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.

"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.

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

POsters

Some Ideas

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]

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.

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.

the birds!

Recipes for Disaster

1.

Just to hear how it clankers
I left the trace of my hand in all
I set alight and left to settle.
Dishes, unashamedly gristle
Sesame, jealousy. Tap, deglaze
Using a sieve I pulverised them.
I am sad for these lukewarm
Whisk, tap, deglaze, whisk.
Once I clarify these melons
I took half the tomatoes and
And striving to pour myself
I did. I thought hard about poppies
It is all over for them.
I mixed whisky and pigeons.

2.

Get closer and rub
Stars and passing custom.
Shift the clean work surfaces
The hatches to the
Pear and stilton salad or
Or be bullied into battening
Your face in it, perhaps it
It’s nice to have walls in your
Grease spots, adapted recipes
Just to hear how it clankers.
But at the end of the night
Kitchen, for instance to cover in
And not always burn your arms
Would be nice to leave

by JW, after the recipes of AO

indexical card

dr dr - DRAFT 3

MEDICAL QUESTIONNAIRE
STRICTLY CONFIDENTIAL

State if you have suffered from any of the following:

Tuberculosis NO
A detached voice YES/NO
Fainting or Migraine YES/NO
Blood Coughing NO
Proper names NO
Compulsion to make up stories YES/NO
Coughing or hoarseness YES/NO
Sciatica, of long duration NO
An unholy din YES/NO
An empire of crime YES

Is any investigation pending?
If so please specify I LOST MY VISION IN A PROVINCIAL STATION AND NOW I OBSERVE IT THROUGH FIELD GLASSES. I AWAIT FURTHER INSTRUCTIONS.

Have you suffered an injury?
If so state when and how THE ABUSE OF POWER HAS LITERALLY COST ME AN ARM AND A LEG. THIS WAS MANY YEARS AGO NOW. WITH MY WRITING HAND I STRIKE AND STRIKE OUT.

Are you at present on any form of treatment or medical advice?
If so please specify GIVE UP. DON’T GIVE UP. GIVE UP. DON’T GIVE UP. I SELF-MEDICATE BY EATING, SHITTING AND SINGING.

Have you had any specialist advice in the last two years? GET BEHIND VELVET DRAPES. STUMBLE SOFTLY FROM WALL TO WALL. MY GASTROENTOROLOGIST PREDICTED A DIRE SWING TO THE RIGHT BUT I THOUGHT HE WAS STILL JOKING.

Have you lost any time through illness or injury in the past three years?
If so, for what and for how long I HAVE LOST EVERYTHING. WHY DO YOU THINK I AM APPLYING FOR THIS JOB? DO YOU THINK IT IS FOR MY HEALTH?

Do you feel in good health? IS ELIMINATIVE MATERIALISM REALLY SUCH A DIFFICULT CONCEPT? LET ME ANSWER THAT, YES. I STRUGGLE TO FOLD DOWN WINDBLOWN MAPS , LET ALONE HUMANITY.

Have any of your relatives suffered from any of the complaints listed above?
If so, please state which and the relationship of the person to you IF BY COMPLAINT YOU MEAN COMPLICATION AND BY COMPLICATION YOU MEAN EXISTING THEN ALL OF THEM. START FROM HERE: ADRENAL HORMONES SUCH AS GLUTOCORTICOIDS INCREASE WITH STRESS AND DEPRIVATION, AND SUPPRESS NEUROGENESIS IN RATS. NOW RUIN THE TOWN HALL.

How much do you smoke per day? THAT IS A GOOD QUESTION.

Postcards