toblerone [remix]

hamstrung by the ancestors of landlords
beneath the distant barren peaks of a toblerone—
the traumatic trough entrenches resilience.
a slight slide and crunch underfoot on icy steps,
the organism (the leviathan) slips into disequilibrium.
revolted by bolts of thunderous chunder, and a cold sweat
a risky coffee poured into the evacuated gut.
in a feverish daze, i found the courage to ask for help
and was restored—with my problems undiminished

there is a nut on my bath plug. it can run up or down a screw length. no clue why, at first.

one day, after one of my many long baths (like the one i’m in right now) i turned the knob that ejects the plug. and it had no effect. so i was reduced to spending my evening emptying the bath into the loo with a saucepan. then i went to drill a hole in the plug, but before it made an incision the jolt of the drill burped out the seal and the plug came out.

i inspected the nut on the plug and inferred that clearly i must turn the screw all the way down to the bottom, for maximum ejaculatory force. i did this, and then for ten years or so, generally when i tugged the knob at the end of the bath, the plug always came and the water drained.

but then the knob ceased to have effect again. it impotently refused to drain. twice again in the space of a few weeks. it even made it into the poem (perhaps not yet published, i can’t remember, and, as i said, i’m in the bath.)

i don’t understand, i thought, the second time. the nut is screwed maximally to the bottom?!

a few weeks later it occurred to me. maybe i should try screwing the bolt leftwards, up to the top of the shaft. sure enough, with that setting, the ejected plug sat a good half centimetre further out of the water.

thank fuck i never spent that £2.49 on one of those rubber plugs that you just pull out and never ever have to try and extract with your toilet plunger ten years ago when i first had this problem.

i have a theory that burns is to ayr as ice cube to compton/different, but the same

i suppose i still had burns on my mind from the burns night celebrations. i had been at a friend’s for a haggis supper. i had hoped i might get a chance to recite some poetry, but it didn’t seem to be the vibe.

i like that there are some elemental homophones going on in the line. burns, like fire; air, like wind; and wll ice is water. and burns are also water. i don’t think the good people of compton celebrate cube suppers yet though. maybe in two hundred years?

january is the worst month of the year. 2025 is only getting better now. stanza 2 ‘witness (1 dope)’ is live on youtube/insta/the blog from tomorrow and is already up on apple music, spotify, etc

it’s very expensive, and different but not nicer

so ostensibly this line is about post-brexit toblerone. prices have indeed risen and qualify has dipped. whether it is toblerone widing its valleys, or cadbury changing its recipe.

but its also about brexit. and about late stage, hyper unequal, billionaires and paupers style capitalism. we privatise, financialise, put the price up and reduce the quality. the trick might have worked in 1979. but that was a very long time ago.

sweet child, have you tried the toblerone?

we are at the first chorus. i decided i wanted to write a poem about brexit called ‘toblerone’ ages ago. in 2016. the brexit referendum result came out on my birthday. i was genuinely devastated. a vote for shear stupidity.

anyway. i had the spinal tap yesterday. went to the doctor with a sore neck and this is what they do to me. I am done with western medicine. it turns out i just needed a neck massage and some rest. so i quit my job. one of the best feelings you can get under capitalism.

the stress of january can lead to bad decisions:/we all rely on the good souls that forgive us

so i wanted to quit my job today, but instead i find myself at hospital waiting to undergo a lumbar puncture to check for signs of brain disaster. which reminds me of the last time I quit a job, ten years ago, and i had a broken hip. i rushed back to the office as it felt a bit weird to give my notice via email from hospital. isn’t the universe mystical?

anyway, i was given the decision to make re the lumbar puncture. and i am a fearty. so tempted to draw a line under the affair. but i shouldn’t make another bad january decision just because i’m stressed and scared of a bit of needle.

and nae cunt’s wearing tartan

sadly i don’t have my diary with me to check what was going on last year. i never wear tartan though. or wear a kilt. i think its an autistic thing. pathologized pattern aversion.

i’m posting today from the hospital after a serious of scary headaches over the weekend. waiting for a ct scan. the last time i had one, i got shingles. i also went over my knee at the bouldering yesterday afternoon. its an all you can eat buffet of niggles.

a southerly wind blew the weather away

weather in the west of scotland is not the most predictable. i type this two days after a powerful wind blasted across the island, taking roofs from houses and depositing them in the sea, and after returning from a very slow and cold run through sleet, ice and mud.

but last weekend it was mild. and next weekend i’m going cycling on the warmer windy island of lanzarote. last year’s cycling holiday was to gran canaria, where we endured winds about as strong as the ones that brought carnage here this week. like cycling through violent treacle. let’s hope for better luck this time.

an address to yer arse and lets make it the last

there is an awkward symmetry to today’s date (25.1.25), which happens to be the 266th anniversary of rabbie burns’ birth. he is scotland’s national poet but his work is internationally famous, particularly ‘auld lang syne’, as traditionally slurred on hogmanay.

i hate the national anthem, ‘flower of scotland’. it’s a nationalist dirge, bleating on about medieval battles and nursed grudges. all the more outrageous when so many burns options are available. i would love to hear 50,000 scots sing ‘a man’s a man for all that’ before the soccer meet at hampden park.

burns was also a pistol carrying excise man – a tax collector. so he really is my spirit poet. i don’t think i’ll be having haggis tonight but i shall be sure to raise a dram to our nation’s greatest scoundrel.

https://www.instagram.com/n.n_benn/

https://www.youtube.com/@nnbenn

@n.n.benn

*toblerone is now available on spotify / apple music etc. new music and videos will be released on the 1st of every month, with the poems dissected in the blog/insta over the rest of the month in daily posts*

ya puddin’, ya haggis, yer cheap lousy habits

burns’ night is 25 january, tomorrow. but clearly it was on my mind, as the haggis is notoriously, ‘the chieftain of the puddin’ race’.

maybe i will reflect more on our national poet tomorrow. today we have a big storm in scotland. its a red warning – the earth’s protective atmosphere is today dangerous to life. all the schools are closed.

except one: tough school, near kirkton of tough. it takes more than a bit of weather to deter the tough children of tough.

every act cast’s a vote for your honour and character

aristotle talked of ‘eudaimonia’ in the nichomachean ethics. this was the course of university that i failed to understand. i got a d. by far my worst grade. if only i had got a c, i would have got a first for my degree!

eudamonia is sometimes defined as ‘happiness’ – but that’s not quite right. it’s about living a virtuous life. living moderately. and what is the make of a man or woman?

we are just what we do. every time we act, we vote for the person we are. i actually heard this idea on a zoe nutrition podcast. i teared up a bit. i finally understood aristotle.