This book’s “a real page-turner”
it says so on the back cover.
It’s not though really, is it?
Thinking about it.
It doesn’t turn its pages,
I do.
Pedantic I know.
Maybe I have writer’s envy.
I can’t write a page-turner
I can’t even write a page
Lately I can’t even write
Blocked like a drain;
again.
Wake up, stuffed nose, can’t breathe
can’t see, light switch, where’s the light switch?
Get up, still house, silence, silence
and the clock tick-tocks the night away.
Walk around, bare feet, cold feet
need a glass of water I’m parched.
Wine and bitter mouth, that last digestive
getting festive on a Saturday, as you do.
Sunday’s here and I’m the only one to see it
and when it’s time to get up I’ll go back to bed.
Not much to do but write and read and
Lester Bangs talks to me of Lou Reed
and The Velvet Underground.
Well, at least it’s Sunday Morning.
“Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery that mediocrity can pay to greatness.” So said Oscar Wilde.
While I hope my work isn’t mediocre, I can understand the sentiment behind the statement. We who doff our caps at others are acknowledging something which we appreciate and would probably like to do or achieve.
I have a weakness for reading Raymond Chandler. Every once in a while I’ll return to any one of a number of books on my shelf. A great writer. By all accounts a greater drinker also, but that’s neither here nor there. I’ve always loved reading Chandler and, not so long ago, as an idea to ‘unblock’, I wrote a small, Chandleresque sketch. It only runs to 68 words but after doing so I found a new impetus to my writing.
I hope you don’t find it too mediocre…
She offered me a coffee. I took it like a man. Black, no sugar; like my mood. I don’t know which discount supermarket she’d bought it from but even with hot water added it was as dry as a Saharan wind. I managed to drink it without pulling any expression except appearing concentrated on what she was saying, which wasn’t much. Her words flowed like an uphill stream.
The train leaves Milan Central station and heaves over the tracks in the rain which streaks the dirty windows; its carriages are packed with steaming rush-hour tiredness and anger.
The young man sits in the corner up against the window, as the rain beats time, with Hemingway’s words falling off the pages as he tries to concentrate but can’t. For Whom the Bell Tolls? The bell was tolling for people who want peace and quiet on a train carriage to allow them to read, he thinks.
A fat man who’d possibly eaten only garlic for lunch sits opposite, hand wrapped around his phone in some strange death-grip as he seethes and steams, letting the person on the other end know as well as the other three occupied seats around him that, Cazzo! the fucking contract has to be there by Friday or it’s not just his balls on the line, understand?. He doesn’t say which line, which is OK; the less he talks the better, the young man thinks, his own anger rising.
Through the red mist that descends before his eyes the young man looks up and sees her, in the opposite seat across the aisle. Her silky, shoulder-length hair is dark, and her hazel eyes strike out from her face which seems to have had the benefit of a tan recently. In her jeans and blue sweater with white stripes (a little French he thinks: oui mademoiselle, oui), she becomes his calm in a storm-tossed sea. He watches from a distance, as her forehead wrinkles and she glares at the woman opposite her.
This woman opposite has her tablet on her lap and has wires and a mike stuck to her head as she babbles continuously, her voice rising, informing everyone that didn’t want to know that Cazzo! how the hell is she supposed to fit in another meeting on Thursday, she isn’t a fucking machine you know. Sat there looking like Robo-Queen that could be debated, the girl thinks, as she lowers her head and raises her book in an attempt to block out the irritation. As she does so the young man opposite gasps. A Farewell to Arms – Hemingway; she’s reading Hemingway!
Mr Garlic is making another call but its wafting anger slips into the background as the young man looks only at the young woman across the aisle, his book held up to his chest, now half-forgotten. The train starts to slow.
Robo-Queen finishes her call and transforms into e-bitch as she proceeds to beat the hell out of her tablet, with two fingers having some maniacal life of their own as she sends an email, probably shouting Cazzo, cazzo, cazzo!
The fat garlic man wheezes his bulk into an overcoat big enough to protect a small car from winter frost and grabs his briefcase, stuffed full, as its leather creaks for mercy, and he makes his way to the door.
The young woman looks up. She sees the young man looking at her and her eyes drop to his chest. She sees. Fine lines around her eyes appear and she gives him a smile. He returns it just as e-bitch starts to make another phone call. He waves her over to the now-vacated seat opposite him and they whisper words of Ernest, in earnest, as the train takes them home.
Firelight, flame dance
shadow tango, flicker bright
Light, blaze and burn away
the cold, dark winter night
The cold black winter night
of frost, snow and ice
of chilled bones gently warmed,
reading by the firelight
Reading by the firelight
Shadow tango, pages white
Let your warmth envelope me
and burn away this cold, dark night
El hombre con un grande corazon. Raul Lemesoff, you are indeed a hero.
A huge thank you also to Doris, for bringing this to my, and therefore your, attention.
Muchas gracias Doris.
My Words, My World 