maths // and the loonies all walk on the wrong paths // and the grass is green on the Other Side // it pulls the ropes of the evening tide.

TEST MONKEY IN B

We’re aliens looking for life on Mars

aliens trying to make life in jars

aliens homesick for the stars

trying to find home in the all-night bars

in a world with no more la di da’s

the sunset silts its knickers and bras

the night is bright with white guitars

the fat cats smoke their fat cigars

the wall inside is still the Tsar’s

I watch the passing of the cars

I’m through with reading inveterate scars

in a room resounding with loud hurrahs

THAT BLACK NATURAL E

[spoken word narrative for B minor]

Where once I wandered far and wide 

on a field-file, a file-field, 

a fenceless farm without 

security alarm where all hearts bleed

and all arts breed, now Hell

is very quiet, unadvertised.

McBreastmilk, 

McBreastmilk, 

don’t feed your kids.

Gentle face erasing cream,

smear it in and let it sink

down through the pores of your skin

to erase your deepest down dirt.

O stars the government

that truly speaks for us!

Get an extra kid for free

when you spend 99p.

Freefall 0800 down

your own black hole pupils.

Maybelline you maybe only make-believe

you may be the true mating queen of the hive,

may mad vampires stalk you,

stalking walls walk through

your vagrant dreams.

I see state of head

is more than Head of State.

Monster Munch can

always gobble up your food.

Cancerel can always 

sweeten the stewed-

carfume coffee we sip in 

this liminal afterlounge.

It’s getting cramped

as a tin of beans in here.

In emergency please 

break glass and exit.

Credits at the end of innocence

are falling like numberless lists

of fallen autumn leaves.

Snatched handfuls of light

come to nothing in the dark room.

There must be a use for 

this dust amounting.

There’s nothing like digging 

a meaningless hole as if to cure the 

spiralling lethargy of Hell...

and when I went into the 

woods to bury my soul, 

all the trees knelt down.

O perpetual orgasm of the sun! 

Privation is the mother of imagery.

Prayers, ghosts and 

e-mails chatter on 

the ego-loss breeze.

The chitchat in the solipsistic

kitchen of fiction is 'phatic'.

My new, motley fridge magnet

letters contain no question 

mark in the pack but the first

qualification of Modernism

is enquiry and furthermore

wilful ignorance is a sin.

Meanwhile outside the 

fallen Autumn leaves 

are where bears have 

dipped their feet in pots of paint 

and danced across the threshold 

of the paving stones.

Water clears its throat from the tap.

Gunpowder was only invented

for fireworks and a firework

is a champion sperm nosing up

blind to explode bright and wonderful

deep-sea creatures in the Ancient Night.

The world is a cool, bejewell'd

marble snug in Holy Orbit

suckling on a mother sun.

Supposedly there is soon

to be New Atlantis on the moon.

The cure for cancer 

sustains your heart.

Robbed by a bastard vending machine,

somewhere a tramp drinks paint-stripper 

to cleanse the doors of perception,

a drunkard attacks a wall

on an otherwise empty street,

a policeman forces himself

to come with a gun.

Hey salesman 

slow down 

with that

fast-food. 

I don't mind

waiting here

for a year. 

(2002)

LUCY IN THE SOUL WITH DEMONS

(warning: contains voices)

I no longer know if Lucy in the soul with demons

even happens to be an actual substance

but I know that acid can alter personality

and when home-made and strong be very scary.

Do not flinch at your own shadow when

you take its dark receipt into the glen

for panic in a wild stallion horse’s eye

can spread like wild-fire across the madding sky

where a digital wind of blue and green

blows in fake and chemical as glycerine

and the derangement of the senses can go

hang its head in shame, dear Master neo-Rimbaud.

AIR RAID SHELTER

(originally recorded on binaural earphones in The Flood but not used for their record)

Air raid shelter, we're in it together,

let's not get entrenched too deeply,

fear and pain's our only motivation,

got to break free from that habit apathy.

Clinging to loveless, sweaty, rubber limbs

won't cure your heart, it's a painful art,

air-raid shelter, we're in it together now,

wrap me away in your wombs and duvets.

See this world from outer space minor,

saaaaaaaaafe distances have found

all our solid, common ground,

echo grammanon habeo amore.

Won't your spaceships come to find me,

pull myself right back to the centre,

attack on all sides, hold you soooooo tight

now that there is noooooo time.

I’m just trying to forget how to smell acid,

and still it seems acid isn’t flaccid,

but I think that you’ll find I still

got there in the end somehow.

LOVE YOUR NEIGHBOUR

(recorded on binaural earphones in The Flood but not used on their album)

Love your neighbour till your girl gets home

I’m fleeing the town in my neighbour's clothes

love your neighbour in her underwear

I wonder what goes on under there

and you’d better repent

for all the money you spent

now you’re dove has been sent

Love your neighbour when you're all alone

I left my message on your answerphone

love your neighbour with her tricks and lies

ask no questions hear no lies

and you’d better repent

for all the money you spent

now you’re dove has been sent

Love your neighbour till the war is gone

I think they think that’s not fair on John

love your neighbour when the war is over

treat your neighbour like your long lost lover

and you’d better repent

for all the money you spent

now you’re dove has been sent

HUNGER

(recorded on binaural earphones by The Flood and now online)

I e I e I e have I e I e I e have

I e I e I e have I have Hunger

I'm a sick magnet I e I e I e I'm in want

maybe all I need is a new pair of shades

I'm a craving slave for you

your pleasure's dust your pleasure's just

your pleasure's just your suffering's bait

it's a sucker's fate for you

escape escape escape escape

your home your clothes and all you know

leave no footprint in the snow it's just a photo

escape escape escape your name

your stain your skin your dead routine

for the pristine dream for her

I'm going to get your freshness back

plug my senses in the mains

it's just a bloodrush to my brains

I'm going to get pretty much f***ed up

flee this world on a midnight plane

dance with the aliens and the insane.

SKUNKFOOT

(spoken word narrative to go over a drone of E)

Portability still seems the Apotheosis of Form: sometimes I can be walking along on a sunny day when I jump from the jungle to the Arctic to the Sahara. Mutation in consciousness itself, truth too simple to understand, these are gesture-without-motion-bones, like sadness gene and dreaming gland. It's not impossible to write an anti-poem. Love is not a mechanistic set of rules. Love was once aligned with madness, fever and intoxication. Love became grouped with language not God. Love became a tough word-combination. Love has no ego as everyone knows, and so it goes and so it grows. I for one think Lucy in the soul with demons may happen to be an actual substance. Travelling south, as I read Rimbaud, a rainbow smashed a railway train window. A baby cannot trip without memories... I remember “every atom ate our eyes.” Our eyes: they are ingrown in the ocean's bellyful of wine, down in the seabed-orchard. There is angelic music inborn in the inner ear; but those whom the Gods wish to drive mad are sent the end of ‘Bike’ in their heads and madness is not something to be Romanticised as a return to Purity. Impunity seems more what the poet wants. He likes to float on the artifice of organic emotions through synthetic sounds, and is into exploring alternative histories suppressed by the overarching meta-narrative. For plastic surgery of the soul there are libraries. Poetry is the bike riding itself. Monopoly money will get us well, Monopoly money will get us bread, she picks the blue tac off the wall and says “my T-shirt is red”. I put my wounds up on bright flags; I take the angel up the arse. To plug my senses in the mains might engage [!00 %] of my brains. It’s all about a permanent reactivation of the Glastonbury Festival spirit. John Tucker is taking acid again. Money shags in the dark. Thoughts of one’s greatness only diminish one’s greatness. Skunkfoot is putrid demons excreted through stone. Love an army of fire. Fire needs some incentive to rise up. Shall I touch my heart with a red Bic biro? When all the air in outer space is consumed… The bed in the wood, it was definitely a whore’s, with solar spike I can use the Force, with R2D2 I cleanse my doors, I’m just trying to win my Star Wars. I’m starting to think in five musical parts at once. The Anon Throwaway as a new form could become an alternative currency to rival with money for the role of the real. Formal education is not for everyone. The yellow DogMuckels M atop the pole in the industrial park is the postmodern churchspire in the spiritual vacuum. Postmodernism is theme dissolved into message. Giant killers are frozen peas in the microwave. I look into the mirror though I shouldn’t pool my sources. I’m not going to die at the age of twenty seven, watch the dreamtapes on repeat from a golden seat in Heaven. The heart beats to the rhythm of one. A fiver is surely cheese and onion flavour. Cataclysm is catalyst for the old cat that sat on the map of sound, just because the world is very round. If there were paper under my heart there would be writing on it and it would be art. I might ding it in compressed Space Age seconds.

(2002 - 2003)

SPACE IS BIG

Space is big

space is big

space is big

space is big

space is big

space is big

space is big

space is big

and the edge 

is the middle

and the middle

is the edge

is the middle

is the middle

is the edge 

John is gone

John is gone 

John is gone 

John is gone

John is gone

John is gone

John is gone 

John is gone 

and he left

his pink pyjamas

pink pyjamas

pink pyjamas

and he left

his pink pyjamas

they were on 

find a bridge

find a bridge

find a bridge

find a bridge

find a bridge

find a bridge

find a bridge

find a bridge

or we’ll never

live forever

live forever

or we’ll never

live forever

live forever

SYMMETRY LIPS

Symmetry lips   symmetry lips

kiss me quicks  need a fix

make me feel  natural and real

cuts heal  with a plastic seal

I’ve been in your heart  and danced in hot rain

I've been in your heart  and danced in hot rain

now consciousness  is everywhere

now consciousness  is sentient air

the sky falls  apart into place

I crave to sleep  behind your face

everything in its  proper place

live where the sky  and the river freely give

live where the sky  and the river freely give

BINAURAL EARPHONE MEDLEY

(some lesser known numbers by The Flood, some of which may have been recorded on binaural earphones but not used on their album)

Mumrah Greenback Skeletor Shredder Texas Pete Mr. Burns Deceptecons Vader Vader they were all there they were all there // you're playing you're messing you're fucking w/ the real // away away away away in farthest Spain, log on your brain, execute the plane // free the sparrows from the hedgerows nests and cages dissipating off to Africa calm equator sleep in frozen rock wake in sunburn I am the wind-cry robed in shadow // drug me sideways, drug me sideways, drug me north and south, drug me east and west, drug me all around, drug me sideways, // space is big and the edge is the middle and the middle is the edge and John is gone and he left his pink pyjamas on //  apple juice apple juice and sweet little pretty pink things apple juice apple juice and sweet little pretty pink things.

WE COULD BE SO HAPPY

(played at a gig on a rooftop in London, the last gig by The Flood)

Serotonin dopamine

no Codeine or Diazepam

I got ruin'd you got wrecked

let's just say yes to each other’s plans

we could be so ha ha ha happy

we could be so ha ha ha happy

Buproprion and Fluoxetine

a toooooooootal loss of all

language-is-thought-control

it's just some sedative we'll

hide away under snow

I wake up dying for some

junk food to save my hole

when all the money has run out

and our housing contract expires

and the pigs come to track us down

the night will be filled with burning fires

the night will be filled with screeching tyres

the night will be filled with burning lyres

we could be so ha ha ha happy

in the future that ain’t what it used to be

on a drug called Strictly Free

on the loss of the cannabis battery.

DOWN IN THE PATCH WORK QUILT BELOW

I like the light and the flight of arrows

I also love the sound of running water 

Down in the patch-work quilt below 

Where the river of sadness used to flow

It’s easy to trip up on a daisy 

Lazy of us to let it get this way 

Down in the patch-work quilt below

Where mad children splash and play 

Art gets to its feet like a cartoon Bambi 

She might go veggie for reasons of Disney

Down in the patchwork quilt below 

Where the ego-loss breeze can freely blow 

Heading down to the sea can free you 

No-one knows how to free you but meyou 

Down in the patch-work quilt below

Where we’ll inevitably have to flow

[N. B. co-authored with a little help from my brother Dr. Robert L G Tucker]

CHIEF OF THE BLACKBIRD SPIES

Well I fell up a sycamore tree

and nearly spilled my glass of wine,

and though nobody came for me

I didn't mind it I felt fine,

for I was trading stories

w/ the chief of the black bird spies

amongst new leaves and old branches

that don't know how to tell lies...

He said to forget the job,

sack the boss, and hang the cage

which containeth all your rage

for but the minimum wage.

I said it's easy for you

in your neighbouring Otherness -

be Nature custodial or frightening? -

to avoid the mad enemy Stress.

He said he finds it fun-loving

to tense-hop all around

for cataclysm is catalyst for the cat

that sat on the map of sound.

Quite soon he spread his wings

until his wings were spread

and flew to Morrisons supermarket

for a tamed and manner'd head.

He’d said he thinks privation

is the mother of imagery,

and inconsiderate violation

at the root of the creation of beauty.

We’d bemoaned a lost society

w/ all its malaise and cheap talk,

its word-ways no better than

cheep cheep squawk squawk.

We’d spoken in no uncertain terms

and out in the great outdoors

where Mother Nature operates

according to her natural laws.

When he left it grew quite quiet

for he was a tremendous talker

and had a way with words

and had said I would go far…

when I left his sycamore tree

I was glad to see my own home

and return to my own kind

near the beach that’s good to roam

but I remembered that black bird

and his eloquent influence

performing from the end of a branch

in ways that just made sense.

CHOCOLATE DOG

MY DOG HAS GOT NO BRAIN,

MY DOG IS A TOTAL PAIN,

HE'S GOT THREE EYES

AND A BIG FAT NOSE

AND GETS HIMSELF TANGLED

WITH THE GARDEN HOSE,

HE ONCE TOOK A PILL

THAT MADE HIM ILL

AND EVER SINCE THEN

HE'S BEEN STANDING VERY STILL

(aged 8)

PRIVATE

Squawk squawk gaggle gaggle,

squawk squawk gaggle gaggle,

squawk squawk gaggle gaggle,

squawk squawk gaggle gaggle,

bongles has still got the stones,

bongles has still got the stones,

bongles has still got the stones,

bongles has still got the stones.

Squawk squawk gaggle gaggle,

squawk squawk gaggle gaggle,

squawk squawk gaggle gaggle,

squawk squawk gaggle gaggle,

bongles has still got the stones,

bongles has still got the stones,

bongles has still got the stones,

bongles has still got the stones.

FRAGMENTS FROM THE ROAD TO HEAVEN BY NOJ AND THE MOB

L to the pregnant snorkel + Ossie the dog,

he should be sleeping like a log,

goes round and round chasing his own tail,

only goes upstairs for a trail,

of Maltesers nice round and pale,

we’re on the road to Heaven,

happiness awaits us there, flutter

in the sideways, flutter in the sideways,

bring your brief fling with the politics of flight.

Sullen silken sulks, we drink the same

rain, spit is clean and so is dirt.

Normal is boring. Do it later.

God made speed to save us,

God made hash to help us.

Fuck the system. Even a dick

gets big erections. The sun hanged

himself from a length of daisy chain.

Clocktick clock being clocked off by clocktick.

Clocktick clock not being clocked off by Time.

The Universal Mind’s moon meat man might.

The Universal Mind’s moon meat man meant.

The Universal Mind’s moon meat man met.

Break, bird with the skin of snake.

God rushed into the cold cod quick.

THE FIRE-DANCE

The fire-dance dwelled in electric drums

where ecstasy fell soft fathoms to clap

and bells let peace form in blue notes

and peered at deer in the wood and ate of it

and wet let excellence sound out its criticism

and dawn let sting its unsheathed sting

and chloroform in the heart let see

if only Game Over was seen in nights.

A SMALL ADVERT FOR FREE SEX

My name is David Bonky,

I'm a knock-kneed hummingbird,

there's a tear up my jacket

and I heard a different word:

Trans/ philo/ quis/ ation.

I fly through colours and shapes.

Lightspeed is my passport.

The countries are for apes.

A knock-kneed hummingbird

table on which to land and read

does not seem to me to be

such an unreasonable need.

I'll breakfast on snooker colours,

spark a dullard cigarette,

sail the wind of change and

have no room for regret.

I deem it quite Romantic

to go do the monkey bars 

with my legs into her open

chamber underneath the stars. 

I think love is both the all-

seeing eye and love is blind.

So wear an emotional condom

before you fuck my mind.

For that’s what language is,

the emotional condom of

the world into which we’re

all thrown in search of love.

Soon I must fly on, from

this gnarled treefinger perch,

and heal the glitch in the soul,

and join the Giant Search.

I don’t know what we’re

searching for but it’ll find us first.

Maybe just some peace and

quiet to slake the eternal thirst.

(reconstructed)

HIGH, HOW ARE YOU?

Oh high, how are you? I’m high and I’m new.

Oh high, how are you? I’m high, and I’m through.

Here you come with your candle eyes

and your big horizon and your higher skies

here you come with a beautiful smile

I’m going to talk to you for a little while

oh high, how are you? I’m high and I’m new.

Oh high, how are you? I’m high, and I’m through.

Here you are with your hopeful stance

and your lucky star and your backward glance

here you are in the eye of my mind

let’s hope we don’t go completely blind

oh high, how are you? I’m high and I’m new.

Oh high, how are you? I’m high, and I’m through.

There you go, with you angel tear,

and your brand new car getting into gear,

there you go, with your perfect skin,

can’t wait until you come back again

oh high, how are you? I’m high, and I’m new.

Oh high, how are you? I’m high, and I’m through.

[reconstructed]

THE WISH OF NIGHT

Madness swirls deep in the heart

A butterfly resides in you

A tragedy of feelings lost

surrenders to the wish of night

& in this world I can't explain

I know exactly where I am

Inside a crevice of desire

In the dreamy air of a lover's scent

Wherever you take me, that's where I'll be

In the weeping skies my mind gives up

& falls into the arms of sleep

I'd fade to know I thought of you

& the world has risen to my hands

& the earth murmurs beneath my feet

& the light of all that's good is true

if believing is the dawn of dreams

I guess that I'm afraid to tread

The purple skies for the risk of a word

But at least I'm sure of fear

As she gives me the strength to feel afraid

A whisper fathomed deep in mine

Well I don't even care to cry

& I don't care to face the edge

& plunge into the oceans dead

& the flame of love has lit my candle

& the sky has echoed my desire

& all the air is drawn into my lungs

& I know the secrets of the shade

& I know the wars that come from peace

& I know the mystery of love

& I know the resilience of the soul

& I'm sure that knowing you is true...

PART TWO:

UNDER THE CHEMICAL COSH

NOTE

This text is painstakingly transcribed from defaced bank notes. Some of the bank notes are damaged, illegible, others ‘missing.’ Efforts have been made to order the bank notes but were not always successful. No efforts were made to authorial-fingerprint the voice or psychoanalyse the handwriting. The text is not necessarily a critical indictment of embedded liberal capitalism of whom we are liberal, human subjects and where money, formerly neutral means of exchange, is becoming a flying, white, electrical spark passing through borders of osmotic porosity in the dark. Nor is the text necessarily about an imaginary designer drug called Strictly Free that does exactly what it says on the tin, is and makes you “strictly free” to consume. It is but an open-air poem, comprised of torn and bleeding snapshot-fragments that are given artificial insemination. Inherent in it is a notion that money is an Ode to Death, that a fiver is cheese and onion flavour, that work sets you free.

WHISPER

(originally by Black Hole Myths when we were still called Funnelspirals)

I wanted to hear musac from a black

hole by Judas Priest but the guys

sent a parrot after a carrot and

through the conch to outer space

singing 'I won't always be an orange

just because you've sectioned me,

no I won't always be on Orange

just because you've sectioned me

but at any given time I'm working

in a crane' and Jesus said 'Syd by Ray

in a way Spiderman's handwriting

has been too obscene, I rake the

blade over the wishbone of my

legs Breakfast All Day/ gay

teachers can still lay eggs and

I won't always be a lemon just

because you've sectioned me,

no I won't always be on Lennon

just because you've session'd me

but at any given time Oedipus

is spying me up in the shower,

why I'll break the speed of speed,

rendered squander never priceless,

I'll never speed againe, at any given

time I'm a rare aquatic insect.'

(Hackney)

GROG LADETTE IN G

Baby we create the dawn

behind a veil where silence is born

and dawn conspires with the sea

and everything untrue recedes

and down into sleep with no dreams

and all that’s left is you and me

and all that’s left is you and me

no-one knows how to free you

eeeeeeeeeeexcept for meyou

no one knows how to free you

eeeeeeeeeeexcept for meyou

horserace books in traffic light

colours through the ancient night

in the end it’s all white

in the end it’s alright

ONTIMEY

If this thing were a woman

I’d be in trouble by now

and if it wasn’t I’d

be in double by now

like a witch she says

take FACE instead of fags

and then I put my

wounds up on bright flags

READING THE LESSON FROM JOHN IN ETON COLLEGE CHAPEL

Once upon a time there was an acid-rainbow

that struggled from a black hole and smashed through a window

of a big cathedral and landed on a page

and rearranged the sermon the vicar was enraged

O but then he found it bore a strange notation

and it was so profound he needed medication

and then the paper bread turned to acid which was nice

and everyone was singing music from a black hole by Jesus Christ

all the congregation gave their neighbours a nudge

and asked if every good boy still deserveth fudge

the wine it came in buckets through the back of the song

and even the vicar too, he started to sing along

3484, 3484, what do you need one of those for?

I was at the beach I threw a stone to the sea

to rearrange the day and the deity

no-one was beside me except the pretty dog

oozing and exuding uncomplicated love

voices from the city they were heard between the waves

like lost souls trapped in the cracks between the paves

then I saw the mystery of the single shoe

and knew that it was time to drop a line to you

you were off your face on something by this stage

said there’d been an accident and were hiding in the cage

and Barnes has scored a chicken and blanes is a liquid knife

and wingers are allowed bikes in the afterlife

3484, 3484, what do you need one of those for?

IN A FIELD KNEE DEEP IN GRASS

Lovers and tools are breaking their own rules in the game

mad children play unaware of the guilt and the shame

pirates are looting the world and riding the breeze

angels and thieves are kissing at the tips of the trees

and I’m in bed against you

wouldn’t bet against you

I’m in bed against you

shouldn’t bet against you

if all that I’ve loved is a bunch of telly snow

still you can’t take away the afterglow

Science says don’t touch your dreaming gland

it’s all Thumper to you VS Edward Scissorhands

and I’m in bed against you

I wouldn’t bet against you -

I’m in bed against you

shouldn’t bet against you

and I’m in bed against you

I wouldn’t bet against you

I’m in bed against you

and b equals d

[Note: this song seems to be concerned in part with a tape of Pearl Jam ‘VS’ that has a pause where cut and stuck together in the reel.]

BIRTHDAY OF I. A.

You’re not a knock-kneed hummingbird, / you’re not a birthday of I. A, / and who you are I’ll never know now, / and if I did I’d never say… / I am your med-banging elephantine, / and I cry on the windows of trains, / and maybe all I need’s a length of, / need’s a length of metal chain… / and through it all I wish you rainbows, / made for two and very strange, / and somehow what’s most familiar, / is what really can estrange you, / rearrange and slowly derange you, / oh yes it most definitely can. / So don’t run in the corridor / or you’ll sin in the eyes of Santa / as he watches on.

THE NEW BEAT

Door the case

fluff the line

feel the last

dull the white

hone the drift

dawn the most

deaf the ear

grope the bread

fee the seat

blue the ticket

dream the lemon

boat the weed

mine the brick

dwarf the vote

peace the bull

D the random

renew the two

widen the road

steal the wings

gate the lane

mean the scene

send the head

rend the Hell

roll the ball

(C/ Em/ G/ F/ G/ C)

THE POWER-BALLAD OF MARTIN VICIOUS

[warning: contains voices]

I can see death and see flippers

coming out of his senses and say

“come closer you f***ing terrorist,

come closer you f***ing terrorist,

come closer you f***ing terrorist.”

It's because I live a life of all time leisure,

all drugs pure and the radiance just right.

I might be wrong but then I might.

Score some dodgy crack and die

here alone with nobody for a name.

I can be Proust and fathom ten

or eleven types of ambiguity and

rue them all cantankerously,

rue them all cantankerously,

rue them all cantankerously.

It's because I live a dream of my still

working, all love pure and trust in the night.

I might be wrong but then I might.

Score some dodgy crack and die

here alone with nobody for a name.

HOW TO BREAK THE LIGHT SPEED LAW OF NEUROPLASTICITY

You're The Juggernaut that's what you are

walk like an Egyptian and wriggle your little wing

like a winged chainsaw flying up in the cloud

swoop down and seal my soul and everything

For I'm the witness of this scene

I've read the pages of orange and green

I've got to keep my new yellow T-shirt clean

otherwise I'll offend the mating queen

On Grand-darth's Ship I went off a-sailing

suffice to say your horror-packet is served

and when I get back I think I'll give you a ring

for it's the least that you my demon have deserved

For I'm the witness of this scene

I've read the pages of orange and green

I've got to keep my new yellow T-shirt clean

otherwise I'll offend the mating queen

and when you score such a radical goal

it stays with you in your open, Holy soul

and you get no money and get no headlines too

but you've done what someone's just got to do

WICKER CHAIR

Baby I can see the tree kneel down

in Nick Drake’s de-tunings before you

maybe it’s just the germs accrued

upon the windowpane maybe it’s true

love what’s love halved in chaos

love’s the answer love victorious

love’s the hope the heart literally

needs in order to survive without which

it can stop and I love to be alive

so I thank you for bringing us together

everybody loves you between us is the weather

this fair day stay a while and play

trouble’s all gone away love is the only way

THE SUPERSTRING GUITAR

Cool white is the highnote if it's up to me,

cascading down to the deep blue sea -

will blue trousers over the trouser blues

fall down on the Excellent News?

Music penetrates is-ness,

renovates sensation's quest.

Out in the desert the pigeon-stars

ripe w/ new creatures won't bring out the Tsars.

Water splits but the desert's dry.

Stonemouth silence chewing gums by.

Why the high note seems to be white

is the sideways gravity in the smile of night.

The Super String Guitar was electric and was smashed.

Transcendence is the dream of anything squashed.

“You're going to get a dog w/ a laser brain.”

L to the pregnant snorkel = mc squared.

Impairing the wild pear tree to tears.

Impairing the wild pear tree to pears.

Flutter in the sideways gravity of the smile of light.

Phew for a minute there you lost the screen.

E = L to the pregnant snorkel.

E = L to the pregnant snorkel.

L to the pregnant snorkel = mc squared.

Flutter in the sideways gravity of the smile of light.

ICARUS UNBOUND

(a finger-picker in the drone of G)

I really love you my friend Mark,

don’t get me wrong I am not gay,

it’s just a way for me to start,

it’s just something to say…

placing bets on raindrops running

down the opaque window pane,

I have been a melting robot,

then they said I was insane...

there you are across the water,

living on the Isle of Man,

if only my attention-span could

be more like Peter Pan...

you’re the one who taught me de-tunings,

stairs down to The Velvet Underground,

I am the one in love with Flora,

and that fertile map of sound...

you say it’s got too late to make it,

I hear you crawl through new air,

but I was never one to fake it,

I for one don’t really care...

in your room was a very high ceiling

and I remember it was bright,

I can almost taste the loving feeling,

even though now it is Night...

you could not tell if the vocal

in Aphex Twin was a demon

so made us listen to Nick Drake when

on another easy comedown...

lines are blurred in drug-slurred idiom.

lyrical streaks now open up.

I’m thinking of youth which has now flown.

but I’ve still got a little plastic cup.

THE SWITCH THROWN

Blessed may be the end at last

under the sea

below the soul

in the upside-down

Oceans above us

(all that heaven sends is rain)

and blessed is the rain that heaven sends

it is the life for the gilly flowers

some might say

it even falls up

and you’re going to have to think againe

for a clock’s only as fast

as a wounded cheetah

who knows how to

get drunk on cold Wifebeater

but gets drunk instead

on the rhythm and metre

O love thanks

for coming round,

O love cherish

your map of sound,

O love I dreamt that

we were drowned

I made such a mess it’s wasn’t cool

but at least I didn’t

give it away

that music is

the sacred pool

or whatever else I had to say

it’s half past four but then again

the Night is young

the switch is thrown

whatever could

the poor boy mean

he means his heart is yours to own

(N. B. co-authored with my bro Mr. James P D)

THE POSTMODERN ID

I’m thinking about the old days,

how the hippies are not ageless as the sun rays,

I’m thinking about the ideals of 60’s,

and though I don’t believe in pixies

the effect of global warming on the unicorn

succeeded Piper At The Gates of Dawn,

the summer rain falls with as many hands,

as there are names for new rock bands...

I’m thinking about the imminent future,

there has to be a place still for Nature,

thinking about the state of poetry,

the young light has dawned on me...

the effect of global warming on the unicorn

succeeded Piper At The Gates of Dawn,

the summer rain falls with as many hands,

as there are names for new rock bands.

I’m trying just to think about the present,

and how my life could be so pleasant,

don’t want to be distracted in daydreams,

by a woman as lovely as the sunbeams...

the effect of global warming on the unicorn

succeeded Piper At The Gates of Dawn,

the summer rain falls with as many hands,

as there are names for new rock bands.

I’m thinking about the doors of perception,

how literature is beautiful deception,

you might find the bedroom is hidden,

you might find the dawn is unbidden...

the effect of global warming on the unicorn

succeeded Piper At The Gates of Dawn,

the summer rain falls with as many hands,

as there are names for new rock bands

so try to pass the gravy over

Facebook now and be free.

Don’t know what a Dorian Mode is,

but I know who Toad of Toad Hall is,

and the lady in my life is all missing,

and the music’s only meant for kissing.

SONG OF THE NEON DAWN

X-ray specs don’t lead to sex

and mobile phones don’t have gay undertones

and television is a big decision

and the internet can’t just forget

and laser beams are born in dreams

and digital clocks don’t come in flocks

and Ableton Live is my nine to five

and the latest App is an angel’s lap

and I sing for Kate whose always late

and I write the Night until it’s white

and my vertigo lives down below

and my neon dawn will be reborn

and we’ll renew the morning dew

and Google our senses out there like a tide

and dream of love aloft on wings

and try and forget the nights we cried

and the alphabet is the suicide note

of Nelly the Elephant if you deem it true

and love’s gone veggie over Disney again

and the grass is green and the sky is blue

and E is a bet with the myriad mind

and I’ve seen so much I’ve gone blind

and a poem’s a seat where you sit and eat

and a driverless car has gone quite far

and a use for dust is a beautiful bust

and the wheel of a bike is a map of the Lakes

and a rugby match is quite a catch

and an abandoned band is written in the sand

and a red skin cell is a state of Hell

and sadness seems the mother of dreams

but maybe that’s the other way round

and a flower grows just for your nose

HOPE

(by Black Hole Myths)

As I lie around careless of a map of sound

I love the lie of the land

where quiet gilly flowers

curtsey like ballerinas.

Streaming is vision.

Bees pollinate the garden,

birds pepper the lawn

where you let your flowery

blouse come all undone,

and a ray of light

soaks us all around.

The sky is a blouse of blue

hanging on the line.

Harmony thrums and

the sentient air is everywhere.

I lie back without a care,

sunlight blowing my hair about,

without a grey shade of doubt,

and deem it lazy of us

to let it get this way,

a day of careless play,

a carelessly radiant day,

all my troubles float away.

FIZZY POP

I’m a clown, I’m a clown,

a clown in the circus of death.

I had a mate who sent the words

“Liquid Crystal Meth”

into space, into space,

and I was underneath it,

shower down, shower down,

make me feel alright.

No-one knows, no-one knows

what I went through in life.

The sadness shows, the sadness shows,

the trouble and the strife,

but under the stars, under the stars

I dream of love eternal,

shower down, shower down,

make me feel alright.

Fizzy pop, fizzy pop,

gets drunk in Monopoly Jail,

time goes slow, ever so slow,

as slow as a garden snail,

but ecstasy is a teddy bear

back in the garden of Eden,

I don’t mind, I don’t mind,

if you let me off my chains.

FLOWER-PRESS LOVE POEM MUSIC

If a flower-press ending on cannabis 

could seem to equal a dialysis 

then a love poem hoping to impress Flora 

could seem to equal more a motor 

but giving up weed in order to be free

I can’t see how this really matters to me

and if it’s a system I just love you still

and love has not gone under the green hill

if all the noise in the world would be quiet

I’d hide in the cupboard during the riot

if systems rule with fear not love

I’d half it and laugh it with an imperfect dove

here I am at the foot of Sea Ness

this anagram of boredom is in a mess

I’m all set up for a walk on the beach

to watch the waves rolling out of my reach

I trust my family and I trust my friends

I hope my dog’s life never quite ends

the kitchen is clean because I cleaned it myself

my father’s philosophy is up on the shelf

if all the greed in the world would go away

I’d still be Bede at the end of the day

if power is wrong at least it’s transient

a birthday came and a birthday went

and this is the me we all want to see

and this is the way I know to be free

and this is the Now that is in Eternity

and this is the leaf that came to the tree

if the wording of this little contract is mine

alas you are not but I’m still feeling fine

I’ve seen the stars that are out tonight

I’ve tried to forget exactly what colour is white

I’m drifting to E on the end of a stick

I’m searching my memory but it’s just a block

if only I could hold you in my arms

I’ve fallen for all your loquacious charms

(co-authored with help from James P D Tucker)

POETRY BUTTONS

Smart guitars between the stars

allow the ladies burn their bras

I don’t ask for whom the beck

puts a necklace on her neck

let us have a go then, you and I

when we are tired of getting high

piss on the dawn when dad is dead

poetry buttons are in my head

poetry buttons for endless revisions

and helpless self-derisions

got to keep the quavers at bay

got to make the monster go away

the monster is not me

he lives beneath the deep blue sea

when all the air in outer space

is consumed without a trace

through a prodigious systematised

detuning of the strings we rise

would you compare me to a tramp

now my face is on a stamp

the poet makes himself a tea

now he’s a mystic visionary

poetry buttons for endless revisions

and helpless self-derisions

got to keep the quavers at bay

got to make the monster go away

the monster is not me

he lives beneath the deep blue sea

voices voices everywhere

and yet not a drop to think

think of England when you’re on

drink of physical hyperlink

all the world is on a page

where we spend our petty wage

engage with the dark night of the soul

that dreams in meaning like a troll

poetry buttons for endless revisions

and helpless self-derisions

got to keep the quavers at bay

got to make the monster go away

the monster is not me

he lives beneath the deep blue sea

HEARTBOOK

We’ll never take E on a green,

Glastonbury hillside ever again,

never see Love playing through dark,

aviator Ray-Bans after the rain,

we’ll never be young as we once were

and looking back I know it’s all gone,

the real E’s a she and she is not free,

but we can converse while you’re on a plane

flying over the Atlantic ocean

you message me online full of emotion

to say new material has emerged

I tell you’ve never done anything

which you need to apologise to me for,

you kept me in food when in Berlin

I spent my last money on a whore,

Everything happened back in the day

and we isolate bits to form a narrative,

everything that is except for work,

and we used to say live and let live

flying over the Atlantic ocean

you message me online the ball still in motion

to say new evidence has emerged

If work sets you free I will never feel

freedom not like I did back in the day,

the day we were young, you and me

playing in the band, whatever we used to play,

and only the songs seem to survive,

the poems don’t seem to want to last,

and I’m trying to learn Ableton Live,

and get your message like a blast from the past

flying over the Atlantic ocean

you text me online w/ a true notion

to say unheard music by us has emerged

BAXTER

I love my dog

he’s barking mad

when he wants to smile

he wags his tail

his uncomplicated love

is healing for the soul

he has seventy words

like the book with smell

I wonder what the others are

maybe later I’ll know

mashed potato and stew

and a Pizza Hut

and the waves of the sea

go round and round

swim in mystery

but do not drown

ice cream is nice

on Freedom’s shore

so is sugar and spice

and more and many more

and so it came to pass

that I sat in a room

with the dog by my side

and the music on

and I’ve got the dog blues

yeah I’ve got the dog blues

which only means

I’ve nothing to lose

and the stream of life

flows on and on

and a cup of tea

awaits in the kitchen

and the dream of love

has not quite died

and I feel assured

deep down inside

because I love my dog

he loves me too

what more do I need

don’t need to sniff glue

to feel all high

when I have fresh air

and the Emperor has

abdicated againe

and a nice long sleep

will reunite me

with planet earth

at the end of the day

what more can I say

THE STAIRCASE

Once upon a time I was spiked

and thought I could fly

jumped right out of a window

and fell through the sky

somehow managed to land

on my smelly size 12 feet

seven stories below on

the heaving city street

now I tour the public schools

giving talks to forewarn

all the youths about drugs

in the world where they’re born

taking LSD can change

your innate personality

take it from me please never

take the drug they call LSD

Splinter was the master of

the Turtles in the kids cartoon

and now he’s dead and he’s gone

beneath the morning moon

and I’m so sad to hear of that

for loss is painful in the heart

so may we all remember

him in our chosen art

Sitting at the back was a

boy whom I instantly knew

would do everything which

I had pleaded with him not to do

puffing on a cigarette

making all the others laugh

maybe he’ll grow up to be

a kind of talking giraffe

When I fell I broke both legs

and did some damage to my spine

but I can walk if only slowly

and am in my headspace fine

I can still sing but not dance

which I never did much anyway

and I sing about health over

wealth at the dawn of this day

FAREWELL TO THE SEER OF SEA NESS

Farewell to the seer of Sea Ness -

see you later when the future is less.

What will you do about your trance?

Will you send a postcard from France?

I hope that you have a lot of fun…

I hope that you may find someone -

and the scenery streams by the train

and the world is small beneath the plane

Farewell to the seer of Sea Ness -

see you in the future when the past is less.

Will the future there be quite cold?

Will you feel sad and feel old?

I hope that your dreams all come true.

I hope that there’s hope for you too -

and the dreams stream beside the car -

and you make it Westwards quite far.

Farewell to the seer of Sea Ness -

see you in the light we might bless.

Will the visual radio still swirl?

Will you still blame it on the girl?

I hope that your heart will beat on…

I hope that your hope’s not all gone -

and the freedom you find is the best,

and the beauty you dream is a quest.

Farewell to the seer of Sea Ness -

see you in the middle released from the stress.

Will the sound of silence be heard?

Will they hide the mystic bird?

I hope that your love arrows down.

I hope that you don’t hit the brown -

and the light will puncture you

and the good life will still be true.

WAVETABLE IN C

I remember when my mnemonic for the guitar strings was Even A Dick Gets Big Erections… now I don’t need one, I’ve heard a better one from a fellow autist, high-functioning autist – Even A – no – er - Every Acid Dealer Gets Busted Eventually. At the moment I’m on James’ red electric. I remember when he got it for Christmas and I got an acoustic, a Fender, an expensive one, and I wanted to be Kurt Cobain so I was annoyed that I got an acoustic not an electric. I was upset and offended my parents. And now here I am playing on James’ red electric. As I say my mnemonic used to be Even A Dick Gets Big Erections, but this one’s in C. I’ll leave it up to you to work out what that means. Your guess is as good as mine. It could be for countryside. It could be for court case. It could be for caliphate. It could be for civilisation. It could be for completion of the soul.

A POINT FIVE

“I was going to pack it with content… a clock is only as fast as a cheetah. I said that at seven. I got to the end and realised I hadn’t pressed the right buttons on Ableton. You have to press the right buttons in life. That’s more like it. Previously on this program oceans smile with liquid eyes and fill themselves with rain. Also I. T. might stand for Instant Travel too. Lucy in the soul w/ demons might happen to be an actual substance. And if a flower-press ending on cannabis could = a dialysis, a love poem hoping to impress Flora could = more a motor. That was it. Then I realised – see I was trying to put Jimi’s amp guitar on the vocal and it was full of feedback, squealing like an electric donkey. Then I realised the vocal hadn’t gone down at all. I’d pressed the wrong buttons. I am hoping I pressed the right buttons this time. You have to press the right buttons. And now we’re going to have a typing solo. I’m noticing the space bar is like the snare drum. I type with two middle fingers you know, like William Carlos Williams.”

WALKING THE BEAT

(impromptu spoken word piece)

Women can be very beautiful

they can be sharp-elbowed too

they think when we discern their beauty

we are being blinded by love

love is a banana custard to them

man’s highest emotion to me

but single is my jingle these days

I sleep on a single mattress

if I ever do sleep that is

the dog’ll be beside me

he’s a symbol of gravity

and humour and katabasis

it’s been a while since I’ve been in love

and what lovely dresses they can wear in summer

ones with floral patterns on

that come all undone -

it’s winter right now

winter has her compensations

I’m sitting in a coffee-cake dining room

there’s a Christmas tree

adorned with baubles and bright white lights

I suppose they should come down

it’s the 2^nd of January

Bertrand Russell’s History of

Western Philosophy is on the table

some chocolate from Finland

some baccy some papers

some of my mother’s driftwood art

Quality Streets which my dad

used to call Quantity Streets

and what else I don’t know

a toothbrush that hasn’t been opened yet

BONECHINA

Where has all my washing gone?

Maybe it has gone to Heaven!

Mirrors on the street rebound.

Everyone is happy and free.

My dream-meet experiment tended there.

Not the local DogMuckels.

All walks of life were gathered and one.

To wake from the dream is to die.

That’s when you put on your socks.

Unless they’ve gone into the sock void.

Don’t mind me I’m paranoid.

I’ve got some bizarre ideas.

If a clock is only as fast as a cheetah

I. T. might stand for Instant Travel

but I’ll pad downstairs and drink a cup

only at my own slow speed.

THE NEW SNOWMAN

We are the velvet e’s,

we’re shitting in Cuntington’s letterbox,

the valley road below,

beneath us as we fly.

We are the velvet e’s,

we’re shitting in Cuntington’s letterbox,

the valley road below,

beneath us as we fly.

Blissful Lovingness is

where all religions meet.

On the corner of the street.

I am the Burger King,

I can eat anything.

Especially a Double

Whopper with cheese -

and in reality the killer

stayed up all night.

STAVING OFF THE WASTED YOUTH

Please wait while you are on hold,

your secret world will not be sold,

and while you work out what’s gone on,

we’ll treat you to a song.

A cow has sat upon the throne,

and said to travel by Smartphone,

for all connection should be long,

and the maths you do is not wrong.

Thank you for waiting while I love you,

thank you for searching for the truth,

there’s only one God above you,

w/ medicine for a wasted youth.

You’ve been placed in a long queue,

but everyone’s in love with you,

procrastinate and find your crest,

I think your love is best.

The mashed potato that you ate

could sell for millions in the Tate,

and London renews sensation’s quest,

to put your mind at rest…

Thank you for waiting while I love you,

thank you for searching for the truth,

there’s only one God above you,

w/ medicine for a broken tooth.

ECSTASIA

Ecstasia, it will find you,

ecstasia will track you down,

wearing your bro’s blue T-shirt,

somewhere in a different town…

a comedown can be difficult,

a comedown can really hurt,

but it’s going to be easier

in your brother’s blue T-shirt.

Love, it will wound you

then forgive you all the same,

and one day death will find you,

and nobody is to blame...

I’m waiting at the foot of Black Combe,

I’m waiting for my true love,

and E has no value in maths

when you come down from a Dove…

FULHAM F. C.

Fuck you fuck you

we are the best

we are the best

we are the best

Fuck you fuck you

we are the best

we are the fucking best

Fuck you fuck you

we are the best

we are the best

we are the best

Fuck you fuck you

we are the best

we are the fucking best

Fuck you fuck you

we are the best

we are the best

we are the best

Fuck you fuck you

we are the best

we are the fucking best

Fuck you fuck you

we are the best

we are the best

we are the best

Fuck you fuck you

we are the best

we are the fucking best

FABLE

How much is that druggie in the window,

he’s washing off Steve’s holographic beard,

in the totally powerless shower,

he’s making me feel pretty weird,

blah blah black sheep

have you any wool?

Yes Sir, yes Sir,

ten fucking kilos…

How much is that druggie in the window,

I think he’s gone beyond the pale,

they made him a living art installation,

and he wishes he’d stuck to the ale,

blah blah black sheep

have you any wool?

Yes Sir, yes Sir,

ten fucking kilos…

How much is that druggie in the window,

the vision I had has grown dim,

I can particle accelerate Nothingness,

but I can’t write a poem like Jim,

blah blah black sheep,

have you any wool?

Yes Sir, yes Sir,

ten fucking kilos.

HEY MAN HEY

Hey man hey what do you

have to say about today?

These new pube-shaving,

lecky-saving times?

The air seems slightly strange

to me in all honesty,

but I’m just a guy

that plays hide and seek with rhymes.

I lost my teddy in the void

when I was paranoid,

now all I am is all I owe...

at least I dared to dream

unlike a mechanoid

of love the likes of

which we still don’t know…

Well scream is bad,

when you go quite mad

and you lose your dad

and the magpie gets down

into your bones…

and you can’t come down

from the under-town

like a decaying clown

and you know the truth

which nobody owns.

So you must obey the dust

in which you trust

and which lies at

the bottom of everything

and bore the Lord

with your secret chord

and your word-hoard

knowing not just what

tomorrow will bring.

LOVE SONG TO A LIQUID MIRROR

The night is alright under the electric light

and I am thinking of you

how we used to love each other

black and blue forever and ever

how I used to watch over you

while you slept and when you wept and

when we leaped and love was fire

now the light comes fair and even

hyperlink to very Heaven

just like it was when love was open

and it is still full of hoping

full of groping full of dreams

love has not gone stolen pollen

lustful London lips are swollen

and liquid mirrors still run to the sea

where the fish swim without insanity

even though they have fucked eyes

we already went there,

we already did that

sometimes you’re a willing dupe

and sometimes a doormat

PHET ACCOMPLIS

Love, love, good for the brain,

the more you eat them,

the more you go insane.

Love, love, good for the heart,

the more you eat them,

the more you break apart.

They’re dissipating energy

with spiralling entropy,

falsifying vision with

indoctrinated feelings,

colouring perception

with vague mysticism,

you’ve been plugged in

to the mental health system.

Love, love, good for the brain,

the more you eat them,

the more you go insane.

Love, love, good for the heart,

the more you eat them,

the miracle will start.

They’re dissipating energy

with spiralling entropy,

falsifying vision with

indoctrinated feelings,

colouring perception

with vague mysticism,

you’ve been plugged in

to the mental health system.

SNOWFLAKE SONG

Snowflakes are falling to the ground,

that’s why the door-mouse makes no sound,

I could sing in an imaginary tongue,

but I find Klingon is best for song...

then it’s up to birds to saaaaaaaaaay,

“hope you have another blinding day.”

There are no footprints out there yet,

but I might go out and lose a bet.

Sometimes I dream of mapless space,

a little place without X tattooed on its face.

So then it’s up to you to saaaaaaay

“hope you have another blinding day…”

snowfall was injecting smack

into the Universal Mind a while back,

and now I’ve nothing left but tea

still I think you’ll find it’s well enough for me...

so now it’s up to me to saaaaaaaaay

“hope you have another blinding day.”

MOVING ON

When you record on earphones and say you’ll plug your senses in the mains they become aliens, aliens from Hollywood films, like the Fifth Element where there is a blue alien that can sing in two notes at once.

When I hear the sound I think of Jess and her impeccable taste in musical tunes.

I’ve got a little bet that the next guy after me to attain the face of stars, to be enraptured and enthralled, will still write the line I wrote at the time and like I did too think it is his own.

My father knew the line and sometimes I think of him – he hasn’t gone so far – is only up the way – lying underground.

When I was a boy and we first moved up he took me out the back and asked what I could hear and I said I didn’t know so he said it’s the beck.

I COME FROM THE JUNGLE

I come from the jungle,

I come from the jungle,

I come from the jungle,

I come from the jungle,

I am a giraffe, I am not Bungle,

I come from the jungle,

I come from the jungle,

I come from the jungle,

I come from the jungle,

I come from the jungle,

I come from the jungle,

I am a giraffe, I am not Bungle,

I come from the jungle,

I come from the jungle.

EVEN A DREAMWOMAN GETS BEAUTIFUL ELECTRICITY

A thesis as thin as the Rizla it’s in

can lead all the way to the loony bin

and make you forget just how to spell

Winnie the Pooh and get unwell...

but even a dreamwoman

gets beautiful electricity -

come with me, come with me.

The way she hugs my myriad mind

I’m flying through colour but colourblind,

I wish to escape the shape of the paper,

I wish to taste the waste of a flower...

for even a dreamwoman

gets beautiful electricity -

come with me, come with me.

Come with me love away from the violence,

I don’t want to take a vow of silence,

don’t want to have to conceal this feeling,

for feelings are not meant for concealing...

and even a dreamwoman

gets beautiful electricity -

come with me, come with me.

SOMETHING LIKE A SONNET

If Freedom and Peace of Mind are what you’re after / you’ve made the right choice with BT Talk Together / with an unlimited number/ of local evening and weekend phonecalls / if sorrow sighs upon your shoulder/ find yourself another lover/ manoeuvre over backyard fences/ angel where do you hid tonight?/ I’ll make maps of the stars to find you/ soft caressing breeze to guide you/ if you can be in my dream/ can I be in yours too? / get rid of/ ad hoc/ remembering when we wandered round Amsterdam making up poetry about neon chameleons on the spot/ random dime/ random time/ don’t pour Pepsi on the bright equipment/ don’t piss on the cloakroom floor/ don’t fly with only a dream contraption/ don’t keep wanting more and more/ I’m too loud and I woke my mother/ I’m too loud and I woke my mother/ I’m too loud and I woke my mother/ I’m too loud and I woke my mother.

SNAKE BLUES

Amen/ hello / let’s go for a ride / do you believe in life before death? / Amen/ hello / let’s go for a ride / do you believe in life before death? / Red is the guitar / green is the grass / grey is the sky/ don’t say goodbye!

SONG FOR JAMES

James is amazing -

he is my brother -

when we were blazing -

we stole off our mother -

names are for crazing -

engage with the other -

when we were younger -

love was the answer -

Games are for lazing -

saith the author -

when we grow up

we’ll each be a soldier -

dames are for sharing

with one another -

those who must keep them

are soon to learn better -

frames are for breaking -

as saith the nutter -

and when we break out

our love is together…

aims are for reaching -

for further and further -

and love’s not for breaching -

and so it’s not over.

BARNESIE

Barnes’s goal against Brazil

it is the best I have seen still

it was not born under the hill

Barnes’s goal against Brazil

Barnes’s horse got on the course

they said to have more intercourse

so Barnes’s horse flew to the sun

when it got back it was no done

Barnes’s name is not in vain

for I’m the one who gets the blame

inside the flame when the game

has gone insane and is quite lame

Barnes’s nose I don’t suppose

objects to the way her garden grows

and the redolent rose strikes a pose

for the garden hose that no-one knows

Barnes’s wait is just for Kate

whom it would seem is Head of State

went on a date with a mate

and came back home so very late

ALAN THE BAT

Sullen, silken sulks,

we drink the same rain,

spit is clean

and so is dirt.

*

Another, another, an-

other fucking joint.

*

Even a duck

gets big erections.

*

Lucy in the soul w/ demons

might happen to be a substance.

*

To plug my senses

in the mains

might utilise !00%

of my brains

but it’s all gone

wrong at the plug,

just a dream on

an ancient drug.

*

Di di dit di di dit di di dit dit dit

Di di dit di di dit di di dit dit dit

bring bring

bring bring

“hello?

Hi dad!

I’m fine!”

*

Here I am as I write by night

furtive in flight

with the sprightly

hypertext-sniper

on Piper At The

Gates of Dawn.

*

And the sheet

where pictures

brown and blue

simply grew

was Winnie the Pooh.

CHRYSALIS DAYBED MUSING

If you said to me

I would’ve fancied you

had you not let it be known

that you want to eat my bones

then I’d say back to you

girl I don’t want to eat your bones

but of course all the while

I want to eat your bones

but I’ve not thought it through

for if I’ve eaten your bones

yummy as they may be

then I can’t make love to you

but if I suddenly said

and this is coming from me

I don’t want to eat your bones

it would be the saddest thing

so what I really mean

is you are in my heart

you are in my dreams

where there are no bones

pulchritudinous sylph

you’re the reason to hope

like a primrose in Hell

through whom I would traipse

just to hold you again

in my slender long arms

quench all these

insatiable fire alarms

and that’s when we’d kiss

that’s when we’d glow

that’s when we’d shine

that’s when we’d know

TEAR-JERKING SENTIMENTAL ENDING SCENE

The friends I’ve made

I’d like to keep

and brush their hair when

we get to sleep

I think this illness

is a monster

chill with the stillness

and love yr brother

the severed notebook

went on for ages

with no connection

in all its severed pages

I hate these voices

these infernal voices

I made my choices

they were not James Joyce’s

now I want to stay free

I want to stay me

I want to stay calm

in all uncertainty

and I want to stay cool

and not be the fool

who was the Smartest

kid in school

O crossroads of

all inward spiral

I hope your smile

does not go viral

the severed notebook

itches with skunkosis

in my back pocket

pre-diagnosis

and I now look back on

youth that’s flown

over the houses

into the unknown

today it’s snowing

there is no knowing

if the creative

juices are flowing

and I want to stay free

and I want to stay me

and I want to stay calm

in all uncertainty

yes I want to stay clear

as a morning beer

now that you know

I’m the ancient seer

and I live for you

THE REASON

The reason we are doing this again is that the fire-dance think they own whaaaaaaat? I wrote on my favourite wall, without knowing what the fire-dance think they own. It was something my bro said when he came home, to find me sleeping, having been dragged asleep by the sheer undecidability of all the computer files. What he said I didn’t quite fully catch, but it was to do with the fire-dance thinking they own something and therefore meaning we had to bring out the songs again. I am curious now: maybe I have become embroiled in a political struggle for power, and my work with it? It’s not something I intended, to be political. During the fire-dance I was lying down reading an Irish poetess who was using only ten or twelve lines to make the building blocks of a happier world. I had been on the street, me, with my First, and my diagnosis, and was rehoused in a Hostel. That’s where I was reading and I got a text from my dad saying riots had broken out and I was to stay indoors. Someone came to my door and said I should go out and check it out though, so I did go out for only a minute to see, and within a minute as I say was back in my room reading an Irish poetess.

CHEESE DREAMS

Di di dit di di dit di di dit dit dit

Di di dit di di dit di di dit dit dit

Di di dit di di dit di di dit dit dit

Bring bring

bring bring

“Hello?”

Gold member, you're the one,

the one with the heart of gold

Vowels, pure vowels 

Immanuel Kant

will come to thee 

with immanence

You come home smacked up you come

d/ d/ d/ down

grooving up slowly

d/ d/ d/ down

grooving up slowly

d/ d/ d/ down

grooving up slowly

yeah yeah yeah

yeah yeah yeah

yeah yeah yeah

boom

boom

boom

boom

boom

how did we get down here from flat-top

wide tunnel cities self driving cars

bears in the moon and liquor and drugs

and whisky baaaaaaaaaaaars

boom shanka, you're the one,

the one with the sonic boom

knickers knickers faster than lightning

skin up fall out of bed

and did those feet

in ancient times

rain down, rain down,

come on raindown

and walk the sun

fatter, hippier, less well connected

always walk the hallways

down to create my own

and in the meantime

and in the meantime

I'll do the monkey bars with my legs

manic depression has enraptured my name

don't know what I want but I just want shame

don't know what I want but I just won't shave

rainy waif, rain always,

lay back and dream

on a rainy waif

now I know how Kurt Cobain sang

oh now I know how Kurt Cobain sang

no more laaaaaaaaaa la's

removal van canes will be turned into furniture

we're thinking of putting Tricky's name on the front sir

you never see me dead near an inch of closure

|| | |||| | || | |||| 909 and 693 are wings

“and a record made of sound

goes round and round, conveying

music to the speaker through the stylus,”

says the radio as I turn it on.

Well, although there is no

such thing as the Nirvana barcode

it opens up a discussion about

the Telepathic Walkie Talkie, how

if barcode is rain barcode is phone...

and at least I have

the grace to come

back and say that the

extinction of consciousness

has no monetary value.

It is past dawn

and I see that

that first mobile

phone has gone.

TRADING ANGEL AFFIRMATIONS

What do you do

with a literary failure

what do you do

with a literary failure

what do you do

with a literary failure

early in the morning?

Woke up this morning

feeling so bad

felt like a pig

had shat in my head

He-Man’s out to get me

that’s the way it seems

people always let you down

so do those that die

for no hamburger heaven

draw the same as those

that shape 9/ 11?

and don’t forget a rose

would smell as sweet

if it were but called

barmy as the army of

Michael Vaughan, m’ Lord,

Michael Vaughan, Michael

Vaughan m’ Lord,

Michael Vaughan, Michael

Vaughan, m’ Lord,

Michael Vaughan

yeah yeah yeah you’re

in the broken army

now broken army

well it’s a one for the money,

money for the blow,

blow to get hairy now

go cat go but don’t you

silence my cosmic Muse

do they know it’s

my 40^th birthday

tomorrow at all?

Lean in your tits

when I’m sitting in Kutz

with my hair everywhere

like a malting scarecrow

chicken korma police

arrest this man

he talks in curry

to be very blunt

Aphex acid isn’t flaccid

ecstasia so much

to answer for

my childhood won’t smile,

my childhood won’t smile,

but I’m gonna be big

feeeeeeeeed the

biiiiiiiiiiirds

let them know

it’s my birthday tomorrow

God save the queen

we mean it man

her Hitler hairdo

is making me feel ill

and we have crashed

her party everybody

must get stoned

close your eyes

make it a better place

for you and for me

and the entire human race

suicide is dangerous

it brings on many changes

liquid donkey

liquid donkey

tra la la la la la la

I am the Almighty Cornholio

and I bring you water

water when you touch me

water when you

hold me tight

poetry it’s over

poetry away

poetry or not

as the case may be

somewhere over the

fractured acid-rainbow

Baxter the dog flies

teenage mutant

ganja turtles heroes

in a halfshell

Turtle Power!

||||.

THE KEY

Science STILL says to only keep my falsification of the Nirvana barcode and my brother’s notion about <BEE>. The <BEE> thing is not mine; it is my brother James’s design.

My little brother is a genius – he designed the sheet where pictures grew. Admittedly the pictures seem to depict the lyric to one of my songs – but I concede it is not mine. I did not lay it down.

James designed the new da Vinci circle as follows:

@

<BEE> [long squiggle]

Infinity Symbol

The new da Vinci circle is a discrete system containing the international language alphabet in 4 Points of Difference.

It not only suggests <BEE> might soon ensue from @ in the international language alphabet but by incorporating a long squiggle, hopefully and ideally escapes “every word in every order” as a new super-computer can by no doubt organise.

I think it a brilliant piece of work. James had also made a previous document, with some Badly Drawn Boy lyrics about the power of the sun rendered in an anti-clockwise spiral like a word-sunflower:

sunshine inside of you

old sun warm sun

spreads over you

soleil all over you.

He left the two documents to rot on the upturned box we used as a table in the den in the barn. I went down to the den in the barn and read them and at first couldn’t see the <BEE> one.

We don’t know why this is but I saw a tabular arrangement of signs in boxes on the <BEE> sheet. It was like the Periodic Table except with the characters of the international language alphabet laid bare, a sign per box. One was [backward f, forward f, equals running through.]

I was impressed, and left it alone. Then going back down to the barn to reread James’s imaginary alphabet or whatever I thought it was found the <BEE> document as James initially drew it – and couldn’t find the tabular arrangement of signs in boxes anywhere.

Again I left it alone, and some time later when our dad had just passed I went down to the barn another time and found the Badly Drawn Boy sheet had grown pictures. They seem to represent the lyric to a song I wrote going

I’m the only one left,

left to shoot my own gun,

this is the dead land,

crack a smile and curse the sun.

So I gave the document to James, who laid it down so must still own it.

Truth be told we haven’t conversed over the matter but I think he was using ‘c’ as in Einstein’s value for light-speed as an author…

TRANSPORT

He found himself on a plane.

He found himself on a.

He found himself on.

He found himself.

He found.

P.

FINGERS ON THE FRETBOARD

1 + 1 = 2

2 + 2 = 4

4 + 4 = 8

8 + 8 = 16

16 + 16 = 32

and you’ve guessed it already – I’m going to sign it ‘c’

Einstein said E = MC squared

and you’ve guessed it already -

I’m going to sign it ‘c’

c

c

c

MUSICAL DISCOGRAPHY

To listen to The Flood, whose album was recorded on binaural earphones, visit rhythm guitarist Tom Woodhall’s page on Soundcloud.

To listen to my first solo album after The Flood, ‘Songs To Record With Earphones’ [Demo 3], visit John F B Tucker’s Soundcloud page.

To listen to the four albums of my stuff arranged according to my brother’s design of the new da Vinci circle, even though they are not really meant to be listened to, only read in a book (please see Soundcloud Rain) visit John F B Tucker on Bandcamp and look for the four albums by “Various Artists.”

To listen to material by Black Hole Myths and other collaborations with Grant Aspinall, including when we put Blake to music, visit Grant Aspinall on Bandcamp.

To listen to ‘Unplugged At The Foot of Sea Ness’ visit John F B Tucker on Bandcamp.

To listen to ‘Wishlist’ by The Flood, visit John F B Tucker’s other Soundcloud page.

Note: there is also an E. P. I made with Grant Aspinall back when we were still called Funnelspirals. It is called ‘The A and E. P.’ by Funnelspirals and can be found on Soundcloud. We are inclined to discount it because one song was deemed too close to a Mark Velarde number and all the other songs were later factored in to future projects, but it’s still there.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

John Tucker was born in London in 1982 to a Finnish mother and an English father. He graduated from Lancaster University with a First Class Honours degree in English, Creative Writing and Practice in 2009. He has been in five bands including with his siblings who wrote The Road To Heaven by Noj And The Mob when he was 12; Oedipus Wrecks who foreshadowed doom in teenage years; Secret Chord H who actually made it to the radio in 1999; The Flood who only recorded on binaural earphones thus to break the ancient silence; and most recently Black Hole Myths who are working on a spoken word album. He has also done a lot of solo work, not to mention self-publishing or vanity-press publishing 17 books. It is thought that John wrote the song we mean when we say the sheet where pictures grew depicts a lyric. He now lives with his brother and mother at the foot of the Lakeland’s oldest fell Black Combe.