Tuesday 2 February 2010

Last man in Herne Bay

I am not a man
except for this pint
except that I am the last
in Herne Bay.

Mini golf. A barking noise.
It’s never occurred to me.
I am for the Swayze
Just coming on the jukebox.

When you are trendy for a pint
God it’s so ironic we are here
my manners have slipped
dancing on my own

When you are the last
you will dig out oysters
and lob them at the rocks
like the birds

you will step over
a leaking postman
to scoff wafer cones
from the kiosks

you will catch
yourself mumbling
along the corridors
of the marine hotel at night

when you are mechanical
and will always face
the sea
what can you do?

was it you I was with?
paying £1.20 to eat these slugs
and getting pissed on the beach
Jesus Christ.

Ruins of Dreamland

Dreamland burned down. The dreams of Dreamland burnt too. I tried explaining the penny arcade to my hunting pack. They snapped and they clinkered and one by one they died. Ranter and Ringwood, Bellman and True.

Radio rust over Dreamland, over. Shortwave static grows through the scaffold of the coaster tracks, propagates slowly in the evening tide. Echoes of the ghost train. Right well I served my master, said the voice.

One voice from the bunker. Female uninflected, smudged by atmospherics, generated by machines. Whiskey stained. Foxtrot and tango as sprung dancefloors into powder. Dreamland attracted over two million visitors a year.

Dreamland attracted me. As you will plainly hear, smudged by sunspots. In the public language of numbers, though this is not, shall we say, for public consumption. I spent many nights here as a young buck.

Perhaps fifty times larger than a man, Dreamland was potential. Its ruins lie all around us, in burnt out sierras, of dandelion, sorrel, jack-by-the-hedge. I tried explaining seaside architecture to a dead gull. From its bill whispered Kursaal, Washington, Hotel, Napoli.

Poaching the ruins for steel struts and coddling them for coaster rails. Dreamland was a controlled explosion. Dreamland was my delight. I tried to explain this to the numbers as they drifted over the sea and tangled in the scaffold. Dreamland burned down. Dreamland burned down. Dreamland burned down.

Friday 29 January 2010

"Far from creating a mood of dread, the power failure created a mood of euphoria. An almost cosmic joy swept over all the darkened cities. Why people felt that way may never be answered."

Robert Smithson, 'Entropy and the New Monuments', 1966.

The Road to Passaic

Parts 1-4:

on the number 30 bus of the Inter-City Transportation Co.
anonymous tins of food wimpled softly
the ashes of the late world wimpled softly
the tarp wimpled softly
a set of tracks suddenly appeared and wimpled softly
like something trying to preserve heat
like the last host of christendom
like certain frescoes
a set of tracks appeared and wimpled softly
I pulled the buzzer-cord and got off
that ashen scabland wimpled softly

*

the sky a sensitive stain of sweat
the bridge an enormous photograph of wood and steel
the river an enormous movie film
in the glassy air of New Jersey
a good business in STONE, BITUMINOUS, SAND and CEMENT
Passaic seems full of “holes”, he said.
The boy didn’t answer.

*

I walked down a parking lot
that monumental parking lot
like a grieving mother with a lamp

all that existed were millions of grains of sand
trembling like ground-foxes in their cover,
like shoppers in the commissaries of hell

the future is “out of date” and “old fashioned”
such futures are found in grade B Utopian films
and a paperback called The Road by Cormac McCarthy

*

In those first years Robert Smithson was so rich in color. He sharpened a quill in the smokestacks and the 1968 Firebirds and the barrows heaped with shoddy so it would be possible to see how was made oceans, mountains, New Jersey peopled with realistic waxworks of raw meat. When he rose and turned to go back the tarp was lit from within. The ashes of the late world wimpled softly, like squid ink uncoiling.

Thursday 28 January 2010

I am definitely the last man awake.


Hope you guys like the posters. Think I'm going to get some of each of these two printed out.

final drafts




BEEP AFTER EVERY NUMBER 98765(4321)BEEPS God's agent, in the swimming pool to sketch broken arch of London Bridge the BEEP ruins of St. Paul's, to sketch exactly as Victorian Englishmen987659876598765 sketched some died in the abhorrent whiteness those of polo necks for Rome. I pick them off next to t BEEP he sudden fuzz down the blower the commercial warehouse is (4321) Cannon Street Station, brand-ne BEEP w in 1873 of a sanatorium, of a prison but here I imagined 987659876598765 with the cast-iron piers of the red tomato and BEEP a green, I double agent, I replace the tired estate agent, I biological agent, I sits on a anti-caking agent, agent-agent-agent. This machine can actually rather rise see the difference bet BEEP ween a Shot tomato. Some. I can't find the numbered divisibility nor money nor love I am free agent. Some feedback territory. Hungry. Went to the hotel and stole the sheets. Found BEEP some The cathedral-like ruin sugar. I 98765 had a bridge rusting away in the tidal ooze I BEEP had a nurse but she had broken her ruin ankle. Fished the last ever bird.

More Ideas







Wednesday 27 January 2010

POsters




Some Ideas

Tuesday 26 January 2010

Heston: wrong


"You finally, really did it. You MANIACS! You BLEW IT UP! Aw, damn you! GOD DAMN YOU ALL TO HELL!"

Gustav Dore, The New Zealander, 1873

"He sits on a broken arch of London Bridge to sketch the ruins of St. Paul's, exactly as Victorian Englishmen sketched those of ancient Rome. The cathedral-like ruin next to the commercial warehouse is Cannon Street Station, brand-new in 1873 but here imagined with the cast-iron piers of the bridge rusting away in the tidal ooze."

- Christopher Woodward, In Ruins (London: Vintage, 2001), 1-2.

[Abi, I will email you a copy of this image for the collage - J]

Thursday 21 January 2010

I am free agent, double agent, estate agent, biological agent, God's agent, anti-caking agent, agent-agent-agent.
This machine can actually see the difference between a red tomato and a green tomato.
I can't find polo necks for love nor money.

Tuesday 19 January 2010

i am the last man alive

Hungry. Went to the hotel and stole the sheets.
Found some sugar. The hotel had a nurse but she
had broken her ankle. Fished in the swimming
pool. Shot the last ever bird.