The Christmas Film Quiz 2011

Garlands join me

It’s a birthday gift to my friend Esme. My wonderful, beautiful friend without whom I would disintegrate. It is everything that I want her to know, always.
Happy Birthday Esalmeberry.

A love letter for Joanna

I’ve been reading and rereading John Keats love letters to Fanny Brawne for the last few weeks. His devotion to her has kept me buoyed and has reminded me how good love is.
This is my love letter to Joanna Lumley. It is everything I would say to her if our lives were different. They would have to be pretty different mind but somehow, love would be champion. The woman is utterly magnificent. Thank goodness there is somebody in the world living a life as full as hers.

As I walk through streets

It is about being on the edge of something, too frightened to move forward whilst knowing that its the only thing there is left to do. Nothing changes if nothing changes.

If I end up in the same place

It is really about surrendering yourself to the inevitability of never really knowing. There is nothing more than what we have and no matter how we go about things the result is going to be the same.

I wish it looked like something else

This week I’ve been unable to shake the feeling that I’m screwing up every aspect of my life. That combined with having a pencil and notepad by the side of my bed at 11.30pm has resulted in this poem. It isn’t how I feel always, just how I feel at the moment.

The roots from which they grew

THE FILM QUIZ

Somehow I cope (a time for something)

Its about doing what you can to get through each minute, coping mechanisms and indiosyncrasies that help us not to drive into the sea.
Its about finding what works.

Phantom Lego Bricks

Its about being distracted by technology. It is about being hopeful. It is about wanting to move forward into something in spite of the fact that you can’t know the outcome. Sometimes its just enough to try.

Substitute for a Breakdown

Its about looking for answers in the wrong places, trying to find some sort of solace in the act of ignoring what it is you need to be doing instead. Its about Carly Simon, its about her mouth, its about swearing when you probably shouldn’t.

The lost art of letter writing

I found a most wonderful website.
Its called http://www.lettersofnote.com/ and is, according to site Editor Shaun Usher, 'an attempt to gather and sort fascinating letters, postcards, telegrams, faxes, and memos.'

Last evening I spent two hours filing through pages and pages of them.
It made me sad that the art of letter writing is disappearing and it filled me with such heady, refreshing joy that something like this exists in the world. I think you should check it out.

The below is from the website. I almost wept reading it.

On August 5th of 1962, 36-year-old Marilyn Monroe was found dead at her home. The next day, the following unsent and seemingly unfinished letter, addressed to ex-husband Joe DiMaggio, was discovered at her desk, folded up in her address book. It is thought they were planning to remarry.


Dear Joe,

If I can only succeed in making you happy — I will have succeeded in the bigest and most difficult thing there is — that is to make one person completely happy. Your happiness means my happiness.

Filled with Empty

Its about sitting incredibly still when situations feel overwhelming and trying to get your head around the things that you perceive are standing in the way of what you could achieve. It is about love. It is about being consumed.

Lo and the Beholds website launch

One of the 'best upcoming acts in London', Lo and the Beholds have launched their brand new website and it features one of my illustrations. Take a look at their site here
They sound like I imagine the baby of Madeleine Peyroux, Emmy the Great and Emmylou Harris to sound.
Love the music, love the illustration, love the design. I can't ask more than that.

If your heart was a unicorn

This poem should be read fast. At least thats the way I wrote it to be read. You should not stop for breaths. If this was a script from a Woody Allen film it would come near the end when Woody (the neurotic, insecure lead) would realise that the only way he can win over his love interest (no doubt played by Diane Keaton) is to lay everything out without thinking or editting himself-she needs to know all of him. I’ve been told I do a good impression of Woody Allen, now its seems to have spilled over into the words I write. (transcript below)

'if your heart was made of clay' i shout
'then i would wrap my hands around it and form it into
something else
something new.'

'Like a unicorn.
Unicorns never made anybody unhappy.
and they're made of glitter
and I'm sure they can grant wishes like genies
and ladies who sit on ends of piers
in headscarves
and dresses with beaded fringes
and floral prints.'

'I wish it was a thousand unicorns that would stampede and burst through your chest like that part in The Lion King that I can't watch cos Mufasa dies and it doesn't matter that Simba becomes King at the end and marries Nala and has babies because Mufasa is still dead.

I don't want to die though.'

'and now theres a hole in your chest from the aftermath of the stampede and I would put my hand inside and it would be the first time I got to go inside fully and my hand would be there and you'd smile and I would smile and the clay heart unicorns would be running free through clay heart forests on some new course and music would play amongst clay heart sticks and all the other clay heart animals that had been freed before by someone else.'

'But your heart isn't a unicorn.
Its not even a horse.'

I want only great things

It is everything I want to say but never can. It is a love poem. It is a dedication. It is a physical reminder that there is light somehow, always.

 

Living without Parallels

This week my first solo edition of 'The Inside Thoughts of Now' appeared in Creature Mag. Its about feeling like you are on the outside of things. Its about the moment you realise that reality will inevitably not match up to the fantasy you have in your head and its about being alone.
Having complete control over the work I was creating was immensely satisfying and being able to introduce the sorts of images I make was an utter thrill. I will be continuing with my solo pieces for CreatureMag fortnightly in hopes that you will come to completely know all of me. This is a fine place to start.

Paper Shell

My latest poem for Creaturemag is called ‘Paper Shell’. Its about saying goodbye and trying all you can do to hold onto some element of something that isn’t there anymore. Its about love. Its about endings and its about dealing with what is inevitable.
It is the final collaboration between me and illustrator Steven Jarvis but I will continue working with Creature Mag with a brand new format. I will be in control of both the words and the illustrations and I am very excited about the possibility of what I am now able to create.


I will lay paper on the ground
and draw lines around your shadow as you go
so that when you're gone I will have something to look at
and a part of you will have stayed.

The outline of your body,
now pinned to my wall,
will have to be enough
because your inside was clogged with
a truth that was not my own
and I never saw all of you.

I will take coloured pencils and fill the paper shell with yellow lines
each one starting at your heart
and ending where the pages stop.
I would have breathed light through your lips
if you hadn't gone
but staying was beyond us both.

It would be easier to believe

Here's my latest poem for CreatureMag
Lots of trying things have happened to both me and those around me in the last month or so which has led to a lot of talk about free will and whether or not God exists. It has also encouraged discussion about ones own strength and ability to overcome trials and whether this would be easier to do if you believed that a higher power had a hand in the things you experienced.


It would be easier to believe,
because life is fact
and ease is hard to come by.
My eyes aren't open and
I lay as today becomes something else to remember
and the world fills with yet more holes.
If I was certain that what I was looking for was more than wishful thinking
I would search around corners and up stairs
take journeys to places where water tastes different
and people smile for other reasons.
I would take chances on good
and sing songs in bustling streets.

For now I count seventeen penny coins in my hand
and throw them onto the ground.
Knowing that I changed the way the earth looks
and the distance closed a little
I continue forward,
and I continue to search,
because there is nothing else I know
and I want to be certain.

Rebel without a Cause-Finished

Here it is-my Ritzy Cinema 100 Poster competition entry.

Its taken FORTY HOURS to complete but I'm almost sure its worth it. No doubt this is exactly how James Dean hoped he would be remembered-I only wish I could be sure he'd like me.

Let me know what you think maybe-that could be nice.
 

 
For your reference, here is the original.

CURRENT SEWING TIME= 23 Hours.

Sent using BlackBerry® from Orange

CURRENT SEWING TIME=19 1/2 HOURS. Face=done.

Sent using BlackBerry® from Orange

Two and a half more hours complete. CURRENT SEWING TIME=9 1/2 hours.

Sent using BlackBerry® from Orange

James Byron Dean, Ritzy Cinema

Here is my entry in progress for Ritzy Cinema's 100 Poster Competition. I'm sewing the 'Rebel without a Cause' film poster (see below) and I started James Dean yesterday. Sewing with my hands makes even the darkest days seem a little more worthwhile and I can only assume that being remembered with a needle and thread was exactly what James Dean always hoped for.

CURRENT SEWING HOURS = SEVEN.

If I was brave you would love me

This is the latest poem for CreatureMag. To check out the illustrated version click here.
Everybody at one stage or another has wished they had the guts to say something to somebody they care for and this is my experience of that. Sometimes it is easier to imagine grand gestures as opposed to tiny moments when truth is all there is between two people and that is where this poem stems from. I wanted to write something utterly personal that had universal appeal and would perhaps encourage people to step up and be brave.


I consider painting my eyes onto your face
so you could see what I see.
I spend time wishing I could fill your head with my thoughts
hoping you would breathe them into words
and make them into something real.

I walk with you along beaches and
write things I'm too afraid to say into sand
knowing that ocean will erase any proof
before you have the chance to see.
I pick up rocks and collect them in my pockets
because I feel heavy and it's all I know how to do.

Given the chance I would cover your floor with matches,
knowing that even the greatest fires start from tiny sparks,
and hope that even one step
would light even one match
and things between us would be new.

If I was brave you would love me.

Bryan Adams and the Ritual of the Curtains

My brother must still have been in a wheelchair
because we pushed past high rises
and people who were respected at five
and drunk by seven.
I threw pennies at the Carnival Queen.
"Don't aim for her face" someone shouted.
Now it seems I was smaller than I was but
I'm sure I saw more than knees
and hightops
and plastic cups filled with Carnival nectar.

Later, my hands greasy with vinegar and the memory of chips,
we walked up the hill that unfolded into the sky
Unending
and unforgiving
At home, Bryan Adams played on the radio.
I realised then that my family would die.
Thats when it started.
Vinegar hung heavy like dustsheets over everything.
It's what I remember most.
That smell of vinegar and the overwhelming realisation
that I controlled my families future
with the ritual of the curtains.

A Poem for Katy

Here is my latest entry for creaturemag. My friend Katy and I had a very compelling late night visit to the West Hill recently. It was during the Super Moon and as we stood, cold and still, staring as the sea glimmered under extra big moonlight, we spoke about the sky and the moon and how we’re all connected and how we’re all made of stardust and how we’re all falling, constantly falling.
This poem is for her and it is for that night. Its all I could do to ensure that I didn’t forget.


I fall deeper into billowing sheets of grey and blue
anchored only by lights that shone once before
and just for a minute.
I scribble words onto sky and watch them glitter and drop onto ocean
and into your hands
finding it difficult to seperate you and it
so intertwined you have become that it seems unnecessary even to try.
As we stand before magic that exists not only in our eyes
I consider piling sticks
one
on top of one
on top of one
so you could climb above and see what tonight looks like from another place.

As evening breathes into night
and blue and grey part company for black
we pause and anticipate involuntary change.
Buoyed by our own design.
If music had been playing I would have danced with my eyes wide open.
Cosmic rhythms.

It isn't always easy to be brave.

The Weightlessness of Knowing

This is my latest poem for Creaturemag Its called 'The Weightlessness of Knowing.' You can see the illustrated version on their website but for those of you who just want the words, here they are.


I almost saw a fortune teller today
only a wall between us.
Between me and her,
the future and I.
A plasterboard representation of the barrier that keeps me held back,
suspended here.
As others have their fortunes told I sit.
As doors are opened into and towards untouchable things I wait.
Nothing but now crammed into my pockets.

Later, as I sit in bed I consider what I could have seen.
With the lights off, the smell of clean hair fills the dark,
knotting itself around bedposts and door handles.
And I lay
thinking about what she may have said and
how I would have tied one end of strings to each of the stories
and the other to my wrists
allowing them to pull me into tomorrow
carried by the wind
and the weightlessness of knowing what is waiting there.

The elephants are becoming everything. A reminder, for now, that there is more.

Sent using BlackBerry® from Orange

We are gold-dust

I think Joni Mitchell is saving my life today. Without her I'm almost sure I would have held my breath until my eyes closed.

End. Period.

I sat on the step into the kitchen where I've sat for a decade and then I got up and it was the last time I sat there.

You make the sky less scary big.

I sewed a little picture to celebrate Valentine's Day and I gave it to creaturemag.
Now I give it to you, with love.

Observations that stem from getting nowhere fast

This is my latest entry for creaturemag. Last week I had a few days when I was questioning the direction my life was taking, doubting whether I had the tools to build a successful life for myself. It all came to a head when I text Katy saying ‘I don’t know how to exist in this world’ and, whilst that sounded like a suicide note, it opened up the flood gates for me to reassess how I feel about the energy I put out into the world. This poem is what manifested from those days.


‘I think I would be better served with the elephants'
is something I thought today,
and yesterday and some times before.
I'm not sure I know how to exist in this world
and no matter how dramatic it sounds I know it to be true.
The rain falls too hard
and I don’t know which way to turn my head.
Thelma and Louise bleeds from the television
and I want them to drive into the gap between the two sides
because here doesn't understand how their minds worked
and anything but the gap between the two sides would be
wrong.
Thinking about the elephants, I touch the ground with my hands
wondering how they feel the earth as they move across it.
When one of them dies they visit the spot year after year
to mourn and to remember,
Saying everything they need to say without the words I take
for granted.
They stand and they wait.
'They would understand me'
I say inside my head as my hands sweep the ground.
The thought makes me self-conscious and so I erase it,
leaving only a faint mark behind-
I don't want to lose it entirely
because today I don't know how to exist in this world
and the elephants are making me forget.

The moments in between the big things

I picked up a sticker and stuck it over and over
on my jeans until the stick disappeared
and there was just space in my hands.
I smiled for a moment and then stopped myself.
There is a time to laugh and a time to cry.
Now was neither.

Too many are

Today has been small.
Sent using BlackBerry® from Orange

I disappoint myself because I'm shit

The end of the thing that never actually began except inside my head once.

I had a dream about you last night
You had a convertible.
I had a puppy.
She was dressed as an Avatar.
The roads were very big and it was busy.
You took us to the airport.
We didn't have any luggage.
'I'm gonna cry in bed when I get back to England tonight.' I said.
'You probably will.' You said.
At one point we held hands.

Today I wrote

Today I wrote something new and I sent it to Popshot.

It's called 'Bryan Adams and the ritual of the curtains'

I want them to fall in love with it.
If they don't I'll give it to you.

You must keep it safe, it has my heart inside.