marathon training

slow pegs toe the towpath
peel back the algae film
under the dull mist sky
stop to pee
like six times at least
empty both bladders
very stiff, very type two
until the high kicks in
ten miles in
listening
to weyes blood sing
oh god turn me
into a flower
put me in
a wee clay pot
somewhere with nice light
not too hot

this must have been near the start of the marathon training. for i am once again, near the start of the marathon training. my longest run since the marathon is 24km and i’ll be pushing it up to 27 in a few weeks. i think i’ll hold at 30 for a while. i did lots of very long runs last time so maybe i’ll do more runs but less long.

you go through a lot on a long run. listen to lots of music. tune out for a bit. then a song might grab you. maybe cry a bit, running about crying in tiny little shorts and a vest. this is just who i am.

thinking about being a poet while getting an m.o.t.

my byline is a shyline
to project my insecurity
protect my anonymity
objectify my vanity
the car passed its m.o.t.
three minors, one of which
will strand me
unprepared on
a lane in the country
but that’s not for a while yet…

it still hasn’t happened yet, the stranding, but it’s a matter of time. the car got through its m.o.t. again this year. it picked up a dent somehow though.

the rising of the cult of the solutionisers

veering into the giddy stratosphere
my plus one request gets a kb
leaving me in mild peril
overran sesh so i only ran four kloms
then was late and to the wrong fireside yawn
a tedious rant that also overran
now i’m late for dinner and sober
so i take the motor for a spin
down dark windy lanes to the train car swap
solutionize became my siren
elevate and inspire to escape my horizon
if it isn’t part of the solution
it tends to be precipitate
selena lookin woman in dumbstruck awe
and though it was nice to participate
when the cult disbands to autumn sun
i prefer to solve,
in search of my elixir.

there were some lovely days in september last year. i spent a lovely week on a dadaist retreat in the home counties. oh, and i was training for a 10k. the solution / precipitate bit is a reference to a toothpastefordinner comic from probably about 2008.

dance like nobody is watching, write poetry like nobody is reading

kids tend to like me
my therapist said
because i am
weird in the head
i feel things intensify
or barely at all
but you know that i love
the slow, sad songs
a masked dancer pirouettes
down the cycle path
which is then autocorrected
to psychopath
i’ve seen her again since
wearing her cowboy hat
and i’m jealous but happy
that she has that
it didn’t occur to me
to wear an actual mask
an invisibility cape
draped on for the dance

and the thing about moving home is that, as well as organising your new home, you also have to sort out things with the old home. changes address. get a new doctor (best add that to my to do list). get all the last stuff out the flat, clean the place. and work / usual life commitments continue unabated.

unstephen

morrissey
you died
you became unstephen
it’s the only way
i can enjoy the smiths
for example
i, a stoic, sometimes like
to nurse a melancholic
feeling in my chest
let the tears come
a little wail
rub my eyes and head
in the bath
listening to the smiths
this, that you’re so scared of
a little misery?
feel that hollow chest
the pain in the cheeks
a noseful of snot
is it so bad?
it’s not like you’re bored
or morrissey

steve/phen is one of the sacred names in my life. so many known. at one time, all my friends were called stephen. then i had a girlfriend called stephanie for a while. all true stephens have a related tracy. in my experience.

stephen also translates: st ettiene – great band, great football team. and san esteban. the setting of my novel.

a sunny weekend in greater st albans

backpack to london
for the downtown fun run
ladybirds, butterflies,
apple trees
and sofas in the sun
through the field of wheat
like a young theresa may
teal dragonfly perched
on a vibrant green
leaf above a rust bed stream
we wade with baggy minnows
by the weeping willow
clock two foxes,
attempt avuncular football
scorched between the bridges
peddle assisted
to the bucket hat photobomb
goosebumps on
the cold carriage home

this was a lovely holiday. it was sunny. saw friends. family. wildlife. waded in a stream. it was very cold on the train home though.

poetry needs to suck sometimes

i sing a duet
with my teenaged heart
love may tear
us apart
it’s hard to
believe
i’m in my 40s
and haven’t got
any better
at poetry (poe aught ree)
cry in the bath
for auld lang syne
you’ve got to believe me
that i tried this time
we always knew
it would come to this
the universe is so small
and poetry, so big

i really loved the song, love will tear us apart, when i was younger. i don’t revisit early obsessions much. then sometimes i listen to 90s music and i’m like ah man culture was so much better in the 90s.

i can’t remember the last time i listened to joy division though. but i recorded two covers of love will tear us apart between the ages of about 15 and 18 and i listen to them every now and then and try and imagine being that age. i think i felt broadly the same, but much more insecure. no idea what job i would have, where i would live, would i find love. it’s scary being young.

a short poem about a short cycling holiday in argyll

a hot heat,
awestruck, fading
but you won’t get rid of me
a lizard in argyll,
a long goodbye,
hyper-palatability
confused saint mungo,
road chicken strut
and tut. and tut.
sent the pint back
and got a new one
just the same

there’s the road ahead
and the music in my ears
an idea in my head
called the gilet years
it’s the beep of the derailleur
greeting the last cog
march on, forward, onwards,
towards our epilogue

i am always thrilled to see a lizard, all the more so if it’s in scotland. you don’t see a lot of lizards here. i’ve seen more red squirrels than i’ve seen lizards here. three squirrels. two lizards. oh i ordered a pint of st mungo and it was dead nice. in the bar. then i ordered another one, in the restaurant. but it tasted different, not as nice as the first, so i assumed they had given me the wrong thing and sent it back. anyway, the exact same flavour of pint came back. i think maybe they gave me the wrong pint at the first bar.

my pre-millennial childhood

o index finger
like a long toe
my pinky also
unusually small
little wonder
my handwriting’s unclear.
correction fluid
another go, please
i subtract seven letters
and get left with rect o fud
register my domain
with the nineties web dial up
to bravenet guestbooks
and fansites and bandsites
try and capitalise
on the dot com boom
all you need is a brand
profits will come soon
the scars of hubris
are born by us
inferior designers
and i wear them fine

i’m not sure if my little pinky actually has any impact on my handwriting. but if you remove enough letters from the ‘correction fluid’ we had in lieu of tip-ex in school, you could make it say rectofud. so they nearly all said this. pass me the rectofud, one might say, after an egregious spelling error.

as a 13 year old boy, i thought, i will set up a record label called rectofud. i made the website. it was the dot com boom. i figured that was all i needed to do to make my millions. it was fun anyway. the web was new and exciting and fun and i had my own little place on it, before myspace and bebo came along and gave everyone their own little webpage and none of my school friends had any need to post on the rectofud guestbook any more.

alanis said it first so it’s ok

i go to bed early
i wake up late
french kissing won’t be tolerated
on this date
a collegiate day
leaves me rough
in my navel
looking for fluff
two roles away
on down the hill
wine and dine
(and sixty nine)
on a jagged little pill

this is mostly just silly, but i have been thinking a lot about belly button fluff recently. there used to always be fluff in my belly button if i had been wearing clothes that day. most days if not all that would be. but there is never ever fluff in it any more. i still usually wear cotton tee shirts. i still have a belly button. and i’ve been basically the same size for 30 years at this point. i don’t understand what has changed. if anyone knows, please let me know.