THE LAND OF NOD I’m already in love with you. I’m already lost and what can I do? I know the stars for you, they burn in the early hours, when I am sleeping, love. When I am dreaming of you. If dreaming is what I really do, which I suspect it’s not, I’m over you. So, tell me love, what is it I do? If it’s not dreaming of you, in the middle of the morning early hours do. I want to wake beside you. I want to wake beside you. I want to wake with you there. Saying something I can barely hear. Because I’m in the land of nod. I’m in the land of nod. I’m in the land of nod. I’m in the land of nod. I’m in the land of nod.

STARS (DISAPPEARING MESSAGES) With a tongue on your mind, on your eyes I linger. And the walls they are surrounding like stars in the night, shining bright, keeping us up into the early hours. Do you wanna’ come along, love? Take me with you. Do you wanna’ fly away, love? Saying something I could hear. I know words lovely. I’ll show you, time. Mercury in retrograde falls in the window. Pinot-film, spaghetti Western. You call me up and I pretend I’m asleep because I don’t want to speak to you. We don’t speak, we only message on Snapchat, DM, or Instagram. Disappearing messages again. What do you want to say to me? To me? To me? What do you want to say to me? To me? What do you want to say?

VOLCANO Out in the fall, a cold and a naked woman standing by the side of the road. Are you coming? Are you going to pick her up in your car before you go home? Or are you going to ride away put your foot down? Pretend you did not see her in your rear-view mirror? And I would have taken her back but for you, you’re the driver. I never knew how many times she’d been there at the side of the road. And she was calling for somebody, anybody, who might come along, and give her a ride so she could put all the tears back inside. But I know that you were going home, you never heard the way she called you down the road. The motorway calling you home, calling you home. The phone rings, what time will you be back? By the photos, singing in the back of the car where you left it by the car keys, I don’t know, I don’t know what you’re doing to me. But I feel it deep, deep down, deep, deep down. In the calling of the mountain in my bed. In the calling of the sunrise in my head. In the calling of the mountain in my bed. And the mattress has a hole in it and if climb in, then you can dive deep into the water, into the water within. And you might find a volcano to relax in. I never knew anyone else who can do it that way. You’ve got a way with words, my boy. You’ve got a way with words, my boy. You’ve got a way with words, my boy. You’ve got a way with words, my boy. They all tell you that. It’s nothing new you haven’t heard. It’s nothing new you haven’t heard. It’s nothing new you haven’t heard. It’s nothing new you haven’t heard. You’ve got a way with words. You’ve got a way with words. You’ve got a way with words. You’ve got a way with words. You’ve got a way with words. You’ve got a way with words. You’ve got a way with words. You’ve got a way with words. You’ve got a way of making me feel, something right here. You’ve got a way with words. You’ve got a way with words. Are you coming the night? Are you coming in the day? Are you making me feel the way I feel anyway? Are you waking for, waking for, waiting for, waiting for? Waiting for me? Oh-oh…

ASTRONAUT Lonely woman, wander the valley alone. Lonely woman, you wander the valley. Lonely woman you wander the valley full of stone. Lonely woman, I could have taken you home. Lonely woman, take your security, your back, your pocket, your watch, your phone, your possessions. Lonely woman, RIP. Lonely woman, are we all lonely? Lonely woman, you are my mother, you’re just like me. Lonely woman, sinking into the TV screen. Lonely woman, living alone with no one for company. Lonely mother, you are just like, just like me. Lonely sister, living on the south coast. You are opening your mail, wanting something to lift you up from your position. You’re lonely too, all three of us are lonely women. We find ourselves alone on Friday nights. Lonely, I’ll go to Sainsbury’s, the highlight. Lonely woman, watching a film on HBO. Lonely woman, women. I know lonely woman you’re watching a film and you’re feeling his body wrapped around you but he’s not there. Lonely, his absence the curled air around your back. Your bottom is bare where he would fill it in. And my mother, she’s reading a book, a crime novel. My sister, she’s in a bubble bath trying to while it all away. And I am sat here, thinking impossible thoughts. Ready, I would have been an astronaut.

ONE TICK MAN I saw your face and I was wondering if you were coming around. And I was hoping that you might make a decision of your own tonight. But I know you are a one-tick man. And you are busy doing things in the evening that I am not because I don’t live like you do, John Lewis furniture to sink into of an evening. Oh magnolia. I know you live in a castle by the sea. And I know that that is something not destined for me. Because I live in a studio flat, and your kitchen is twice as big as that. O’ love, I know that you don’t understand the way that my mind roves in the night to you. And then I hold your hand, like dreaming fields do. All I know that all that we could have had is like a birthday balloon floating along the M25 to get to you one insomniac night when I’m lying there moist and between my legs the thought of you doing what you do best. Doing what you do better than the rest. Doing the only thing you’re good at. I’m hard to pin down, you’re right about that. So come on home, to me, love. I’ll make it worth your while, oh, be stardust, we’re made of crushed carbon. Is that enough for you?

GIRL ONLINE We talked in the night. We talked in the day. We talked in the afternoon. What did you say? We talked in the night. We talked in the day. We talked all afternoon. What did you say? All your words are running around my head and making me dizzy. All your words are running around my head and making me dizzy. All your words are running around my head and making me dizzy. (I love you). Love, I want to kiss you, but I know it’s not possible, no, no. (I love you). Oh-oh-oh-oh-oh-oh-oh. All my words are running around my head. (I love you). Oh-oh-oh-oh-oh-oh-oh. (I love you). Oh-oh-oh-oh-oh-oh-oh. (I love you). All your words are running around my head all morning. All afternoon, it’s all I do, think of you. And all your words are running around my head. (I love you.) It’s not boring. All my words are running around my head, running after yours, and love. (I love you.) I want to see you in the coffee shop. I want to touch what I haven’t, haven’t got. I want to wake with you in my bed. I want to tell you what you could be anyway. Are you dead or not I don’t really know I haven’t heard from you in weeks. It’s time to let go of these virtual intimacies, they don’t lead to anything. It’s just a fallacy, celestial encounters. Well, they do, and they don’t work, and we run and run from it. Bored, and he is bored, and I am some kind of outlet. For him to sing his boredom on the commute. And I know I don’t mean anything. I’m not under any grand illusions. I’m just a girl online. I’m just a girl with some time. I never got married and I never got entwined. Do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do (I love you.) Do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do. (I love you.) I don’t want to love you, but I think that I might. It’s getting out of hand, giving me a subtle fright. I don’t want to love you, but you’re doing something to me. You are getting gin my head with your words, is this chemistry? Do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do. Forever chemicals. Do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do. If I could I’d love you, but I know you are busy in Wetherspoons writing your new, new book. (I love you.) You are an indie author, and I should have given up on them a long, long time ago but hey, they’re drawn to me like flies to sugar (I love you) and I don’t know what I do, but there must be something in the ether (I love you.) Loo-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-candyfloss. (I love you.) Do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do. Well, I love the way you move. Oh, he loves the way my body hits the groove. And I could love you if you’d only kiss me. Wanna come around or meet up (I love you.) for coffee? Oh-do-do-do- do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do. I talk about Nabokov. You don’t get back and I guess you are busy. Oh-do-do-do-do-do-do-do, reading Susan Sontag talking about a ‘transformation’. The only transformation she is interested in is a total transformation. How about that? We talk about being ‘reasonable’. How we both like the word. Are you a reasonable man? Or be entirely unreasonable with me. I don’t want you to be reasonable, not today (I love you), not any day. Be entirely unreasonable with me (I love you) in your dreams (I love you) in your threads. Be entirely unreasonable with me (I love you). IRL. Be entirely unreasonable with me. (I love you). Let it go.

I WANT TO LOVE YOU LIKE FELLINI WOULD DO “There is no end. There is no beginning. There is only the infinite passion of life.” (Federico Fellini) I want to kiss you by the riverside. I want to hold you outside the BFI. I want to make love to you in the strawberry ice-cream. I want to hold you at 7 p.m. I want to love you before the film begins. I want to touch you not in my dreams. I want to love you like Fellini would do. I want to hold you at 7 a.m. I want to kiss you, let the fun begin. I want to miss you, not every moment that I do, got to feel summer, let it in, rose petals. I want to love you like I know I really could love you if you’d only give me a go. And I’m a girl, a woman of passion. You could find out if you would only ask me out. I want to know you and what makes you tick. Is it the same that makes me tick? I think it is. They call it chemistry. Like it is between you and me. I want to know you in every day. I want to know you don’t go away. I want to kiss you like 7 a.m. I want to miss you in my dreams again. I want to hold you inside the BFI. I want to kiss those lips that could be mine. I want to miss you in my dreams not IRL. I want to hold you. By the way, that photo you sent me. It did nearly kill me. Never knew you could smile like that. Had a smile like that.

INFLUENCER Glowing in that dress, in your glowing, glowing shoes. You could have taken off. You could have flown around the world in those shoes, they were buoyant, buoyant, oceans, oceans. Seven oceans. Would have had you swim, swim across seven oceans. Oceans, they were so buoyant and red. You would have glowed in the dark. Ship navigation systems would have seen you from seven thousand miles away. They would have known you by your glow, your angelic glow. Glowing white in your red shoes on the seventh ocean on the seventh day. You stepped into it. And I curled my hand around you. Asked you what you wanted to do that day. It was snowing outside. With limited options. You said you wanted to ride. We took a sleigh, went to Sainsbury’s. Did a little bit of shopping. Came back. Then you said you wanted to take over the world. I asked you if you wanted a cup of tea first. Then we read “Kafka and his Precursors” by Borges. Talked a little bit about Influencers and attraction. Influencers. Where’s the cutlery? Can you remember when we talked about the cutlery in Campo St. Leo. It was the first time we spoke. Can you remember? When the bells slow and the rhythm changes slightly and I wonder what you’re doing. How can it be that two minds can get connected like that? (Entwined.) “We’re connected” you said, and I thought Oh, here we go again. These virtual intimacies. The way that we insinuate and insinuate. I love you. I love you. I love, you. You, I love. I love, you.)

IS THIS WHAT LOVE IS? I know you. I feel your vibe. I know what you want. And all that I can do for you I would do, if I only had fifteen minutes with you, I would make it last for a long, long, long, long time. And you would lose track, track of time. You’d lose track of time. You’d lose track of time. And you would let yourself go, like you’ve never let yourself go, love. Hey, I want to take you home with me, and I don’t waste to waste no time. This life doesn’t wait for anyone. We’ve only, only got so much time wrapped up in the palm of our hand. If I open it up and show it to you, will you read my palm? Will you make me see you in a different light? I know you’re good for me, I can get it right. And darling, I only want to be home. Lay down next to me. Take all my body. Wrap me around you. Come and lie behind me. Do what you do, do what you do best. Surprise me. Let me spring, umm, spring in my belly and loins, I want to breathe for you. Is this what love is? Is this what love is? Is this what love is? Is this what love is? Is this what love is? Is this what love is? Is this what love is? Is this what love is? Is this what love is? Is this what love is? Is this what love is? Is this what love is? Is this what love is? Is this what love is? Is this what love is? Is this what love…? Is this what love is? Is this what love does? Is this what love is? Is this why love sits in the body and the loins and the bones and the skin and in the veins and in the pulse of my wrist? Won’t you take it in your hand, stroke and kiss that skin? Is this what love is? Is this what love is? Is this what love is? Tenderness. What I feel for you I tenderness. What the hell do I do with it? It proves hard to let go you can’t shelve it. Where did it come from? When did you get to me? When did you say you’d write something and become lodged in me? I want you to be extracted, expunged but you’re right in there. And I don’t even know if I care. Is this love? Is it what it feels like from above? Is this love? For you I feel tenderness. And it’s the very worst thing to let go of, when you feel like somebody understands you and you can lie there alone at night and they would get in and hear the wind between your lips, hear the wind rushing through your bones, hear the wind and the mighty tide and the moon. And the wind running through your bones and the wind running through your mouth and the wind running through your bones and the wind running through your skin.

PLUTO I was the stardust; you were the moon. And I turned into Jupiter. Put on perfume. And you, it got your back up. You said you were more important. And could you be promoted to Pluto or Neptune? And I said I don’t think Pluto is even a planet. I think NASA told us so not long back. But go ahead and be Pluto. I can call it you if that’s what you want. But I’ll remain what I am. Silver rain that falls in the countryside when I am out of data and there’s nothing and nobody on my back. And I can walk with the sun behind a cloud and know that I am going to be alright even though can’t track me my flight, my heartbeat, my vital signs, and my steps, they will not know. Let it go. Don’t you feel what I feel? Come home with me. Won’t you come home with me.

A HERD OF BUFFALO RUN ACROSS THE 60-INCH FLAT SCREEN TV “17th. Whatever you do, do it like hell”. Marion Milner, from A Life of One’s Own (2011:18). Are you sure you want to delete this? Unrecoverable. Ads. After ads. After ads. After Cookies. Accept. Or deny. How about shut the lid and get out of the house for a bit? What domain name should I chose? she says, dressed in mint and salmon. Sun flooding the table. GO DADDY throws up: blog,. link, .digital, .me, .biz, .net, .shifts, .io, .tech, .uk, .avocado, .best, .black, .band, .green, .LGBT, .best, .give, .hip-hop, .movie, .letter, .social, .show. Fake pink chrysanthemums. (At least they’ll last longer than the roses). Came down, in the morning, to their heads on the tabletop. That’s the trouble with roses. Solid aspect. Verdant lawn, room for a pool. A herd of buffaloes run across the 60-inch flat screen TV. Low-sugar granola, in between the teeth. EAT NATURAL. Daily Wash or Full Cycle? Sun-kissed wrists, scented with Sicilian lemon and almond, some Greek brand from TK Maxx. Made in China. Bonne Maman. Monosodium phosphate. Bacterial culture. Iodine. Vitamin D. Vitamin B12. Watched the movie Heat (1995) last night, tried to remember where I watched it before. Winchester - 2004. GUARDIAN REVIEW. DO YOU ACCEPT? YES, I’M HAPPY. But am I really? Are you? Pacino, and de Nero’s, first to do, so to speak. De Nero. Shot in the chest. Noooooooooooooo. Twice. LOS ANGELES AT NIGHT. The beauty of it. Eternity - at a touch. The City of Angels. Neon fever. The air – warm – no matter. ARE YOU SURE YOU WANT TO DELETE THIS. CANNOT RECOVER IT. Black Mustard. Monterey Cypress. Public Enemy Number 1. Subtropical desires. Eucalyptus moods. Your blooms are not your own. Mulholland Drive. Lynch and Wenders. Fuchsia hypnosis. Can never spell it right, like Nietzsche. Volatile. Sporadic - June is, less. Pineapple Express. The thing about kids is – they’re violent, inherently. Then they grow out of it, develop RA, and call it progress. Latent anger. Remember how she headbutted that little girl, in the grounds, on their wedding day? Her face, a moment or two, before she did it.

HALO You’re wearing a halo. The sky is bluer than your eyes. You’re crying into your palms. They’re upturned. Towards the sky. Do you believe in God? Or do you think you can fly? Do you believe in God? Or do you think you can fly? I know you, you’re in my dreams. Some Jungian archetype, no good for me. I’ve met you before. I don’t believe in a past life. Don’t believe in reincarnation. We’re only here once for the taking. Won’t you take me? Any which way that you’d remake me. Do you believe in God? Or do you think we are here for no other reason than to breathe for a bit and then go back to the dust or where we came from. There’s no rhyme or reason for us to… Or do you want to say that you mean business anyway? You’ve got to go out to the shops today. You’ve been turned into an existentialist overnight. You never understood that in your twenties but now you do. The absurd makes sense to you. Now that you’re older you get it. And Derrida’s point, or Camus and Sartre, he does it for you when you say: Do you want to have an intellectual relationship? We could be unusually good philosophers travelling around France. Then you say you’re too good looking for him, and I guess you are. And she was a right one anyway. And if they weren’t bedding their students then they were arguing and making love. And if they weren’t…

PLEIADES Do you love me like I love you? Do you want me to be yours? Do you love me like I love you? Do you want me to be yours? Do you love me like I love you? Do you want me to be yours? Or do you want to run away and go your own way? Or do you want to love me to meet me in the hotel room? Do you want to undress me and hold my body expectantly? And I will run to you if you follow Pleiades. I will try to call you when I can. You are lovely. I want to take your… and sink into it. I bet you kiss well. Your tongue, it’ll know where to go. And I bet you’d do the same thing down below. Down below. I bet you’d do the same thing, you’d know where to go, you’d know how to begin, and when and where to let go. You’d make me rapturous. Take my mind off it. Whatever I’m doing now, you’d clear my mind of it. And make my body weep with ecstasy in my sleep. If I could love you, I’d drip, drip, drip from the thick of it. The thick of it. The thick of it. The thick of it.

CLOUD THRONE God is watching from above on his cloud throne make me feel no good as I lay here on my bed watching Netflix or HBO. And God what did you have in mind for me? Am I letting you down watching too much TV? (Spectacularly). And God what did you have in mind for me? Am I letting you down watching too much TV? And God, I know I see you there. You are omnipresent in your underwear. And God, with a twig of rosemary, sat on your throne made of clouds. Tell me what I am to do, and I’ll do it but until then you can listen to me from your cloud throne. You can listen to me; you can hear me at home. You can watch me watching TV or HBO. You can shake your head or waggle your finger at me. You can say: What did I do wasting my time with her? Why did I make her real? Why did I send her down to Earth? Why did I give her a chance? She does nothing for me, just lays there 24 hours. God, I’m sorry I’m here. I need to get up, get dressed, get real, and do something. There must be a reason that you put me here. There must be a reason that you put me here. There must be a reason that you put me here. There must be a reason why can’t you tell it to me?

ETERNITY DOESN’T EVEN HAPPEN TO FLOWERS AND IT CERTAINLY WON’T HAPPEN TO ME Don’t say you’ll leave me alone, it’s only a voice in your head. Making up the stories you do before you go to bed. Put your head on the pillow. Go to dreamland. But instead, you touch yourself. Trying hard to understand. The ways of the world. All this shocking violence. But love can be violent too, yes it can do. But what if I love you? And it is not like that. But instead, it’s like the summer falling on the rain, falling on the mountain, falling on the valley green, falling on the soccer field, falling on the ice-rink outside, falling on the swimming pool, falling on your open mouth, on your tongue, it is falling into you. What if you’re the one for me? And what if I love you forever? Will you be always true to me? Or would you go off with another? Even though you said you’d never do that. Why do we talk eternity? When eternity doesn’t even happen to flowers, and it certainly won’t happen to me.

DO YOU WISH TO CONTINUE? Do you wish to continue? (on repeat)

FREEZER DELIGHT I saw you in the freezer aisle making eyes at the broccoli, I was surprised I thought you were a meat eater, but I must have been wrong cause you sure looked like you were going along with the marketing bods. And anyway, I don’t do my shopping on a Thursday night, so I took it, this freezer delight as destiny that I was to meet you that night, that we’d cross eyes by the cauliflower it’s got potassium. Or flavonoids that can make me look younger than me. But I’ve got to eat them with the skins on to make any difference, to make me feel young. I gotta munch ‘em, it’s no good peeling it off, and what about you? Do you wanna come home with me? I’m in the Audi, I’m not proud of it, but I haven’t got a mum or dad with disposable income. I never had any hand me downs. Never had any legs ups. Never had any contacts who could build me up. Did it all on my own. And then I met you in the supermarket and we all disappeared. And I thought about what Slavoj Žižek said about how we fall in love and all our systems are designed for ‘love without the fall’. All our systems are designed for ‘love without the fall’. But what if I want the fall? Will you be so kind to pick me up off the floor to make my shoes shine? Will you be so kind? Will you be so kind? Will you be sublime? Will you be sublime if I lie down now by the open my legs what do you see? Not privilege. There’s nothing inside of me except what you see. And all of me is here for you to hold. And I don’t ever want to get old. And I don’t ever want to get old. What about you? Do you love me too? And what about you? Will I be like glue to you? Or will I start to bug you? Once you’ve taken me off a pedestal and seen my flaws at four in the morning. You know me not, probably, but nobody does. I’m an enigma to myself. I’m kind of indulgent all alone. And I don’t want to wake my neighbour up with my mobile phone. And you, what about you? Do you want to love me, like I love you? Do you wanna’ get down the freezer aisle? In Asda come a Thursday night. It was just a little fantasy that came between you and me. It passed me by in aisle 15. And I don’t ever want to see your face again. And I don’t even want to see. When we were loving one another’s bodies into the early hours. Waking beside the water. I could have turned in to a mermaid if you’d have held me any other way than what you did. I want to feel like meat between your teeth. And you did, you held me the way I like to be held. How did you know what does it for me? I know other man who can do it that way. I’m a problem to you and I’m a problem to all who know me. And I’m a problem to you and I’m a problem for all to see. But I’m made of water and fire and carbon. I dropped out of the sky one fine night when there was an earthquake. And some kind of light in the sky I didn’t know, and some bright, bright star. And I fell from it. A thousand feet. Ten thousand feet. Fifty thousand feet. Five hundred thousand feet. Five thousand, thousand feet. Five million feet. Five zillion billion feet. But you caught me in my sleep. They say stardust, it don’t weep. And I love you in my sleep. And I love you, I just can’t keep it all inside me. Cause I might weep on the inside, and I’m not made of tears, I’m not blue, I’m red. If you open me up, you could taste me, I hear I taste good, just a little salty. But I am ready to love you. And I’ve been closed to the world for quite some time. I’m a girl and I’ve been hurt before. Now I mend no more. And I am broken in. And I am pleased for you. And do you wanna’ go shopping with me. We’ll buy diet-Coke and a movie. And we will drive home, and I will look for. Venus’ trajectory on my mobile phone. I’ve gotta’ download a dark sky app, I know it’s on there. You just drive. And if you want to pull over, then it’s your prerogative. I won’t try to control you ‘cause I’m just a passenger. And you are going to take the back road, I know it, I feel it in my bones. And if you do, don’t leave me alone. If you take the back road, then I will breathe…

MY WARHOLIAN EXHIBITION Took a gun and held it in my hand. I never meant to do it, pull the trigger on you. Pull the trigger on you. But you gave me no choice, you cornered me, you made it what I would do. Even though it’s not in my make-up, my desire to pull the trigger on you. Pull the trigger on you. You made me feel like I should be so much thinner, so much prettier, and shapelier for you. Shapely for you. Does my bum look big in this? Was never a question for you. It was only something I read in a magazine and that’s what you did. You made me look in the mirror and see what they saw. The ideological desire to be the norm. And when I was only twenty years old, I could have been a model but instead all I see were the folds, the weight, the way my legs were out of shape, and all the parts of me that simply did not look like they should have looked in the magazines. And then I realised that all the girls in the magazines neither did they look like that. And when I sat in the coffee shop and looked around, I realised that X, Y, Z don’t look like the girls in the magazines. And then later on came all those photoshopped beauty queens. And hell, when he saw me, he had a shock for all eternity. Put me on his 60-inch screen for all to see. And then I was famous. Suddenly famous. I was famous. Suddenly made it, my fifteen minutes of fame. My Warholian Exhibition. It was running for all of fifteen minutes, I was famous. All of me, my body running down the TV screen. Illuminated pixels for him to ogle, for him to stroke, for him to get acquainted with. For me to feel like I was part of the picture. Setting the mood in the front, front room. Setting the mood were my legs. Setting the mood was my mother of God, what he liked best. Setting the mood was my wanton tongue, waiting in the vestry to be undone. Setting the mood was all of me, not in real life, but you know what I mean.

PRITT STICK Blue, blue eyes are you coming around? Turn my flat into the seaside. I am waiting for you. To come around and make me laugh. After the age of 45 a woman needs a man with a man with a GSOH above any other escape, my love. Do you have a GSOH? Then tell me what do you do with it? Should you come around and bring it on a lead. GSOH. Lovely, I am waiting for your GSOH. Tell me what will you do with it. Is it glue or Pritt Stick? Baby, will you tell me your secrets or keep it in your hand. What else do you have? Or will you keep it in your hand? My love, Keep it in your hand. Tell me, what do you have? Or will you keep it in your hand? My love, are you coming on a Friday night? A Friday night. Are you coming, are you coming? On a Friday night. Bring your Pritt Stick, love. Bring your Pritt Stick, love. Bring your Pritt Stick, love. Bring your Pritt Stick, love. You can glue my walls and put up the posters you want. I don’t mind. It’s not my flat. And anyway, the landlord can complain should he wish to. Are you coming around my love? On a Friday night. Are you coming around my love? On a Friday night. A Friday night. Are you coming to save me on a Friday night? Kiss your perfect body. The way you smell is… And I want to take you in my arms. Pritt Stick or Blue Tack. Make it messy on the walls. Messy on the walls. Messy on the walls. Messy on the walls. Will you come around? Come around, love? Will you come around baby and do some good? Will you come around, darling? Come around love, and do some good?

PAINT ME What were you wearing, darling? I saw you bearing fruit like summertime, your eyes, they were blue. My God, I know you do something to me. You do something to me that I don’t know. I was so good at telling what you thought I need to be, but I am only going to love you if you stay tonight with me by the candlelight. Will I? Love, I could be tempted to stay one more night in December and play it all right and be your tomorrow girl. But when I see you walking down the street in front of me. My whole body weeps for what could be if only you could see me. I know you never said, we’d ever get in bed, but I was kind of hoping for something to wake me up from my sleep, my slumber. Love, I know you feel the way I do when I lay my eyes on you. Your body is so beautiful, I am lost for words. I don’t breathe easily when I’m around you. You see, you do something to me incomparable, baby. You do something to me incomparable, baby. And I believe we’re meant to be lost in… What I want to say to you. You want to know my name. And baby, I should have gone away but I stayed here anyway wishing you’d come around. And make me wait. And love, I know you’re wearing your best clothes. And I am naked sat on the chair. Will you paint me? Paint me. Paint me blue. Or will you make me feel brand new (alive). I want to kiss your body in the morning. The way you love me is like no other I have felt between my legs. Will you come and stay the night? And make me feel something just get it right. And make me feel something I haven’t felt before. Go ahead and pick me up off the floor. I love the way you smile. The way you hold your body. And we are naked. Something I never really thought about before. (Incomparable). Because you do something that nobody’s ever done. (Incomparable, baby.) You do something to me. You make me come undone. That, I see. When I touch you in my sleep I wonder as my hands they suddenly feel complete. When I have found my way to you. Like summer in my dreams. Won’t you come love to me and whisper something indecipherable I could have tried to translate if you had spoken up. And I am always wanting to be with you. It’s kind of compulsive this dreaming I do. To kiss you, your beautiful lips. Your beautiful lips. Your beautiful lips.

DOCTOR, DOCTOR! I got a call, the doctor’s receptionist. She said: “Hello, is that Samantha?” Said my last name and I knew it was kind of formal. Don’t like to pick up these calls. And I said: “Yes, speaking. It’s me.” And she said: “I’m sorry.” And I shook in my boots waiting for reality to set in. It always starts with a blood test. It always starts with a blood test. It always starts with a blood test. It always starts with a blood test. The only time I wanna be normal is when the doctor calls on me. On me. Oh-oh-oh-oh-oh-oh-oh. Doctor, doctor, show me the chart. Squiggly lines. Sinus tachycardia. I said: “What is causing it? And he said: “Look it up. Google it!” And I thought well, is there anything I can do, or am I doomed? I noticed at age 25 I had a lifeline that was half as long as my boyfriend’s and I thought I’m getting out of here earlier than he will. He’ll have so much fun and I’m gonna’ be six-foot under. I’m gonna’ be six-foot under. Six-foot under. Six-foot under. Six-foot under. Six-foot under. I said “Doctor, am I dying?” And he looked at me and said: “No, not yet. But we’ve all got to die.” Doctor, doctor, give it to me! Doctor, doctor, reality. Doctor, doctor, give it to me! Doctor, doctor, a piece of reality. Oh-la-la-la-la. Oh-la-la-la-la. Oh-la-la-la-la. Oh-la-la-la-la. Doctor, doctor, doctor. Doctor, doctor, tell me, this reality. Is it always a blood test? The only time we want to be defined as ‘normal’. Doctor, doctor, give it to me. Doctor, doctor, a piece of reality. Doctor, doctor, give it to me. Am I dying? Then if so tell me.

PNEUMA/NON-COMMODITY I never saw a wild thing sorry for itself. A small bird will drop frozen dead from a bough without ever having felt sorry for itself. ~ D. H. Lawrence. This is a sweet thing. I never told you that. Non-commodity. The word ‘soul’ as originating from the Greek word ‘Pneuma’ P-N-E-U-M-A which means breath. Why don’t you come back? (Going down, doors closing). The soul exists outside of the body after it dies. 26 degrees. Going down, doors closing. Non-commodity. Non-commodity. Non-commodity. Non-commodity. Non-commodity. Going down, doors closing). The word soul as originating from the Greek word which means breath of life in the body where the soul exists outside of the body after it dies. Non-commodity. Non-non-non-non-non-non-non-non-non-non-non-non-non-non-non-non-non-non-non-non-non-non-non-non-non-non-non-non-non-non-non. The word soul as originating from the Greek word which means breath of life in the body where the soul exists outside of the body after it dies. Non-commodity, non-commodity, non-commodity, non-commodity.

DEAD WHITE MEN WORKING ON OVERTIME I look for you in the water. I look for you in the rain. I look for you in the sunlight. I look for you when I wake. I look for you in the patterns of the wind. But the wind it don’t make patterns, it only shuts us in. And I look to you when I wake. But you don’t see me. You’re always busy, love, doing what you do. I want you talk to me, to make me feel like I’ve been heard. I’m only human, pay attention to me. Wrap your arms around me so we can love one another right. Be our best we can be. We can get this loving right. We can love till eternity. But what if eternity doesn’t exist? What if it was a lie written down by some dead, white men working on overtime? What if they had really nice handwriting and their calligraphy was their deal? What if a graphologist came along and said they know what they mean? Would you believe them over me? Would you believe them? Or would you come right on in to kiss me? Would you let me in? Cause I believe in you. Do you believe in me? Do you wanna’ love till eternity? Or do you want to give up on all we could be? Or do you want to stay? Get in the bed with me. Or do you want to stay, tonight and watch the moon float into the room. And flood us with mystery. Do you want to stay with me tonight? Let me run my fingers through your hair. Do you wanna’ let yourself go with me? Do you wanna’ run away to eternity? Even though we both know there isn’t such a thing, it was only a lie they made up, those scribes. Darling, I feel like it does exist when I’m by your side. So, won’t you come stay by me, love? Won’t you come and hold my body like a glove? Won’t you keep all that love you had? Won’t you wait for me at the end of the day?

WOMAN (WOMB-TASTIC!) River running on the side of the walk, I was walking on the road I was waiting for you. All that I could hear when I shut my mouth and opened my ears was a sound. Motorway, I don’t even know its name. Don’t they all just sound the same? Yes love, I could be yours, if you would only take a minute just to see what I, I’ve got to you. Or are you coming home? Do you miss me too? And love, I would be here for you. I would open my mind, open my… Will you come to my room? Will you say you are you staying? I’m sorry that this song is not about anything intellectual or political or anything. I was once told that love needed a political resolve. I am a woman. Oh, what you gonna’ do? I am a woman. Oh, what you gonna’ do? And they want to call us ‘vagina owners’ too. And I’m thinking about the Enclosures, reeks of it, I don’t own this thing between my legs. I am a woman, yeah. Whoa-whoa-whoa. Don’t you like the sound, the round, the wholeness of it? On the mouth look what it does, look at what it makes my mouth do. Woman, woman, like womb, like womb, like WOMB-TASTIC, yes, I have one inside me. I’m a woman, woman, woman, listen, I’m a woman, well, I love the roundness of it. Woman, woman, I’m not a ‘vagina owner’. And I guess one thing that is true, we won’t be seeing ‘penis owners’ any time soon. We won’t be reading of ‘penis owners’ anytime soon. It’s not trendy. Ha, ha, ha. Well, I’m a woman, woman, woman, what about you?

SPREADSHEETS All words were pointless anyway, if I could have held you, if I could hold you, what would I say? What were you wearing? Nobody knew you were coming but me. And nobody else could see. All there was before me was some material glory – call it your skin. God, I know that I’m not made of rose petals, and neither are you. But what was it all about? My love, darling. Are you coming? Oh, are you coming? Oh, are you coming? Oh, are you coming? Yeah, in the late afternoon. What will you wear? Why can’t I think better thoughts? Why are you filling my mind with, muh, muoah, muoh. I love to watch you get undressed. And I would gladly pend my afternoons doing that. But instead, I’ve got to get the spreadsheets done. And I don’t want to do that love. Are you coming, are you coming around? So, I can do something else, a distraction, a provocation, love. You take my mind of it, this obligation. Microsoft Word fixation. Oh love, I would rather, I’d rather be doing it with you on paid time. It’s the only revolutionary thing we can do now. You can go out and strike, put your yellow vest on. Or you can come back to mine, get under the covers, and get undone. We can love one another, one another, and love one another, and love one another. We can love one another right.  

LIKE STEVIE NICKS SAYS Lord, I want to say to you, I know I should do better than what I do in the day to day when I don’t live by the letter. But like Stevie Nicks says in interviews she was not rule bound. Rules mean nothing to her. So, the last thing a man should ever do is lay down the ground rules. Lay down the ground rules. Lay down the ground rules for me, tell me how it is, or how it should be. And I watch from my window, open blue skies. Birds that fly higher than eternal sunrise. Don’t you know that I love you? It’s in my bones, in my blood, in my skin. It’s in the sweat from my pores. The very thought of you and my hands they begin to go all clammy. I need to see you, to touch your face, to know that you’re there, that you will be around for me, that you’ll be around for me, for a long, long time. You’re not going anywhere. You’re always gonna’ be some kind of loyalty, DM’ing me. In the middle of the night, sending me a film to make me feel alright after a tough, tough day. And I want to say to you, that I love you. ‘Because I never said it you before. It doesn’t come easily to me. I’ve been hurt before. Like you have and her and him. It’s nothing individual the way that I love. It’s nothing to be paid attention to. I’m just a woman with baggage. You’re a man with baggage too. So, what do we do, get rid of all this blockage, this junk that sits within. We can run away from it in your dreams. You’re always in lost cities looking for a place to be. And I am always in strange houses lost in rooms I don’t know. There are a few faces that know me but otherwise the feeling is “What the hell am I doing here?” I know you’re there I feel your presence when I lie down cocoon myself at night get into the embryo position hold my body tight. What will you do for me? What will you do for me? Promise.

A THOUSAND PROMISES YOU NEVER MADE ALL COMING INTO BEING Lover, come and haunt. Love, come and look for me. Lover, comb the beach at night. Love, won’t you take me home? Lover, won’t you hold me tight? Lover, I am only listening to the valley for a word from you. Let the bird carry a message in its beak. Lover, I am holding your heart in my hand. And lover, I am trying to call you up. I want to hear you speak to me, God, it is so lonely. Lover, can’t you come over, I’m breaking. God, I want to fight it in the water, fight it in the water. Stormy path won’t you keep me in shelter, Lord? For I’m a lonely warrior. Lover. Lover. Lover. Lover. Why won’t you come and take me home. In the mountain. In the mountain. I know you’re there. I feel you deep within. I’ll hold you there in my belly. The sweetness of waking up with you. This is life, this is what we should do. I would fly to New York to be by your side. Take a walk by The Hudson at night. Watch the skyline from the rooftop of The Jane Hotel in Greenwich Village. I’ll never let that sunset go. Orange flames. Orange sky. Could have been a thousand promises you never made all coming into being like the feeling like the feeling that you have when you wake in the early hours. Throw open the window. And you catch the birdsong, and the air is like mountain air. Just for a moment you dare feel alive. This is life. This is life.

ROOM 203 I want you to love me the way I love you. I want you to feel me with all that I do. I want you to love me. The stars above. I want you to see me. The real woman that’s stood before you. The sky dark blue. And light, over there by the sea. I’m waiting for you to come home, I won’t wait forever, love. Wait forever, love. Won’t wait forever, love. Won’t wait forever, love. I want to love you, your body too. I want to wrap myself around at 3 a.m. in the morning. And hear your sounds, the sounds you make for her, I want you to make them for me. And I will love you eternally, eternally. And now I’m alone with you. The thought of you makes me love you, even more than I do. What the hell is wrong with me? Why can’t I settle for the ones who come a knocking at my door? Why can’t I take one of them on? And make it sweet and make it real and make it good for me? What is my wiring and why is it so faulty? I never realised I do this with my eyes closed. Invite you in. I want to take your clothes off in room 203. I want you to come around and take your clothes off for me. I want to hold your body all night, I do. I want to kiss those lips, those lips that do it for me. I know you’re otherwise engaged. Stay now, I want to take your mouth and show you what loving is about. I know you’re really taking your time. Because you’re a man of reason, you’re a reasonable sort. You do not act on impulse, you do not act like I do, you do not act on impulse, you’re reasonable in all you do. And that’s just how I like you to be, and I don’t want that for me. I never wanted to be a reasonable woman; you see. And hey, hey. Hey, hey. I love the way you move, the way you take me in your arms. The way you kiss my body. The way you keep me from harm. The way you ravage my skin. The way you keep the secrets within. The way you tell me, you talk like the moon. You’re a mystery in mid-bloom. I would have loved you forever more, if we only, only had a chance in this real world. But we know we never will. So, until then, I’ll say goodbye to you. We never began. We never, ever, ever, had a chance.

FOREVER CHEMICALS Only the thought of you writing to me in the middle of the night with the swans outside floating down The Clyde under moonlight huddled into the side of the water seeking respite, and getting their sleep, folding their necks in at night, I could weep at the beauty of it. I walk along, only some dog walkers walking at night like me. I don’t have a dog, so I walk alone, watch the swans taking up their temporary, nocturnal home by the side of The Clyde, coming in to sleep at night, by the moonlight, beside the shipping yard, and all the bright, bright lights and all the activity that goes on at night in those buildings, infrastructures opposite me, darling. I wonder what you’re doing on the other side of the world, breathing in those forever chemicals. I read they’re in our toilet paper, in our bags, in our bottles, in our washing-up. I know they are toxic, toxic, love is, everywhere you can’t get away from it, ‘cause these forever chemicals are just doing their stuff. I watch the swans they take me all away from it. I wonder if they’ve ever, ever read about it, or do they just get to drink, drink it, swallow it in the form of some plastic bag they never should have come across and they haven’t been tagged and wouldn’t have done if it weren’t for you and me and the likes of us and a lack of corporate responsibility, tax evasion, and landfill and dumping all our waste for our generations to come, and plutonium might be the answer for some but not for me, I like to think that there’s another way to be but maybe I am just an idealist, I am just an idealist, I am just an idealist, some Romantic type, an irreverent, a woman sat in my room making up these things, in my head, reading the daily gloom on The Guardian, I’m thinking I should unsubscribe, I really don’t like what they put in my mind all these subscriptions, ‘gotta cancel them, there’s really no point, I’ll never get around to reading them. All these Substacks, (subs) all these Patreons, (Subs up) all these Crowdfunding friends that need my help, the owner who’ll make me realise how long this YouTube video took to make, all the hours they took, all the fancy, posh hardware and software that they had to buy to get that influencer rate right up, and get the subscribers hitting that button, and tag on everything, ‘cause it means everything to them, oh-oh-oh-oh-oh. These forever chemicals are never coming out of me nor you, they’re lodged in our tissues deep, and even beautiful swans are drowning in them. I bet if we open them up and find residue, human glue, think about it, all that packaging (moonlight). Do you really need it? (Won’t you subscribe, keep me alive?). Is there another way to live? (Subscribe, keep me alive!). I’m not trying to guilt-trip you. (Keep me alive. I’m with Slavoj Žižek on it. Passive activism, do your recycling. Make yourself feel good. Drink that Diet-Coke without the caffeine, and it’ll all be alright and then you can go to Starbucks and pay an extra price for your coffee but no, hey, hey, you’re doing a good deed, it’s going towards saving the children of Guatemala and it’s all included for free in the price. It’s all for free. (Subscribe, keep me alive. Won’t you subscribe, keep me alive?)

HOTEL DRESSING GOWN I guess I am saying to you, do you wanna’ love me too. I want to take your body in that hotel room. And run my fingers down your backbone. And take your flesh in my palm. And kiss those lips that I have seen before. And make you realise. I want to wake you up in that morning dew. The sunrise it’ll shine in the gap between me and you. On the crystal-white sheets. Hotel dressing gown. 500 ply John Lewis, wrap it around you. I know you never needed me; I probably never needed you. But in the middle of the day, it is my mind you’re running through. I can’t do much about it, stood at the side of the road. Waiting for the green man, to tell me it is safe to go. But I’m missing you, even though we’ve yet to meet. How can it be a phenomenon? How can it feel so damn sweet? Will I love your body when we finally get to meet? Or will I not recognise you when you’re stood across the street? And what will I say to you? Or will we just drink coffee like we do? Or will we love one another true?

LA Wanted to be your love. Wanted to be much more. Wanted to be your plaything. Always behind the door. Wanted to be your first point of communication in the morning. Wanted to tell you that I was lying there thinking about you. About you. About you. Oh, about you. Wanted to be the one who’d always look for you. Whether it was rain or shine, love, I would be there. Wondering how I got by so many years without you (by my side). Oh love, I keep it all inside. And you, you’ve got your heart on your sleeve. And that kind of does it for me. Opens me up. Put simply, it’s not rocket science. Rocket science. But I know I can’t have you. It's just a pipe dream. All this dreaming I do. You’re already taken for, if only I’d have met you many years before. We could have been something in another universe. Or maybe we met in a short story you haven’t written yet. But hey, if only I could take your body in the domestic space. I would begin, and love, I could just hold you. Come in from a day at work, and I would hold you. And we’d make it work. Not like work — like love, the best kind of work. It’s all up there. Ready to read in a book that you wrote many years ago. You’re writing the same book, hey, hey, I guess you know. You’re looking for something, something else. Maybe I just could help you along a little. I would wake in the morning, morning / I’d say: My love, how are you feeling? / Did you see the swans? Will you walk with me by The Clyde one night? We’ll both see them, huddled together under moonlight. But it’s not every night. You’ve got to be lucky to catch them. Lucky to catch them. When they hold one another tight under moonlight. And I wish I could kiss you in the morning light. I would whisper something I don’t know yet. A new kind of language that hasn’t been invented yet.