[ssf] legally human

adam adam at diamat.org.uk
Fri Mar 13 15:36:43 GMT 2009


iii) waiting for buso
---------------------

oh, st'stuttering statisticians
i can't get my breath

a don't know which is worse
becoming a chimera
in front o'a mirror
or as part of just a slow
synchronised swimming process

fish bowl tactics
top tips for the gas cook
successful secrets
of a sexual kind

that's what sells these days i think
in the magazines i mean

scarcity, false scarcity
digital init, on, off
black on white
like lotsa email

some folk dream in black and white though
allegedly

at ox-en though
it's black on yellow
very nice, soothing to the eye
easy reading

ow, silk, silk, silk
what do cow's drink

  w'water

do you know
i could never remember
how to spell 'water'
when i was a kid
i always used to get mixed up
and put an 'r' in it, 'warter'
until someone said to me one day

    just spell it like it sounds

  i am, sez i
  war-ter

    nayow, not how it sounds
     when the teaches say it
    how it sounds
     when we sey it, water

  ah, i get ye, water
  there's no r in water ...



  i'm going round in circles
  i mean, my head is
  it's the same at work
  or rather what's left of it

  i look at letters, notes
  stare at them, turn them over
  pick them up again, look at them again
  try and make some sense of it all

  but imagined conversations
  sometimes proceed real ones
  and one thing i know
  is one never knows
  what the real conversation
  will actually be
  other than this

   it will not be
   the one imagined

  i had a long conservation with myself once
  after getting back home from a trip to london
  to watch the harlequins verse the wasps
  and after playing a morning match misen
  as tight head prop for the under thirteens

  i fluffed a try
  and the team dogging still rang in mi head

   why

  i had the ball
  firmly in my hands
  five yards out
  no one in my way

  all the different ways
  i went over this one
  hours after hours
  i couldn't sleep with it
  how i would do things differently
  if only
  if only
  i could have the chance
  to replay the game
  exactly the same
  but i couldn't work it out
  what to do
  how to replay it
  hours and hours
  i was it
  for a fair few nights

    why did you pass the ball

      well adunt score tries do a me

    what tha on about
    tha scored ferst un

      aknow, that's what amean ...


     i'm imagining a different conversation
     as i type 2nite
     and it goes something like this


         well ye know
         have got very strong feelings
         for yor one
         and she asked me
         back last summer
         if i'd make her favourite desert
         at her wedding
         in fact she was booking me in
         for quite a bit of the catering

         -- i imagine this person's nanna
            smiling at this point --

         but then she stopped
         and said

            i couldn't
            i wouldn't

         what, sez i

            get married
            can you imagine
            my family at my wedding

        -- i stop again, and sey --

            adunt think she's talking about thee

        -- i imagine her nannan bursting out
           with the name of an often accusee --

            mebby, a don't know
            -- i'd reply laughing --
            or maybe her brothers
            but i think it's sad
            but i know what she's on about though
            i remember what it was like
            when i married her sister ...


     i doubt i'd get that far
     in the real
     no doubt
     events would over take

     like i mean
     i love eire
     don't get me wrong
     and have not been to dublin
     for quite a while now
     but it was like
     there was no bus queues
     it was like
     the bus stopped
     and every one just
     tried to get on
     all at once

     may be
     that what's wrong
     or right presently
     depending on how
     one looks at these things
     over on this side of the pond

     mebbe that's why we're not revolting
     we're just queuing up
     looking at us watches
     staring, chatting, exchanging pleasantries
     waiting in a nice orderly fashion
     waiting for the bus to come ...



iv) art, empire, industry
-------------------------


  i didn't want to go back to college
  to finish my first degree
  at every level
  it had lost its importance

  what's the point
   i thought to myself
  it's all corrupt, tout le monde
  and any way
  i'd rather be here

  but a chatted about it
  and remember
  a few of the conversations ...


     it's a waste

       aknow, but it's all wasted isn't it
       i can always go back later though
       if i change my ideas

     but you won't
     you've told me so
     it's of no interest to you now
     but unless you finish it
     you'll not get the grant
     to start another
     because you won't have finished this one

       aknow, but a don't want to start another
       and i don't want to finish this one

     you'll have to get a job

       aknow, well i've always got one
       if i want one though

     what
     down there

       ye, they'd have me back
       i'm sure

     i'm sure they would too
     but i don't want this for you
     enough of my family
     work down there as it is

       it's decent pay

     i know
     but why won't you use your brain

       i would be
       we all have to use us brains down there
       you know, but i'd be in the offices mainly
       if that's your concern
       well, the labs, and we haven't had
       a fire down there,
       for a good few years now

     don't

       it's a lot safer now

     no,
     why do you want to repeat this

       repeat this what

     life here
     get away
     not down there please
     not with your opportunities

        i'm not convinced

     it's her isn't it

        no, she agrees with you
        oh, rather she wants me
        to finish the degree
        but for different reasons
        but there's some over lap, in that
        she wants me, to go back
        and use mi brain for a change ...


  art
  ---

    don't improvise, and
      throw it away ...


  empire
  ------

    have you every fallen in like for a person

    just like to be around them
    no big thing really

    but they always seem
    to have an answer for everything

    like mi welsh mate for instance
    when they got all roiled up
    and i'd enquire --

       what we're gonna do

    and they'd reply
    quite amicable like --

           i'll tell you what we're going to do
           we're going down, that fucking office
           right this minute,
           and we'll deliver the biggest fucking
           that that crowd
           will have seen
           in their whole
           miserable
           fucking
           lives ...


    it doesn't come from nowhere
    this sort of perspective
    it's germ form appears to be born
    in confined spaces --

          no, you're doing it wrong
          it doesn't matter what you've been told
          that work shall be ripped out ...


    the tight space
    imposes a pressure upon
    one's perception of time
    or at least it tends to
    on mine

     rip it up, and start again
     i'll take the furniture
     and start all over again

    i mean, one might have
    a thousand different thoughts
    floating through one's nogging
    and heaven knows
    if you're not confused now
    you've obviously not
    been paying attention --

     buy that, sell this
     work all day
     live on hay
     they'll be pie in the sky
     when you die, peace on earth
     and an half of mild
     open man u factoring
     n os car wild

    but there's an entropy
    a certain crystallisation
    birthed in confined spaces
    never the less, hello ...


  industry
  --------

    what tha wanna work down there for

      it's work init

    ye, but why work there

      it's around here init

    dunt tha miss thi mates

      have got mates here

    aknow
    but there's not much left round here tha knows na
    steel's shut, mines a'shut, nayot, it's going
    it's gone

      aknow

    well get away then

      a love it round here

    aknow, but tha mure use back there
    than here

      how's tha mek that art

    well there's nowt round here is there

      aknow, it's wasted

    what's tha mean, wasted

      well look at it
      tha's said so thisen
       steel, pits, and every thing that
       wo supporting it

    nayow, there's change
    big changes,
    but there has been before
    but there's still folk
    and it's folk who'll mek it

       -- i shake mi head
          and the other continues --

    listen, when a wo thi age
    they had us do, national service
    it prepared us for life
    in many ways, common discipline
    upbringing, but it's the mates init
    at the end of the day
    any way, them days have gone
    a wo one o'last, and na
    it's thi turn, but they dunt call it
    national service anymore
    it's college init

       -- i shake mi head again --

    listen,
    dunt romanticise about the steel and the pits
    terrible working conditions
    shocking, miserable, listen
    tha's got a grant to do
    a physics degree, finish it
    then come back here if tha wants
    tha'll be mure use after
    tha bound to be ...



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