One Hundred Cities of Solitude

We are all a book, reading ourselves,
River’ed as the stones
Huckleberry Finn
Placed in the pockets
Of his evening jacket.

Sleep Jim, sleep,
Sleep an upstream dream,
Slave only to seduction and
Trails of smoky wuthered stars.

In discourse with the
Corpse of Sarah Woodruff,
Her salty breath
Spreads the bows of sailors.

Contrite to the cracks of The Cobb
Eau de scandal drips from her lips,
Sarah whispers meekly, soil-slicked teeth,
“If only Jane Eyre had unearthed me,
Heathcliff fucked me, my soul left in
A paper grave for paupers to ink on.”

Last night I dreamt I went to Manchester again
On Salford Quays I sat down and wept.
Midnight’s children were calling “Sally-Anne” –
Tiny voices grazed the
Grass’tures of Saddleworth Moors,
Once more, their pleas were not heard.

Lowry’s everyday becomes the everlasting,
Sweeps of majestic soot across
Slate charcoal Victorian skies,
Irlams o’ th’ Height ordained
The Wythenshawe weep, the rain…..
Oh my Lord, fuck did it fall.

Slurped into buckets off piss,
Sluiced thru’ Canal skin
Sunk to bowels of kichen sink (drama).

The night stalker
Spread sunrise over
The derelict orphanage,
In the deadlurk,
Pip Pirrin plays musical chairs
With Caliban and The Sandman,
Oliver Twist texts the ghosts in the wall.

Author’s note. The unpleasant stanza which should have stood here, has been deleted in respect of Arthur Labinjo-Hughes. The 6 year old recently brutally murdered by his step-mum and dad. May God show them no mercy.

On his bedside cabinet,
Curved breath curled
The Anatomy of Melancholy open.
He dreamt himself into the Chapters.
_/
The hanging rope became loose
So he made a noose from lice & dead mice,
And here’s the thing
Which made his sleep swing,
When he awoke
His wife was purple
Like a turquoise pearl in an oyster bed.
Dead mice wrapped around her neck.

If on a winter’s night a traveller
Should leave their memory suitcase
On your book shelf, take down the
Typewriter and write your life:
There are only 26 letters in our alphabet
Let no other type your twenty-seventh.
Own your voice as the
                               greatest Eagle owns its wings.

Fahrenheit 451 steals love from the sun,
In flames of entartete kunst they also burnt
Heloise and Abelard’s love letters
Lips of Constantinople Library crushed to ash.

That was I. That was me. That was you.
The night goes on without us,
The light at the top of the stairs
Is perhaps, the cruellest metaphor.
One globe, spinning planet,
Invented by ghosts and
Every spectre in between.