Daye 19 / Lark Hill/Floor Of The Park

I first meet a.h. at an autumn fête
on lark hill
sometime in late september
the sun is setting
trees petals bushes
beginning to redden
a few stars appearing in the sky
air is damp
lawn is soggy and gently hissing
after a brief shower
and my legs can feel the wet
as it seeps upwards from the grass
I am talking quietly to this girl
when from behind her slender body
a figure arises
as if from a trapdoor
in the floor of the park
I notice that
the figure is carrying a flute
and a notebook
and that it looks
kind of zappaesque
another girl steps out
from behind him
she turns out to be lucy
we get talking
they tell me they have just returned from
a tour of the states
I ask what kind of a tour
“a tour of duty” he replies
“you’re a soldier?” I ask
I am incredulous
“sort of” says lucy
she laughs
“we’re just tourists really..”
and then they explain...

they are travellers
travellers in time
travellers in space
travellers in multiple dimensions
and they are five
a.h., lucy, under-leary, matthews and molloy
back and forth they go
to any destination
and to any period in history
the future included
no chemical assistance required
they are troubadours / trobairitz
soldiers of fortune
psykick explorers
astronauts cosmonauts psychonauts
beatniks refuseniks
spiritualists surrealists
idealists konstruktivists
the five are only making
tiny jumps in time
at the moment
a.h. tells me
backwards or forwards
fifty or sixty years
just enough to measure how their presence
may affect the future

with no apparent ill-effects
on themselves
they have travelled back
to play gigs
with the beatles and the stones
they have turned on with lennon and harrison
and brian jones
or jammed on-stage with hendrix and page
and with can and neu
played on the forever changes sessions
with arthur lee
wigged out with sly stone
and funkadelic
"ah, the things
we have seen.."
whispers a.h.
as I lie down on my back
inbetween the time travellers
the wet grass is soaking through my coat
and I begin to shiver
I’m staring up into the clouds
the satellites and the planets
and the stars and the spiral galaxies
are all passing overhead
“to travel interdimensionally
everything must get big...”
says a.h.
so everything gets big
then everything gets bigger
whilst I’m shrinking
my universe expands in all directions
things begin to slither away from me
I feel myself flattening out against the lawn
down
down
down
I’m sinking deep into the grass
down
down
down
I’m sinking deeper into the warm earth
molecules everywhere
and blackness
and sudden sparks of bright light
the fundamental particles reveal themselves to be strings
and the dimensions hidden inside them begin to uncurl
you cannot imagine
what it’s like
to look out from deep inside a carbon atom
to see the universe from the inside out
”it’s like looking down the wrong end of a telescope”
says lucy
“..I never realised that there is so much space
inside us all
or between us...”
everything has become accessible
I think to myself
now there can be no more secrets...

Daye 18 / Do I Really Have To Live This All Over Again

11am monday morning
been awake for hours
nothing out of the ordinary
church bells ringing in the distance
birds singing outside my window
something large passes by
the house shakes
furniture rattles
life is linear
the afternoon is not going to take an oblique turn
the day is passing gently by
harin and the others are talking
and drinking english tea in the garden
somebody asks me why
most of my songs are about dreaming
all my songs are about dreaming
my life is one long continuous dream
I reply
they laugh but I’m being serious
I'm in a permanent alpha state
and music is drifting outwards through the patio doors
the dew is still twinkling on the grass
a cloud is moving slowly across the sky
a cat dreams in the sun at the bottom of my garden
what would happen if we all woke up now I think
suddenly I'm awake
it’s 11am
monday morning
been awake
for hours
and I’m writing this blog
have I been asleep?
or daydreaming?
can’t be sure
I call harin
after three rings she picks up the phone
I have woken her she says
and she dreamed that she
was sitting in my garden drinking tea
I call brion at his house on tempest drive
his phone is always switched off
but today it rings three and a half times
before he answers
no you didn’t wake me
I've been lying here for a couple of minutes
thinking about a dream I know I was having
but I can’t remember any of it
he says
and
a cigar-shaped craft is hovering over the trees in the park
a mushroom cloud is rising above the city on the horizon
I am running away from somebody or something
saying “yes!” to the estate agent
who’s showing me around this
incredibly creepy house out in didsbury
I am albert hofmann
riding my bicycle through a van gogh landscape
250μg’s of lysergic acid diethylamide
coursing through my veins
I’m on stage at the glastonbury festival
and have forgotten the words
to every one of my songs
why should I care
performing's a gas
but it isn’t gonna last
and I’m driving through the foggy city streets of C.o.M.
early morning out of control
about to crash
time slows
everything grinding to a halt
everything except me
I’m totally alive
totally in the now
thoughts are racing
surprisingly calm
my whole life is replaying
I have floated six inches above my own body in a field of poppies
I have driven through ashley whilst
having a long conversation with an apparition
I have unified quantum mechanics with general relativity
but I’ve mislaid all my papers
I have swooned beneath a lattice sky with a new baby in my arms
I have laid down on the grass
and felt the swing of the earth as it orbits around the sun
I have unintentionally fallen in and out of love with a thousand girls
that’s at least once a week
for the first twenty years of my life
I have hurt and have been hurt
I have written and discarded
more songs and stories than I care to remember
all of them unheard or unread and useless
I have written every day since I was seven years old
nobody has noticed but I have not been overlooked
I’m a dreamer
I dream things into being
everything I see has been created by me
I’m back at the beginning
my mama is cradling me
and I have all this to live through again

Daye 17 / Girl Up A Tree On A Swing

do I remember
yes
the sky was cobalt blue
and cloudless
and so bright that I could barely look up for more than a few seconds
all that funny monday morning
I’d had a feeling
that something was about to happen
we were by the river
annette was sitting against the trunk of a tree
arm in arm with her sister marian
they were giggling and talking in whispers
the way sisters do
with their heads touching
annette brushes her hair away from her eyes
her red shoes
poking out of the shadows
and sparkling in the sunlight
she gets the urge to climb
disappears up into the green leaves and thick branches
on a clear day you can see the whole world
from the top of this tree
she says
while marian and I listen from below
she describes all that she sees
the wedding at the church on the top of the hill
the bend in the gentle river where she swam last summer
the windows of the houses along chestnut drive
the clock tower on the west end of st pauls cathedral
the white cliffs of dover
the eiffel tower
the taj mahal
the gingerbread house
the mountains of the moon
the thunderstorm that’s due on friday at noon
and now annette is laughing
as she swings herself outwards over the river
on the rope swing that’s been there since we were infants
she gives me an odd look
a sideways glance
marian asks for my camera
says she'd like to take a photograph of annette and I
so we sit down under the tree
and we both smile
and annette leans against my shoulder
and I can smell the summer in her hair
and she can taste balsam on the breeze
and we can feel the long grass between our fingers
and the camera clicks and whirs
and I’ve never dared
to have the film developed
for fear of what I may or may not see
it’s still in my camera
where she asked me to leave it
when we were about to say goodbye
and this is how we spend our last day together

Daye 16 / How We Were Made

its not as hard
as you might think
dreaming something into being
in fact its quite easy
we needed only a few basic skills
imagination
visualisation
belief
and persistance
to arrive at the instant of creation

the cosmos was born blank
and we elected to fill it with
all the things of our imagination
we were thinking big
so we started with the superstructures
the galactic clusters and superclusters
the galaxies and supergalaxies
and all the stars
but when we peered deep within the fabric
of the new space
we began to realise that the cosmos v1.0 was flawed
we had neglected
to imagine the smaller things
that held all of
the superstructures together
almost immediately our creation began to fall apart

so we envisaged
the strong nuclear force
the weak nuclear force
the electromagnetic force
the gravitational force
and the fundamental particles
the quarks, leptons and gauge bosons
and plugged them into our cosmos v2.0
as soon as we had managed
to get all these things
operating to our satisfaction
the cosmos began to work like a dream
it took on a life of it’s own
so we stood back
and watched for a while

some of the stars began to die
quickly running out of fuel
before exploding into supernovae
others just grew dim
a few became black holes
the supernovae blew clouds of gas
and higher mass elements
across the galaxies
some of these gas clouds began to
form into newer stars
whilst the heavier elements which were leftover
formed into the planets
that orbited around them

six billion years elapsed
as we contemplated the life we would create
on the most suitable planets in each of the galaxies
we tried and failed
to visualise a succesful lifeform
for a further two billion years
before we became incarnate
and had our first success
in a distant part of the universe
that has now faded out of existance

at this point we halted all of our imaginings
and left our creation to it’s own devices
the universal race has prospered
evolving out of all recognition
and spreading to every part of the cosmos
at all times we are watching over you
but we have taken a vow
that we will interceed
only at times of extreme danger
now everything in the cosmos must be begat by you
by your imaginings
by your dreamings
by your desires
by your belief
by your actions

we have left many clues hidden in the grand design
clues that will unlock the mysteries of creation
but you must know the use of numbers
to find the clues
a knowledge of supracalculus is essential
but since supracalculus hasn’t been invented yet
you will have to wait
until somebody in the universal race can visualise it
and thus bring it into being
dna sprang into existance in this way
first it was imagined
then it was ‘discovered’
you are now learning how to replicate it
and if you look at the number strings
there are massive clues to be found within its structure

as you seek out and discover
the intricacies of the universe
so even greater intricacies will appear
that which you consider to be
the most fundamental particle
will always be found to consist of
even more fundamental particles
the things which you consider to be
the most gigantic structures in the cosmos
will always be found to be
a minor part of an even bigger structure
and so it goes
on and on into infinity

***

excerpt from an anonymous email
which arrived in the float jr inbox
at 7.06am this morning...

Daye 15 / Empty

bury met
don’t remember the month or the year
but there is snow on the ground
we are tourists from timenotyet
p.a.u.l. has grown a goatee to celebrate
his sister-in-law says it doesn’t suit him
threatens to shave it off herself
if its not gone by tomorrow morning
but still kisses his cheek
before she leaves the dressing room
and he is so sick
sick to his stomach
travelsick
homesick
junksick
citysick
timesick
sick of the fuss
doesn’t know what is expected of him
but neither does he want to give what is expected
hates having to get up on stage
hates having to tour
but is still too weak to say no
refers to himself as the performing seal
dislikes crowded places
and tells everybody so
you’re in luck tonight then says baxter
and flicks a burning cigarette into the corner of the room
before disappearing out of the door
and into the darkness beyond
p.a.u.l. has a premonition
suffers from electrophobia
believes he will be electrocuted on stage
or during rehearsals
like les harvey or keith relf
he will no longer practice his guitar playing
writes all his new songs on piano
and won’t get close to a microphone
so his singing voice is always muffled
his manager has had to take a course in resuscitation
just to get him to play
and p.a.u.l. has taken to wearing rubber-soled boots
his mouth is always dry
he grabs a bottle of evian
and his little yellow notebook
and begins to write

baxter
sinclair
peter anthony vickers
are already on stage
waiting
anxious
tuning up
where is the singer
the otherguitarist
why is he always late?
he needs to tune up
ah, here he comes now
head down
he makes his way through the small gathering
some of the crowd already know him
some of them don’t
some of them soon will
some of them never will
some of them will forget him forever
some of them will remember
but not yet
jumps up on the small riser
all blue and white polka dots tatty silver jeans and longhair
blonde twelve-string rickenbacker shimmering
underneath the stage lights
pink and green shadows cast across the ceiling
grins at his bandmates
they grin back
sorry he mouths at one of them
baxter shakes his head
and continues to tune his guitar
the house lights dim
a tiny noise comes from the stage
p.a.u.l. can hardly bear to touch his guitar
his stomach is in knots
throb of the bass
snare drum begins to ricochet off the wall at the back of the room
the intro seems to go on forever
electropulse growing stronger
vortex is dragging him in
flailing in the wake of the leadguitar
lights blind him
make his mouth even drier
his body is sticky
his arms feel too heavy
add stagesick to that list at the beginning of this blog
he opens his mouth to scream
and swallows up the whole room

''immortality
has got to be junked
forget the soma
because its potency’s shrunk
she laughed “you’re useless
you make all the wrong guesses”
she took me out
with a shake of her tresses
tried to keep her awake
I even bathed her in oils
I could feel the quake
all those miles undersoil
the heliotrope
bends a few more degrees
cut away this debris
I’m empty
I’m empty

we watched the aerostat
plunge to the ground
how could I lose
what had never been found
made my excuses
and I left on my trip
when she passed out
the words were still on her lips
in the back of beyond
we slowly slipped out of phase
the treasures have gone
sold and never replaced
the heliotrope
bends a few more degrees
cut away this debris
I’m empty
I’m empty

hubble bubble
there was toil and trouble
I was high
as I checked through the rubble
she was fooled
wearing all the wrong rings
she took me out
with a twist of her limbs
the electrics are crude
our wires are stripped
talking things through
cannot heal the rift
the heliotrope
bends a few more degrees
there’s only dust and debris
I’m empty''

Daye 14 / The Age Of The Time Storm

a day has gone missing
I don’t know how it could have been mislaid
but it’s gone
vanished
vamooshed
disappeared
evaporated
something extraordinary has happened
actually I may have lost more than a day
I can’t be sure at the moment
but I am investigating

and that’s not all...

whilst I slept
somebody or something
has rearranged my life
so when I woke up
this morning
everything had changed
I feel different
the date is wrong for a start
today should be a friday
but the calender says it’s saturday
I’ve fallen out of sync
I’m at least a day ahead of myself

and

last night at 3am
there was an electrical storm
in C.o.M.
a misty blue sphere climbed up
the telegraph pole opposite my window
hissing and humming
changing colour
shrinking and increasing in size
as it began to float back down the pole
it drifted towards my house
and passed right through the wall
through my head
and out through the wall behind me
and now the girl beside me is altered
she has the same face as harin
she has harin’s eyes
skin smells the same
hair is the regular colour
height and weight are as expected
she speaks with the same voice
pronounces her words in exactly the same manner as harin
sings with the same wavering voice
folds her clothes in the same way
when I quiz her she gives all the correct answers
picks out her favourite pair of shoes and dress
to wear to dinner
and I recognize the puzzled expression on her face
when I ask her if she remembers north walsham
but she is not who she appears to be
I even checked that little scar on the back of her neck
and it is still there...
and a day is missing
and I don’t know what to do about it