Each time we meet, we do at least one speed writing exercise for 15 minutes. If you’d like to come along, pm me in the usual place!

One example of 15 minute momentary abuse…

I will not dance on your grave
I will not ring the bell
I will not see you in heaven or
wish you in hell.

I will not raise a glass
I will not wear blue – or black
I will not cheer, spit,
or turn my back,

but I will mourn the fact
that you died with the same arrogance,
the same ignorance,
that you always had

and this cold goodbye
that we must pay and endure
does not worsen the disease
but it may begin the cure.

LISTEN HERE

It Stop.

She was the multitasking queen, perfect kids, perfect husband, perfect hair and an organic food plan seven days a week…perfect imperfection with her shabby chic shag pile, precision-ally chipped mosaic tile, aga scones, and reclaimed, retamed, Art Deco retro, grandmothers tat. A hat for every weather condition, a smile for every mood affliction, encyclopaedic knowledge of all herbal teas, middle range red wine and the still acceptable cliche of a wild boar steak.

We’re waiting. We’re patient.

82 years old and she’d never smoked dope, dope is what he’d said and dope is what she shouted back, not intending the joke, the ironic clarity piercing the fear but neither he nor she were laughing that day. The tears had flowed with the tea and lack of sympathy as she pleaded with him to make her proud, don’t go with the crowd, make a stand, make her understand… And then they were gone. We’re patient.

All that was left in the room was a broken guitar, the window, open, laid bare the ice in the night and on a rooftop, a starling.

It was not hard to hear… That bird that sang alone in the dead of night. He wished it. Dead before he wished it well. Some distant companionship bound. Them. A slow revealing empathy forced the window to always bare, their Loneliness, easier to believe it so. Before winter. Claimed him and others warmed to the peace. They closed their ears, curtains down.

Elvis was strangled by a woman last Monday. People in glass houses shouldn’t throw fucking jailhouse rocks, a billy goat naahee doesn’t cut it, mustard, custard, sickly sweet but without the talent of an in cahoots flea shackled with thread to a miniature hairpin bike, I fail to see your charm because the arrogance – the arrogance – exposes you to my contempt, first stone and all. That. Jazz.

We’re waiting.