My Words, My World

First drafts – A few pages in the large wilderness of the world of writing

Archive for the tag “sounds”

Breathe and look and listen

At 4 am when the world’s at rest and the only ones awake are those that should be and those that don’t want to be. I step out onto the balcony, breathe in the deep pine scent which flows down from the mountain. In the clear air the black sheet of night is bejewelled by a thousand diamonds and the planets are visible without the need for technology (except for my glasses). I sit and breathe and look and then I listen to a distant owl, in my usual waking hour before the hooligan cries of the crows begin.

Good morning

The subtle scream of a distant ambulance

the harsh cry of a crow

the hum of the elevator

and her soft breathing beside me.

The fingers of dawn yet to creep through the blinds

the alien glow of the alarm clock

the annoying too-early church bells

disturb the darkness of the room.

I get up.

Good morning.

Somewhere

Clock tick, ticking in the silence of the apartment
or
the apartments because there are nine in the block
and
I’m the only one awake at this time,
in
these hours where I should be elsewhere
and
not writing, or reading or dropping benzodiazepine for sleeping
and
my body aches for sleep
but
my mind tells my body to fuck off
and
get up, get going and do something
and
I’m on the sofa with a pen in one hand
and
a notebook in the other and a book by my side
and
the clock keeps ticking
and
to think that somewhere the sun is rising
and
somewhere else it’s setting on another day
as
the momentum of our forward roll takes us around
a
big ball of light and heat that keeps us here,
alive,
going nowhere except forward;
rolling, rolling
in space time, in real time,
(who’s got the time anyway?)
as
somewhere to the east of me the sun is coming up
and
somewhere to the west of me it’s going down
as
10,000 lives have just left
and
10,000 have just begun
and
we just keep on rolling. Somewhere.

Morning story without the glory

The deep-water sound of someone pissing from a height at 4.30 in the morning
before the first blackbird has it in him
to wake up and start singing
and no car hums the tune of rubber on tarmac
and the night has its own sound
a no-sound
a “fuck me, well hello again, it’s you” sound
and I join in the silence,
eyes wide open and mouth closed shut
and I breathe in and I breathe out
and it doesn’t do much good and I turn over
on my side and wonder if I should read by reading light
or just get up and kiss the night
goodbye
so I say hi to my pen and paper and I want to write a story,
any story,
about the world and what goes on in it, within it
and all I end up writing, again, is my own.

Noise

Electric light, electric noise 
The TV scream
and noise just hurts my ears 
and tears my soul and

SILENCE! Please…

I can’t hear myself breathe
I can’t hear myself live
I can’t hear myself,

be myself

Symphony and scream

The air is filled with the symphony of a thousand broken hearts shattered into a thousand pieces while the remaining void is alive with the anonymous scream of a thousand voices, cried bloody and hoarse.

Symphony and scream

 

Sounds of morning

The summer sun sighs through the strains of a morning

So humid

I open a window;

to sounds that fill my space

 

The unwinding of the blinds on another day

A car coughs

and a motorcycle

screams down the motorway

 

Birds wittering and nattering in an air

thick with heat

a fly whines, a bee hums

as a cat pads through grass

 

No breeze murmurs in this sultry morning,

just scratching

as my pen rolls across the page

like a bead of sweat between the shoulder blades

Happy place

Puerto La Savina is a happy place
in the early morning.
It’s not a miserable place filled
with the miserable grey shouts
and whistles of a city port.

It thrums; it thrums with
sound of boat engines.
It is happy,
basking in the sun.

Brooms sweep the pavement
and early morning walkers walk.
A thicket of masts wave
with the sigh of the sea.
It is a happy place.

Sound Travels

In the cold January air flame and smoke disappear

but the sound goes on forever. 

The pistol crack; the victim’s gasp,

dead before his wide-eyed head smashes against the pavement;

the screams of the passers-by;

the shouting policemen holding them back;

the wailing ambulance;

the knock, apologetic, on the door;

the crying, desperate,

left without a husband and father;

the monotone of the priest;

the 12 clicking heels take the coffin;

the sobs of the veiled

and the final, definite scraping of soil,

thrown from shovel to grave. 

The shot was still ringing out.

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