Fading This is from when he was still a young boy; hip-slung, just so; nothing very much to say. Three lances of sunlight, emanating from beyond the top right-hand corner, fall forever across the photograph, piercing a number of the sitters - pupils and teachers. The headmaster (Mr. D) - front row, centre - has … Continue reading Fading Beehive.
After some time, a bearded, balding, overalled, paint spattered, coot man - stepladder and duffel bag in hand - came into the low level buzz of the waiting room. He clumsied himself and his chattel through the door, allowing a brief rush of oily, night cold air to enter, too. The gust, flustering the newspaper … Continue reading The Waiting Room.
Perched on a bough in a black alder tree, trench rot soaking his booted feet, armpits and groin and tunic unkempt, teeming, a pale airman watched two strangers beneath. They were stood in shirt and tie, pinstripe beneath mackintosh and tucked into black rubber boots, ankle-deep in the river he knew to be the Quaggy, … Continue reading A Pale Airman.
Short on time, Tweed Gilet meld day into night raising a frenetic, greasy, bubble haired, scuffed rhythm and soul hullabaloo. The frontman, yesterday's eyeliner, candle wax flesh bent beneath the polystyrene, sick-looking, kisses the mic, briefly, tenderly, intones, "Safe home everybody." * Being a stranger in town, Knott, nowhere to go post-show, began to help … Continue reading Pigeon Sense.
The car pulled away, faded, and a choir of unseen gulls followed tractor engine noise beyond the dense hedge to his left. On the other side of the road rose a dense, steep wood of pine, the limbs of the trees strung with a laundry of mist. He began walking again, kicking at the cats' … Continue reading The Cats’ Eyes.
The once-black garment had seen better days. It was unseamed, here, and was quite clearly torn, here (and here). There was a coating of various stains, common with rough and careless living, upon it. The moniker, Derek K. Kerrick, was faintly scripted onto an inch of ribbon on the underside. But this was not the … Continue reading The Rabbit.
