Jesus Freak

My father used to be a preacher. He gave it up mind. He's still a salesman though, don't get me wrong, but at least now he knows what he's selling.

They called it revival. It started somewhere in Canada, Tornonto or some place. People were being healed they said, 'Jesus is coming soon' they said. All sounded fine to me. I was twelves years old and on an ordinary Sunday morning, I stared out of our family car window, watching the dreary Slough skyline flashing past, and pondered what this Jesus would be like. I wasn't sure he'd be too happy with me mind. Masturbating in the shower, groping girls in the corridor, shooting swans on the Thames...it didn't look good.

This Sunday afternoon would be different though, we were told. The children would not depart as per usual for their individual meetings, but would instead stay with the adults in the main hall. My friend Mark had Spina bifida and he sat across from me, looking bored in his wheel chair. I smiled and waved over to him. He smiled, nodded at the stage and rolled his eyes. Some old American guy in a light blue suit took the platform. Rodney Howard Brown or something like that. Mark and I had seen his kind before, the Tv evangelists and miracle workers, vessels for the holy spirit. He was already sweating, shouting into the microphone and instantly things began to happen.

The old guy with gold rings on every finger started shaking violently, people raised their hands, spoke their own language; grown men began to cry like school girls, old women danced around, someone started screaming like a mad person whilst the guy on stage cried 'come out Satan.' Satan? I'm all for seeing him.

I didn't see Satan though that afternoon, and I didn't see any miracles either. Mark sat back in his wheelchair, refusing to be taken up onto the stage for yet another failed miracle attempt to save his mangled bones. Instead we both laughed at the old woman lying on the floor, her skirt over her head with her baggy underwear for everyone to see. I laughed and looked up at the sky through the windows overhead. Grey clouds and it began to rain. I thought of the girls at school and slipped away, like a thief...to the men's toilets.

Dont diss my hobbies!

I heard James Joyce claimed he'd rather stay home and pleasantly masturbate than actually indulge in sexual intercourse. After much consideration.... I'm inclined to agree. J bird - 08

blue window

fruit wisdom

take care of yourself

Ghost Tree

broken tire swings

and porno mags in the playground

I'll show you mine if you show me yours.

the old cottage is full of wasps now

and a bell rings in the long grass.

We Pour salt onto slugs and eat tadpoles

whilst a mother calls her daughter home

She has lost her cat and it's getting late.

How Could I be So Blind?

The Hawley Arms, before it burnt down that is, in the spring. Mase and I had discovered Sailor Jerry Rum and we were well on our way out to sea. I drunk to forget a girl, my best friend, future wife and mother of my children; now just a picture on facebook. A thousand heartbreak songs later and here I was, improvising the words to sea shanties and trying to catch the eye of a young uninterested barmaid. Mase's round - and as he left for the bar, a large, middle-aged woman pointed towards me.'You - are - stunning!.' She shouted drunkenly. She wore a fur coat and heavy jewellery, and as she sat beside me I smiled, looked at Mase laughing from the bar, and nodded.... the rest is a blur.

Then we were staggering along the bridge over Camden Lock. I told her of my ex love, of the times I slept outside her window just waiting to see her, and of her infedility and promises broken. The old woman pressed me against the wall and pushed her face firmly into mine, kissing me so hard I thought she'd split my lip. I felt a hand on my shoulder, it was Mase. 'Come on mate, let's go home.' I said something about wanting the experience for the hell of it and with a shake of his head Mase turned and walked away. The woman shrieked with delight and we made our way down the steps and under the bridge.

The light from the lamposts were reflected in the water and shone up at her face, giving her the haunting impression of one Toulouse-Lautrec's Cabaret dancers at the Moulin Rouge. She put a large and rather expensive looking handbag at our feet, and proceeded to bite my neck. 'You smell like sex,' she said. Evidence that washing is overated, I thought to myself. 'Let's get a Hotel, I want to suck your cock.' Skin loosens with age, but it also becomes softer, as was the case with her lips which I was now surprisingly beginning to enjoy. Her experience and enjoyment was becoming arousing, thus I forgot the presence of someone passing us in the shadows, or of the sound of the buses roaring by overhead, I buried my face deep into her large, feathery breasts and pondered her offer of a warm hotel room, when...

'oh my fucking god! How could I be so blind!' She pushed me against the wall, a look of horror in her face. 'What is it?' I asked in bemusement. 'Don't give me that you little fucker!' She screamed. She began to pull at her hair, pacing back and forth beneath the bridge. 'How could I be so blind?' The outburst had me startled, and I was trying not to laugh as I attempted to calm her down. 'Don't you dare smirk you little thief. Right, I'm calling the police!' 'What? Why?' 'You know why! My purse, it's gone!' I looked down, and she was right. It had been there at our feet just moments ago. I put a hand to my mouth, trying again to conceal a smile. What transpired lasted well into the morning. The Lady's theory was this - that I, playing the drunk, had 'lured' her under the bridge, whilst Mase, having pretended to go home had in actuality returned and stole her handbag whilst I distracted her, showering her with kisses and seducing her with my naturally sexual musk. I couldn't help thinking what I wonderful idea it was, and told her that I wished I was clever or devious enough for such a thing, but that such is not the case. However, I soon found myself running through Camden, chasing a hysterical woman who was tossing her clothes into the road, saying she had been shamed and was threatening to throw herself in front of a bus. I dragged her kicking and screaming out of the road and pinned her against the wall. I told her that I was not a thief, that I was attracted to her from the moment our eyes met and that if she wanted to call the police I would do it for her. She searched my face, and her eyes welled with tears. She threw her arms around me and began to sob hysterically. 'That bag had my whole life in it. I'm sorry. I'm so sorry.' She soon calmed down and I let her use my phone to ring the police as I had promised, and then called her a taxi. I gave her the last of my change, and felt her hands trembling as I helped her into the back seat. She looked back at me suspiciously from the back window as the taxi disappeared round the corner towards Euston.

I stood motionless, looking up at the dull orange sky overhead. Hard to tell a clear night in London, the stars are never visible anyway. An ambulance siren echoed from the distance and I turned and headed back towards the Hawley, glancing back over my shoulder before taking out my phone and calling Mase. 'Get the handbag ok? Bulldog!'

JR

Scrambled Eggs and Broken Bottles

A dull morning in East London, Lovelace and I slouched in a greasy spoon discussing the night before: The Queen's Head, a night like every other night - rum, rejection and angry boyfriends. A cold breeze came through the open door, as the early morning radio dj's rattled from the kitchen, and the Bethnal locals stared blankly into their morning newspapers, tapping ringed fingers onto cheap, red melamine table tops. The light in the place made me nauseous, or it did that morning, wray and nephew throbbing behind my eyes as I grimaced at the laminated menus. Lovelace described a sordid scene in the Queen's Head toilets as a sad-eyed Italian woman took our orders. I tried desperately not to glance at her chest as I asked for the all day breakfast. Her beauty had long since faded and she was plain at best, but that morning, amidst the gloom and monotony, she was a Modigliani, maternal and familiar, a wife, a mother to my children! I watched her as she waddled away, and noticed a gentleman looking up from his paper out the window behind us. Lovelace's smile dropped from his face as he glanced over my shoulder. I frowned and followed his stare to the street outside. A woman, dressed in a long trench coat, was leaning against the window, covered in blood, a broken bottle in her hand. A man was wrestling with her, pleading as she attempted to stab the bottle into her jugular. The cafe sat in stunned silence. Suddenly I found myself standing and running outside, with Lovelace calling after me.

Her clothes were flecked with blood, her neck was lacerated, and her large, red hands were gripped like a vice onto the broken vodka bottle. She spat and cursed and writhed as I clenched her hands and begged her to let go. But this was a women trying to do just that; a heroin addict, a victim of domestic violence, an alcoholic, she had lost a child long ago or a husband perhaps, whatever the story, looking into her green bloodshot eyes, I could see that here was a woman intent on 'letting go.' The other man with us was also a drunk, he pulled too violently, threatening to 'break her arm' if she didn't let go. I pushed him away, and he lost his balance and fell. I put my fingers around the bottle and yanked hard. It came free and I could breathe. The woman ran off into the crowd and I never saw her again. The drunk cursed and staggered away.

I looked at my hand, it was cut and covered in blood, hers and mine, horrific images of Aids and worse flooding my mind. The locals in the cafe had gone back to their papers and coffee mugs. Lovelace stood in the doorway. 'Mate, your scrambled eggs...' JR