freedom

so. the difficulty with creating.

while i travel through times or spaces new to me, creation happens spontaneously. things slither out of me right through my fingertips. i see colour, light, details. patterns emerge. i connect with gestures, with smiles. i hear voices telling me stories. i remember fragments of books, ideas i've heard. i'm alert. i transcribe.

while i stay stationary, things close inside. my heart contracts. every word is a possible enemy. gray. things are diffuse, ideas sleep.
while i stay stationary, i dream of moving.
while i stay stationary, i do not bond.

movement is everything,
but what will i do with this new self inflicted freedom?

writing as a practice

a few weeks ago I decided I wanted to be able to do a proper handstand. so I set out to strengthen my arms, shoulders, neck and abs. I do push ups, core work. every day I work on the technique. I pull myself to the right position, I move. I try. it gets better. so with the writing muscles...and here are my stretches

exercise

in order to write a story words are needed. plentiful adjectives. a few nouns. adverbs, to be sparingly used.

in order to write a story a character is needed. a strong character. adversity. an obstacle to overcome. a resolution. or not.

in order to write a story a narrative arc has to emerge. a stage, a landscape. structural devices. an architecture of ideas.

in order to write a story you need neural synapses to be unoccupied, yet alert. oblivious to ringings and beepings. ready to spark as the fingers reach down to the keys.

the café in the corner of lincoln's inn fields

i could tell you with precision the exact shade of pink that colours her heart shaped lips. describe to you in extensive detail the angle at which her eyelashes curl exquisitely upwards. expand on the specifics of her imperceptibly disdainful frown. the bored concentration with which she prepares the millionth cappuccino of the morning.

i guess you could say i'm slightly obsessive, but there was no way to avoid going in for a coffee and a bacon roll the morning after the night when the lads in the office had quite generously – but with a vicious glint in their eyes – insisted on buying me drink after drink to celebrate my new promotion. i mean, a bacon roll, as you well know, was the only thing to save me from complete failure on my first day as associate. and of course, after i'd walked into the caff, well, i saw what i saw and there was no way to go back.

the girl and an older woman stood facing each other like furies, rapidly spitting words in a foreign language, which my traditionally english training failed to help me understand, but which my traditionally english holidays' memories helped me identify as spanish. i thought to myself i may collapse both from the impact of seeing this raging beauty and from the throbbing hangover that was eating up my brain.

of course, i stood there like a plonker, failing to even clear my throat. and then that embarrassing "gracias" at the end, who the hell was i going to impress. but the girl smiled and her eyes burned a hole in my heart. and made me bold and ready, and so i went along to the chambers and strutted in and owned my boss and my colleagues and my job.

and now every day i get my fix. and i might, soon, ask her her name and find out what on earth she had been arguing about...

the half-naked man in columbia rd brings order to the chaos

one day, the girl decided to buy some flowers in columbia rd market. as she got to the road she could see the crowd getting scarier and scarier. there were tourists with cameras and smiles. there were mothers with coffees and prams. there were goths hanging out in the pub. there were babies. and artists. and oysters. and flowers. and palm trees. and forests and more.
she hesitated at the corner.

a couple of children stood on a chair repeating hysterically two for a pound. musicians played hyperactive music in the yard. a woman complained of being stepped on while sitting right in the middle of the only path. helen mirren walked by clutching some freesias. a van beeped reversing warnings, driver flirting with bejewelled chicks. caffeine rose up from a hundred cappuccinos. market sellers competed to sell above the din. bouquets seemed like a far away objective.

to rest her eyes, the girl looked up. a neat row of tightly shut windows fringed the market street without fanfare. equally criss-crossed windowpanes, equally spaced. on one of the frames, a man stood half naked, hair wet from the shower, steaming drink in one hand, elbow on the windowsill, calmly observing the madness down below.
the girl stared, the man winked.

eyes locked, the man navigated the girl around the market. lead her to the stall with the black dahlias with his smile. raised his mug to approve her purchase. and finally released her with a wave back to the crowd. out of the street. flowers safe. and one more magical character to add to her personal mythology.

just moved in to broke walk

black cat sits on top of the old convertible car every night. every night she arrives later and later. the street is quiet. the cat ignores her. the streetlight glares at her. the cameras turn round to watch. households mysteriously silent hide muffled children, drunken good sorts, free-running luminaries. tiptoeing up the stairs she sees the fox zoom past, doing his round of the first-floor walkway. a door bangs far away. cursing the wine she tries the keys on her new door, still unlearned. the door magically opens. the flat envelops her with its new paint smell. boxes clutter round the edges. heels echo on the wooden steps. up the room everest-hard. shoes off, clothes off, hair-clips off, glasses off. under the duvet she hears her heart and the occasional police siren. a couple walk by, laughing too loud on this serious street. sleep comes visiting with broken wings.

black cat races up the fence in the balcony every morning. every morning she wakes up earlier and earlier. the street is quiet. the cat a fleeting sound. the morning sun bursts in. households sleepy get on with their own business. a shadow flies over the rooftops. stretching out on the terrace she sips on a too-hot coffee and counts the trails of planes gone by. daydreaming of buenos aires. a cyclist zooms past hunting for shortcuts. she chooses a record and plays it quietly so as not to wake up ‘azel from next door who’s on a night shift. shower, glasses on, hair-clips on, clothes on, shoes on. no, not those. shoes off. other shoes on. a quick look round her new flat. a promise to finish painting the hall. to stop escaping in wine glasses. to put some pictures on the walls. to make a house a home.

how hard can this be

inveterate liar. this is how my parents would describe me throughout my childhood.

and it was true. i would lie and lie and lie. and spin stories and intricate webs. and then i would believe them myself so much that i would lie without missing a beat. where have you been? at my friends'. where did you spend your holiday? in brazil, surfing. what did you do with him? i can't remember. did you hit your brother? no.

now, though, i have to write a fictional story about myself and i can't for my life think of anything to write about. maybe because who would believe any of it anyway?