The Ballads Of Mister Rhodes

"They're lining up the prisoners And the guards are taking aim I struggle with some demons They were middle class and tame I didn't know I had permission To murder and to maim You want it darker."   - Leonard Cohen (You Want It Darker) Perhaps this is just a feeling and not something that can be written down. A moment of softness that one tries to move away from as quickly as possible for fear that it might be interpreted as fragility or vulnerability. Some sort of admission that the ground is shaky and the compass needle is having a momentary crisis. One of those, in which, if you allow yourself to think, you realise that it started before you were even here. There are things that we pull into today that we didn't even realise we were ever attached to. I am shown videos of a man I used to live with a decade ago. He is alive and happy. Playing with his grandkids. Walking his dog. Holding his wife. From what little I knew of this man, he was one of a rare breed. Ex...

I have to tackle this chronologically. It’s too easy for us to get lost in the notion that there is anything more than time that connects us, ultimately. So, to begin, I stretched out over the concrete block and stared up at the sky. That place, where, at times, I can neither see nor hear anything of the human world. The waves, birdsong, my dogs playing. That is the soundtrack. In that absence of the human world, there is a stillness that I often do not know what to do with. It brings on nausea and a little lightheadedness. I count my breaths and try not to get wrapped up in the idea that there is something to release, although I am sure there is. In a clear blue sky, I can see so many markings on the lenses of my eyes. I wonder for a moment if these will eventually lead to blindness. I also find a little peace in the fact that, at almost forty, I am beginning a physical decline, and that is something that I must find peace with. Whilst the dogs are playing my mind reminds me that the ...