secret river steps

sitting on those 

secret steps again

in the gold evening light

low tide

I watch the seagulls ride

the blue river waves

I listen to the busker sing

that old song

by the flaming lips

do you realise

Do You Realize - we're floating in space -

Do You Realize - that happiness makes you cry

Do You Realize - that everyone you know someday will die

And instead of saying all of your goodbyes - let them know

You realize that life goes fast

It's hard to make the good things last

You realize the sun don'-go down

It's just an illusion caused by the world spinning round

so I sit and listen to the muffled lyrics

from afar I barely heard them

but then I looked them up and it was exactly

what I heard in my mind

the tingling feet

a million bugs

the words ringing in my ears

memories plaguing my mind

and St Pauls

looking at me, in sorrow

wondering why I'm always here

he watches, as I cross the silver bridge

and sometimes I swear
he talks to me;
a speck of sand

in the vast desert of time

we were here together 

you and you and you and you and I

you and sy

brazilian-t

ma favourite Brazilian

you're one in a million

I don't know where

you came from

but it was truly magnificent

-that beautiful day-

we ate chocolate cake

on Box Hill

the sheer thrill of it,

of being on the road again

and talking deeply madly truly

about things, deep, mad and true

I only wish Marta were here too

-epiphany after epiphany-

I wonder why strangers from the past

keep getting in touch with me

out of the blue

I never even knew

they still existed

-the joy of being disconnected-

so it was all new

everything you said

everything you told me

all those old people 

yes we found ourselves there

bird watching

botching words

A-line, and your green wagon

pink haired lady who asked if I was a dealer

cos she found, my bruk up mobile

I tried to lose it

so many times, so many times 

they find 

me (and I'm so glad)

gosh and that restaurant

that too kind waiter 

my head was throbbing

so many hours later

as I tried to take it all in

every crazy bloody thing 

in the world

bird watching by the lagoons

all too soon

and it brings it all back 

there, then, him

-and everything-

in between, life is so strange

in my own skin

skin that's not mine, I don't know

where I am (ever-)

live here

/wish I could get out of my head/

and live in the world instead

strange days/ always

strange days

forever unfazed

forever in a a daze

strange 

through and through

a pair of soaked shoes

aching bones

fog over the lake

ever alone

ever in another zone

hood over head

waiting for the unknown

to make its appearance

the violent geese

-perturbed-

they say

I'm slightly disturbed

but I say

la ilaha illallah

I just look  

to that one dying star

that one fisherman

that one pitched up tent

the sun that never spent

a single moment with him

or me, dawn

a strange time 

lost 

in the mi(d)st of the sublime

and when the other morning begins

the real one

it's like it never even existed

the secret one

and in the evenings

with the river

with the green

sharing skittles

and a whole stream

of unvoiced thoughts

I understand, then
/I understand/

pigeon man

pigeon man

a street cleaner from the 1940's

perched on the palm of his hand

grey bird; fly away

pigeon man

with wrinkles on his face

pigeon man
he looked so entirely displaced

in this time

by the steps of the cathedral

a third dimension

/polyhedral/

-not quite here-

Isle of Grain

the cooling castle

the isle of grain

dear, please refrain

from picture-taking

for here the MOD is making

-strange things happen-

course of my history

How can you talk about the stuff

you yourself can't even begin to make sense of

-there's way way way way too much

so I made a mind map

and I realised this mind
its full of magical beautiful crap

this mind, this year, I swear

it's been, something else, 

the crowds, the cut ties

the ten thousand goodbyes

I ran away
 twice

twice they followed

a hundred times,  I swallowed 

my own words

many times/ times many/ many times

captured nothingness
in ten thousand rhymes

/it's my fault/

everything and it's wonderful

and shit, but now, how

do I make a hundred wrong things right

how do I go back in time

and just change the course of my history
-life/ forever it eludes me-

waiting for you

'I really love you

you're the best'

girl I really love you too

and I can't wait to live out the rest

of our beautiful story

it's far from over and I can't wait
to see you and your beautiful smile again

girl, you're such a gem

you're truly a gem

-mashAllah-

not so broken umbrella

the rain 

the river wandle

it almost flowed
wholly horizontal

the sound of jazz

the lonely path

the green green green

the puddle that almost seemed
like a /mirage/

the pink flowers touching the water
shrouded in fog
life, it grows ever-shorter
for the two umbrella's, not so broken

broken urdu: the words that went unspoken

kya kehna chahti ho?

...remember that time it started to pour...

remember that old storm

I was with you then
 you were feeling so forlorn

and then another came along
and she was feeling the same
but now all that remains

is the smell/ from the bread factory

-kind of trippy-
/all these discarded memories/

pure poetics

purely poetical 

/-censored/ 

for it would be unethical

to post; a hundred drafts

at most; I think I should start

/to un-reveal; this life/

/to heal; what's inside/

-to just be again-

smiles, that heal

/hurt/ 

perhaps a fleeting depression

-compression-

a heaviness that constricts

/hurt/

brought about by this

inert

state of being; inert in pain

-cyclical-

a pain that brings about

a fleeting depression

I wish it would lessen

the /hurt/

the thing I'm feeling

the thing that's stealing

the parts that make me; me

but it did, then

it did when

I saw all your

smiling faces

and when I saw you 

old soul from the past

-pure beauty, in a mask-

I was overcome

by love

love love love

it's a healing

love love love 

it's what I'm feeling

for each and everyone of you

(especially you old soul) and I

wish I could preserve it forever

take it out and wear it whenever

I feel /hurt/

-I have so much love for you-

my generation

this generation

the friends that I got

I got a lot and they got a lot
and we got a lot

/of troubles/

and we're all tryna battle out

these neverending struggles

and I struggle to see

how we can ever be

some place other than here

at times I think it's only me

and I feel so alone, but I swear

we're all tryna to run away

from ourselves, I wonder,

why do we put ourselves

through such hell; 

/riding this same old carousel/ 

round and round and round

and of course we're bound

to get so tired if it, of this life

-yeah, we're barely getting by-

but still we try 

still we try still we try still we try
(to make the best)

end of earth

lying still on my side/ staring
at a patch
of transient gold
 etched on the wall 

I close my eyes and free fall
I free fall
I silently call
on You Lord
and the wall
and the gold
-become nothingness-

lying still on my side,
listening to Karen O

-another sick day-

and so
 I (Hideaway)

well they'll seat us in the sun

....when will I become

someone else?

-nothingness-
perhaps its the aftermath of

the latest series of goodbyes

the latest series of cut ties
and I wonder

if I never go back 

would it be so bad
and I wonder
exacly what is it
that makes me feel so sad

maybe I could don a new disguise

start fresh again

start a new life

I'd like to start again

I missed the summer

I don't want to miss the autumn too
I'd like to walk to
-the end of earth-

goofballs: that evening in Souf

our TV show

it would be more than funny

if only we had the money

to make it

we could take it

all the way

and man, I hadn't laughed like that

in a hundred thousand years

two guys

 two girls

all of us belonging 

to very separate worlds

yet we came together

and laughed like I hadn't 

in a hundred thousand years

and if every moment of this fleeting life

could be filled with this laughter

/after/ ------

all the sorrow and sadness

then wouldn't it be heaven

this short human existence

instead of being there

/a place of distance/

we could be here 

for in that grey grey place

I feel parts of me being erased

I feel space/ folding in on itself

instead can we not/ humankind- fam

just live in laughter

-to be a niazi

a bit of advice

for once in your life

listen to me

stay away from all niazi's

no joke

we're proper mental

we live lives on rental

and yeah it's just like in the movies

if only you could sit back and see

what goes on/ in separation

(guilty by association)

to be a niazi

you gotta be pretty tough

 you gotta pretty glassy

(as in see-through, but not really)

nah, it ain't something you would get

seriously, I hope you never set

you're sight towards a niazi

cos it ain't that hard to see

we be

-truly out of this world-

trampoline

jumping up and down

on a trampoline

your twin; 

she tried to intervene

but I just carried on jumping

jumping jumping jumping

waiting for something 

to jump out at me

twins, I know three 

pairs: ones of twos 

and they're so cool

both parts, both people

jumping on the trampoline

she looked almost feeble

(from above/ one of two)

like a hole in the head(scarf)

thanks for telling me

that my head was on fire

oh wait, you didn't 

well... no worries, it was minor

it's not like it was designer

that headscarf with that burnt hole

it was actually pretty trampy, pretty old 

but it was her favourite

I planned to tell her/ later on that night

that it musta some how/ caught alight

-but how was I to explain it to her?-

 that I was at chapel bank 

placing wooden corpses in a bonfire

for sure she would call me a liar

so I said/ nothing/

now it makes me laugh

-like a hole in the head(scarf)-

listen girl, on behalf 

of those trees, I'd like to say sorry
(for the destruction of property)

anna rose

anna rose

you emailed me

you said 'I often think about you'

to be honest I didn't really know who

you were then, yeah I drew a complete blank

but now that I do remember, I'd like to thank

you for remembering me

and thinking of me often

-connections/ for the living-

passing moments

to rush
(a never-ending) hour /
                                            to (dis) /empower
                           time
                      time                                
                                      time
time    blurs

time
                       it-can-be-a           curse

or a blessing

                                  time
                        it's sort of                    messing 

with my head

A Silver Bird

I heard about this girl,
a proper G

a day in her life, man it would be

pretty hard, more than a little heavy
in her hometown of 

brighton, it weren't so bright then,
back in the day

but even back then
she'd managed to find a way 

to keep it interesting

-and well, rumour has it,
she's finally back!-

I heard she be tearing
through the hood, just yesterday
she had some kind of epiphany
and decided to come back
to live life a little differently

this is how she spent it

...that day...
early morning/ she met up with her old mate

Abu Rajal

dis safe guy from Senegal

they blazed up

and when she'd had enough

of his deep empty philosophical talk

she walked, yeah she walked

she went to shoot hoops with da boys
shocked when dey saw her
 they made such a noise
she couldn't hack it
the attention, the questions,
in less than
ten minutes
she escaped, she made
for da cottage and got some chicken wings
before going back to dat old block
she knocked and knocked and knocked
but no answer

so she left again, sat by da raging sea
there she waited and waited
-for a sign/ to be free-

when the sun had finally set
and the night had arrived

she headed up to Wah Kiki's

for one last dance/
it took just one stray glance,

and she was gone, she left again
and this time she went-

in the obscure night/ to get her old boat

she got in,
pressed her palm against her throat
 and started paddling
to the derelict pier
and when she got there

she climbed up the bars
and sat there at the top
 looking at them shining stars

after some time
she started spittin' bars

she spit da sickest lines
you ever heard

and so the galaxies opened up
and revealed their secrets to her and
she metamorphosed into
a silver bird

-you'll see the bird
circle the Brighton sky
no lie,
she be that beautiful bird
she didn't really die-

school of insanium

nah I ain't Iranian

but I am
 made of uranium

but I did graduate
from the school of insanium

yeah and I might just blow

I might just go

out of my mind

life in a bubble

to live life in a bubble 

to be unaware of all the trouble

that exists outside of it

-the world in which you (re)side-
the world of which you tried/
to renounce
nah I don't watch TV

yeah I admit to a degree

I like to remain disconnected
the reason why I come across
as so disaffected

is cos I am
-unaware-
it's not that I don't care
it's just I can't right now
and no, you won't be able to find me
cos I'm not on facebook

and nah, wrong again, I never look

inside the metro

because I already know

what's in it

and bro, I heard you're in Cairo

I heard you was on da BBC

but I don't watch that, you see

so I didn't know

-whatchya doin' in Cairo bro?-

poetry

-poetry- 

you owe it to me 

to share a single line

that will define

what life means to you

the (not so) special part

/feeling
                                     so completely un-                           (well) 

and so             (a) lone                 there

in Fawanees 

talking about the special part of eid

when it weren't special 

it was depressing as hell  

                                    man, I ain't           -well- 

man, I'm so tired

and these early mornings

aren't paying off /yet/

bittersweet

/life/ 

so bitter-sweet

why is it

that I always come to meet

with destiny

when destiny is slipping away

I've got to find a way

of being in this world

because there's no where else
to be, 

(except maybe Dudley)

black thing

was it a raven
or a crow
I don't quite know

meetings

these fleeting 

meetings

make me feel almost grown up

for in pain, I still remain, 

grounded 

I still come across as sane

and that's saying 

something 

Lord, help me to understand my worth

for I know I can be great

I just need this weight

lifted off my shoulders, 

I feel so so sosososososososososososo much older

than I am

so tired of being good to others
and so bad to my own self

...I still don't feel so well...

in my dreams

-burnt out

I learnt how

not to care

seriously am I back here

again? I'm still tryna fend 

off the demons, I once called friends

I'm still trying to send
blessings
your way

effed up year

effed up year 

nah I'm nowhere near

where I thought I'd be 

though I'm right here

but man 

I'm tired of being
fuggin'

stuck in

the past 

greyhound dog day

I'm unable to grasp

the thing I need to do

in order to move

on and away

I'm unable to find
the right words to say

the right thing

that might bring 

me some kind of peace

some kind of relief 

from this otherworldly malaise

-to be/ so full of grace-

empty signs

life man

it gets me every time

every time I'm getting somewhere

it just gets me nowhere, and the signs 

they drive me crazy 

in ways that he 

will never understand, 

that's why I don't make no plans

they just lead me down another dead end

they just drive me round the bend

-she was so right-