Better than expected

It's a howling gale outside, wind, rain the works. It is January and this is Scotland. Anyway this wee piece of shadowy distortion turned out better than I expected. God is the great programmer and we are the great programmes and I truly have no idea what I'm talking about.

Colours of January

For no particular reason the colours of January this year will be represented by colouring book colours of cats and dogs displayed in a slightly distorted fashion.

Going about their business

Some people might think

If you see some celebrity or public figure

By chance (?)

Three times or more

In odd places

Out in the real world

Outside of a screen

Just going about their business

That it means something

That it's a message

A call to action

A call to act

What would you do?

What would you do with that thought?

The View

The View.

Still life landscape

Traffic cone, vacuum cleaner and piano.

Economics

In the school of economics

Things are seldom comic

Things seldom make sense

There's cause and consequence

But no clear explanation

Theories and equations

Factors, actors and detractors.

Oh yes.

Substance is lacking

You need fiscal backing

Relentlessly attacking

Other schools of thought

You see ...

Economics can be bought.

Triptych

The Holy Spirit moved across the earth, across the waters and through the ether. That was about all he could manage. It had been a tough assignment.

In the jungle, the mighty jungle, the Virgin Mary sleeps tonight. She had no memory of the previous day nor had any flashbacks (yet).

Having done his "job" he moves on and does other things. He does not have a robust span of attention it seems. Eyes all seeing, ears all hearing and a dark brown voice with a contemporary  Middle Eastern tone to it.

Without thinking

Walking down the sides of tall buildings

In a single bound

Faster than speed

Darker than a bullet

The dawning of the age

As a spider moves across a wall

Yonder snow capped peaks can't speak

Before yesterday was another day

There always was tomorrow

It brought comic strips and impossibility

Very straight lines and talk

Noiseless words describing noise

Where the buffalo roamed

We imported that other culture

Misappropriated it and all their deeds

Killed the hostages and bought fresh slaves

Piled gold into limousines

And planned a better future

All without thinking about what we were actually doing.

Moody

Moody Cafe

From a table

interior 

looking out

 light comes in 

traffic and blur 

wedding guests

 shoppers

 pavement hoppers

 hawkers

 apple juice

 gallery 

Saturday

lunch.

Pizza V Timewarp

Intergalactic pizza with fruit

Here are a series of words: Some roads are bright coloured roads. Some roads are black and white. Monochrome. Painfully coloured. Darkened by plain tones. Mixed in places. The plain meets the tones. Here and there. On the borders. Where they mingle. Intergalactic. Inner.

Eastern sunset

Eastern sunset.
There is no Western sunset.
Ever.
Unless you view it in a mirror.

Number two

...in an occasional series.

Wild sea

Here's a picture I created
Called "the wild sea"
Far away from me
but still it surrounds
space - water - time
from a safe distance.

Breakfast

Here's a breakfast I made, earlier.

Now it's a flash in the pan,
a mark in the dishwasher,
debris in the bin.

Some say waste is a sin,
but not the kind of sin or thing,
the excludes you, or eludes you,
separates you, makes you,
look a fool.

Then I reflected.

The eggs have eyes,
well that's where the thinking began,
that turned me into a vegan.

I didn't even think about the bacon.

About time

"Why should I of all people believe in the words of the Buddha? Why should I follow his teachings? There is no peace, no occasional rest, no respite.  I have seen things but they are in the past so what is the point in searching for justice? We are all in constant crisis." 

These are some things I said, they are things I may have meant at the time. Now I'm not so sure. I'm not even sure if I ever said them. It may be that you said them all along, throwing your voice, closing out my thoughts with some bombastic forces that I couldn't counter. I may have been weak. You cannot hang a man for that.

I wasn't sure what was really going on. I was unsighted for a moment. It was all a bit chaotic. I could however sense the disapproval. We had crossed some kind of line, broken away, travelled through. There was a new space and place before. Perhaps there was a breach in the space/time continuum anyway. I'll probably never know. All I can recall was that her nose seemed to grow, her features became sharper and the grasp of her hand stronger. I read later in a lengthy footnote that this kind of thing was to be expected. I did feel judged however.

So those great blocks of concrete closed in around us. The daylight became a precious thing. The size and the bulk was overwhelming. It took courage just to look up, to lift our eyes from the flickering screens, to watch as the heavy air descended upon us. There were cracks in their lungs. Those others in the gloomy dark. The air was like some heavenly poison, too much, too late, too soon for any redemption. After a struggle with myself I found the door and walked out alone. I didn't look back. That would have been the right thing to do but the time was wrong. In the end it's all about time.

Trees walking

One day, quite by chance, the trees came to life. Of course the trees were already alive so when I say that they came to life I mean that they developed movements, animal attributes and what seemed to be consciousness, at a low level. Funnily enough I was the only one who was aware of it. Others couldn't see it. I tried to explain but well, you know how these things are. So as for the trees, they turned out to be reasonably peaceful, perhaps not fully aware of what people had done to them and happy to be poking about in the woods (?). How they were used as a raw material etc. might bother them if they ever find out. They were a bit like cows. I often think of how that first occurred to me. "These trees are alive now, fully alive, but really they are like big. wooden cattle with leaves and bark so there's no need to be afraid unless they learn anger". Once I'd come to this point I relaxed a bit. The trees would mostly be OK but there may be some upsets if they ever get to understand human history but that hasn't happened yet even with cows so we could be all fine albeit forestry is going to be a little more complicated now that the trees are moving around. I considered reading them the chapters from Lord of the Rings referring to the Ents but then decided that might be a bad idea as it might give them good ideas. We'll have to wait and see what happens next.

This means something

Maria said...

There were some things, Maria said,

Words and jumbles, sweat inside my head,

But that's Maria, living the lonely life with you.

Cinematic beauty, nature's crimes,

You go your way, I've gone mine,

But that's Maria, a fictional life that's taboo.

The revolution's here, out on the street,

Packaged for the masses, we're so indiscreet,

But that's Maria, older and younger and untrue.

Never make a song

There will always be some bit you've missed

Within that multi-coloured list

Some history that hissed

With hungry lips you didn't kiss

And was I in that moment there

But that moment's floating in the air

Still out of reach but in despair

The things I fixed in disrepair

There will always be that glimpse you had

Sixty seconds or a second flat

The truth rode out and that was that

Drowned in my innocent intoxicant

And I an instant you were gone

I had a feeling all along

That here was there but there was wrong

Those words would never make a song

These words will never make a song.