KD2006
The thoughts and experiences of poet, playwright, and songwriter Karl Dallas, during the year 2006.
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Tuesday, March 23, 2010
Taking time off
Following two bad bouts of flu I'm taking a couple of weeks off. If urgent, please call my cellphone.
Monday, April 03, 2006
March 23: To Bradford's National Museum of Photography for a viewing of the 1969 Granada TV Johnny Cash in San Quentin concert video. Quite apart from the Museum's TV Heaven viewing room having the most uncomfortable seating on the entire planet (despite the additional cushions handed out by the host), the video is a bit of a muddle, the result of a rather literary/didactic motivation, which persists into the resulting movie.
The concept was to use San Quentin prison as the venue for an examination of the way the myths of the Old West - the gunfighter, the maverick - persist today and survive within prison walls. This overview fell by the wayside while the show was being firmed up, but persists in an now entirely irrelevant intro, with clips from classic western movies and a portentous voice-over.
The interviews with inmates are interesting and could have made a programme in their own right, but they tend to interrupt the flow of the music.
As a result, the music occupies les than half the footage, but what there is makes fascinating viewing, demonstrating how Cash could work an audience, whipping them up to a frenzy (as demonstrated by the opening clip on this posting) and then calming them down with a spiritual song, like the lovely He turned the water into wine.
This footage is unlikely ever to see commercial release, because of copyright issues between Granada and the Columbia record company (now part of Sony) who released the audio CD. Thirty-second clips of nearly all the songs may be heard at http://www.legacyrecordings.com/site_artists/product_4994.html.
However, like all the huge number of archived programmes in the Museum's TV Heaven, the show can be viewed at any time (though not online). You have to come to Bradford and view your choice in the cubicles provided. Hopefully, the seats will be more comfortable than in the 38-seater viewing area.
Details of the over 900 programmes in TV Heaven can be found at http://www.nmpft.org.uk/television/.
The concept was to use San Quentin prison as the venue for an examination of the way the myths of the Old West - the gunfighter, the maverick - persist today and survive within prison walls. This overview fell by the wayside while the show was being firmed up, but persists in an now entirely irrelevant intro, with clips from classic western movies and a portentous voice-over.
The interviews with inmates are interesting and could have made a programme in their own right, but they tend to interrupt the flow of the music.
As a result, the music occupies les than half the footage, but what there is makes fascinating viewing, demonstrating how Cash could work an audience, whipping them up to a frenzy (as demonstrated by the opening clip on this posting) and then calming them down with a spiritual song, like the lovely He turned the water into wine.
This footage is unlikely ever to see commercial release, because of copyright issues between Granada and the Columbia record company (now part of Sony) who released the audio CD. Thirty-second clips of nearly all the songs may be heard at http://www.legacyrecordings.com/site_artists/product_4994.html.
However, like all the huge number of archived programmes in the Museum's TV Heaven, the show can be viewed at any time (though not online). You have to come to Bradford and view your choice in the cubicles provided. Hopefully, the seats will be more comfortable than in the 38-seater viewing area.
Details of the over 900 programmes in TV Heaven can be found at http://www.nmpft.org.uk/television/.
Tuesday, March 28, 2006
The wedding picture
I
He was a foot-soldier, she was The Princess.
Sipping the latte, which left an arousing trace of brown along her faintly moustached upper lip. He wondered if she shaved under her arms, knowing he would never know.
Her dad. He turned the words over in his mind, imagining this young woman's creation.
Pleasure he could imagine, dancing girls he had taken up in the personal elevator, stopping only at the penthouse floor. But nothing as common as procreation, gestation. He imagined a delivery room all white melamine and stainless steel. No blood. No cries of distress.
A baby howling? Surely not.
"Not from him directly, of course."
"Foot-soldiers."
"Yes."
Paying the tab had emptied his wallet. And it was not even very good coffee.
The minders were there as soon as they left the coffee shop. He suspected that they had never really left. Their conversation was probably being uploaded to some storage facility even now, his vocabulary being scanned for evidence.
Of what? He had only answered her questions.
And kissed him chastely on the cheek.
The next three posts are a story I have written, to be part of the CD-ROM of love stories under preparation.
I
He was a foot-soldier, she was The Princess.
"You had coffee," said The Boss. It was not a question.
"A latte," she said. He ordered a four-shot espresso for himself. A bad idea, he knew, but it was frightening, being here with her.
"You paid. That is not permitted. You should have run a tab."
"I will pay," he said. The tab would be more than he earned in a week, but what the hell.
"It is a permissible expense," said The Boss. "Sign and you shall be reimbursed."
Sliding a chit across his huge desk. He looked at it. Did not sign.
"How did you become . . . ?"
Sipping the latte, which left an arousing trace of brown along her faintly moustached upper lip. He wondered if she shaved under her arms, knowing he would never know.
"A foot-soldier?""Do you defy me, sir?" Not raising his voice. Almost as if asking the time of day.
But his eyes were cold.
"Is that what they call you?"
"It's what I am."
The chit lay there, unsigned. Disregarded.
"You know you may not address her directly, you."
"A foot-soldier."
"What does it mean?"
"Doing what must be done."
"Killing?"
"Anything."
"I suppose she approached you first. She shall be spoken to. About that."
He stood in the lobby, dressed in Tommy Hilfiger, anonymously logoed. Lurking, it was called. Unseen, unseeable.
Alert.
Especially when she swept through, her and her minders, was what he called them. She dressed in haute couture so elegant it looked like something a little woman round the corner might have run up on a foot-treadle Singer. Under it a body, the black crepe revealing as much as it concealed. He tried not to look.
"Is that how it was? She spoke first? I do not think you would dare . . ."
He knew what was forbidden, and this – she – was at the top of the list.
"You," she said, dismissing the minders with a wave of her arm. "He will take me to the coffee shop."
The foot-soldiers bought burgers and do-nuts from a stall in the street. Ate in the basement, among the boilers and duct tape. The coffee shop was out of his league.
"I will pay," he told the waiter, who looked his Tommy up and down with a curl of his lip. Why he did it, paid, that contempt.
"You will sign."
He sighed. There would be no end until he did so.
"I was a lawman," he told her. "Internal affairs said I took bribes."
"But you did not."
"How long have you worked for me?"
It was said The Boss knew everything about everyone, even their social security number. That kind of mind. He knew the answer to this question. To all questions.
She, too. "You had not taken bribes. From my father."
Her dad. He turned the words over in his mind, imagining this young woman's creation.
Pleasure he could imagine, dancing girls he had taken up in the personal elevator, stopping only at the penthouse floor. But nothing as common as procreation, gestation. He imagined a delivery room all white melamine and stainless steel. No blood. No cries of distress.
A baby howling? Surely not.
"Not from him directly, of course."
"Foot-soldiers."
"Yes."
"Your accounts always balance. Answer me!"
"Yes, sir."
"Some cream a little off the top. But not you."
"And now you pay out the bribes." Her eyes danced. "You pervert justice. You, the incorruptible ex-lawman."
"I am not a thief."
"You wear my clothes and you drink coffee with my daughter when you should be minding the store. Is not that to steal your time from me, time that I have paid you for?"
"Could I disobey her if she required me to drink coffee with her?"
Paying the tab had emptied his wallet. And it was not even very good coffee.
The minders were there as soon as they left the coffee shop. He suspected that they had never really left. Their conversation was probably being uploaded to some storage facility even now, his vocabulary being scanned for evidence.
Of what? He had only answered her questions.
"You talked of refusing to take bribes. It is not something to be proud of. I shall expect to see small discrepancies."
Suddenly, The Boss fed the chit into the shredder.
"Fiddling is a better way," he said. "My daughter will wish to take coffee again. You will continue to pay cash. She will not be impressed since she has no concept of money. You will reimburse yourself in the traditional manner."
"Let's do this again," she said. "It's been fun."
And kissed him chastely on the cheek.
"You'll need smarter clothes." Handing him the address of an uptown clothing store.
The wedding picture-II
He did not like who he became in his new clothes. They were less like him than the Hilfigers. He looked like a minder though he was still a foot-soldier. He found himself demanding more from his clients. Keeping more off the top.
He needed it. They had taken to eating cakes with their coffee, each cake a month's wages rather than a week's.
She said she preferred the new look. But then he was someone different with her than he'd been before. He talked.
She called him Tommy, after the outfit he'd worn when she first led the way into the coffee shop. He hadn't had a name since his father had been killed. In The Home they gave him a number. As a lawman, too. A barcode tattooed across his wrist, then lasered away. Now he was his thumbprint, retinal scan, DNA. The system knew him and clicked him through to permitted areas, to the penthouse floor when he was summoned.
He had clicked her lovers through. Handsome, anonymous faces. Unchanging, serial, allowed, disallowed. If he ever thought about them and her it had been as a sort of sexless sex, leaving her still inviolate, virginal, spiritually intacta.
The Boss's words shocked him. The prohibition was admission of a possibility that had been so impossible until now it had not even been forbidden. Now it was like juices flooding his mouth outside a sweetshop window when a kid. Sweets he would never have the money to enjoy. The stuff of dreams.
So he began to dream about her.
And his dreams became flesh. Under the severely cut dress breasts, thighs, buttocks walking away after that dismissive chaste kiss, occasionally nipples winking in and out under the silk.
Of course he would not. Could not. But what if.
She took to driving with him to shops, restaurants. She would vanish and reappear, twirling, her feet bare.
"What do you think?"
And carrying the packages back to the limo, clothes she never again wore, her display a reverse strip-tease, who she could become. Only for him. If only for a moment.
She said to call her Eve. Did not say that was her name. If, unlike him, she had one. He wondered if she was cultivating a tree in her Eden, bearing a single, forbidden fruit.
By forbidding him, The Boss had indicated a Pandora's box, not yet opened. He could hear its interior, like honey bees buzzing.
She said little. "Tell me about the hood," she might say. He dredged up memories, long forgotten.
She tempted him to drive through them, places the limo was programmed to avoid, despite its armour-plating.
"How wonderful," she said, "to be up on the roof, lying naked in the sun."
"That's just a song," he said. But he could not explain about the stink from the stench-pipe, the biting flies, the no-go graffiti demarcating where and nowhere. She only knew smells of Chanel, Dior, artificially floral. The one time they had driven out to the country she had wrinkled her nose, sneezed. The open spaces made him uneasy. He was glad to be back among buildings.
It would not be one of the facelessly handsome. A corporate merger. Damaged goods would sour the deal. He drove her to the clinic, a brass plate on an automatic gate.
She shuddered when she rejoined him behind the armour glass plate between them and the driver. "Ugly."
He tried not to imagine the stirrups, the speculum, the latex fingers. Probing. Damaging her innocence.
"They should use MRI," he said.
"It is the church," she said. "They do not trust technology. Daddy too."
She had never spoken of The Boss so intimately till then. Doing so now made him also somehow part of the family. Another link, like the hitherto unconsidered prohibition.
He'd seen society weddings on the box. The shade-eyed minders morning-suited, muttering into their Bluetooths. He could not play that role.
So once again the tailor's measure, the inside leg, the quick slashing chalk, the big tacked stitches, the tightness under the arms, at the crotch.
He had an image of the groom, though he had never clicked him through. He drove them together sometimes, though then he sat upfront, with the driver. He looked to see some happiness on their faces.
In vain.
When he shopped with her without the groom, now, she was if anything more provocative, more borderline between the compulsory and the forbidden. Linking her arm through his, almost dancing him through the swish of automatic doors. Twirling.
He drew the line at lingerie departments, and she danced away from him, laughing. Her breasts more real to him after, though actually he could see no discernible difference.
He tried to imagine them that first night together but he could not. For all her Barbie-doll prettiness she was real flesh. Though he could not detect it under the Chanel, there would be the perfume of sweat, feminine juices. Her groom-to-be was a shop-window dummy, a front for corporate ambition. He was too clean-shaven, talcummed. Probably shaved his pubis.
He wondered why the groom did not come on these expeditions. But did not ask. She made it seem such a question would be an irrelevance.
They – she and him – were the couple. The Boss still picked up the tab. Would do so in future, he imagined.
Locker-room said the marriage was buying in nanotechnology, the groom the junior partner in the deal. A new apartment was being grown for them tectonically on the penthouse floor. He would join her there. But he would still need to be clicked through.
He wasn't jealous of the groom. He even felt a little bit sorry for the poor bastard. Under those shellac nails would be claws, he knew. She was her father's daughter, after all. Though she had never unsheathed them to him.
He imagined them raking down his cheek. Tried to think what would provoke such an attack.
Failed.
Probably she didn't care enough. Unless he refused to follow her into this loveless marriage.
But what then did he know of marriage? His old man had beat up on his mother. Then afterwards he'd hear them grunting and groaning in the alcove above the big old stove. He'd sworn to kill him one day when he was big enough. Instead of which the old man had died in a hail of bullets, her too, in a supermarket hold-up, not even on duty, so there was no fancy funeral, bullets fired over the coffin, no pension. Just The Home, for him and his rat of a brother. Who he put away for ten to life, to die in the joint, stabbed with a sharpened screwdriver in the woodworking class.
He had an image of what a marriage should be, and it was a feeling in his gut. Like how she danced away gaily looking at brassieres. Which she didn't hardly need. Or perhaps they were so skilfully made they looked like nothing at all.
What did he know? The whores he went to all had silicone implants, their tits impossibly huge and elevated like hot-air balloons. But he'd stopped visiting the cat-house after that first coffee-house drink.
So he went. They were very skilful. High class indeed. His suit was steamed and pressed for him when he was done, his Gucci's polished to the sort of high gloss workers of a certain age preferred. He scuffed them up as he walked back, dismissing the limo. He showered as hot as he could stand as soon as he reached his pad, though he'd been soaped and sponged all over after.
Because he'd been soaped and sponged all over after.
He felt uncomfortable next time in the coffee house. But her natural innocence soon dispelled his discomfort. And he never went back to the high-class brothel. Even though the madam had said the tab was covered. And always would be.
Because she said that.
He was finding it hard to pay for coffee now, spending so much time with her, others taking over his clients. So not much top to cream off.
He didn't know if he would, even if he could. He didn't want to be her minder. But how else could he protect her?
From what? From the shop-window dummy? Herself?
Although he'd refused, he realised he would accept it. No one else seemed ever to have doubted it.
Jammy bastard, was the locker-room verdict.
The tectonics were done, and she took him up and showed him his rooms, his own kitchen and shower, bedroom, even a living room.
No furniture, apart from the hob, washing machine and fridge-freezer, the wall plasma in the living room.
"I thought we could choose the rest together." Her eyes wide, guileless, laughing, knowing he knew the game she was playing. Powerless to do anything but play along.
He had minimalist tastes. She did not interfere, except to buy him a big, disturbing abstract for the wall over the single bed.
"Get to be a tight fit if you're entertaining a guest," she said. "Or – "
"Or?" He couldn't resist rising to the bait. But she was already leaving the gallery. Ahead of him, which was contraindicated by his training. She was a very valuable property, especially now. Not everyone was happy about this marriage. There had been other shop-window dummies before this one.
He moved into the apartment before the wedding.
And placed at the bedside a photo of her he'd dumped from the CCTV footage. Blurry, but he didn't mind that.
How he thought of her, when he closed his eyes that night. Imprecise. Uncertain. Dangerous.
Like her dancing eyes.
He needed it. They had taken to eating cakes with their coffee, each cake a month's wages rather than a week's.
She said she preferred the new look. But then he was someone different with her than he'd been before. He talked.
She called him Tommy, after the outfit he'd worn when she first led the way into the coffee shop. He hadn't had a name since his father had been killed. In The Home they gave him a number. As a lawman, too. A barcode tattooed across his wrist, then lasered away. Now he was his thumbprint, retinal scan, DNA. The system knew him and clicked him through to permitted areas, to the penthouse floor when he was summoned.
"You will not fuck her."He had never even fantasised such a thing. In the locker-room a single ribald entendre had tailed off into an apology when he had stared the joker down.
He had clicked her lovers through. Handsome, anonymous faces. Unchanging, serial, allowed, disallowed. If he ever thought about them and her it had been as a sort of sexless sex, leaving her still inviolate, virginal, spiritually intacta.
The Boss's words shocked him. The prohibition was admission of a possibility that had been so impossible until now it had not even been forbidden. Now it was like juices flooding his mouth outside a sweetshop window when a kid. Sweets he would never have the money to enjoy. The stuff of dreams.
So he began to dream about her.
And his dreams became flesh. Under the severely cut dress breasts, thighs, buttocks walking away after that dismissive chaste kiss, occasionally nipples winking in and out under the silk.
Of course he would not. Could not. But what if.
She took to driving with him to shops, restaurants. She would vanish and reappear, twirling, her feet bare.
"What do you think?"
And carrying the packages back to the limo, clothes she never again wore, her display a reverse strip-tease, who she could become. Only for him. If only for a moment.
She said to call her Eve. Did not say that was her name. If, unlike him, she had one. He wondered if she was cultivating a tree in her Eden, bearing a single, forbidden fruit.
By forbidding him, The Boss had indicated a Pandora's box, not yet opened. He could hear its interior, like honey bees buzzing.
She said little. "Tell me about the hood," she might say. He dredged up memories, long forgotten.
She tempted him to drive through them, places the limo was programmed to avoid, despite its armour-plating.
"How wonderful," she said, "to be up on the roof, lying naked in the sun."
"That's just a song," he said. But he could not explain about the stink from the stench-pipe, the biting flies, the no-go graffiti demarcating where and nowhere. She only knew smells of Chanel, Dior, artificially floral. The one time they had driven out to the country she had wrinkled her nose, sneezed. The open spaces made him uneasy. He was glad to be back among buildings.
"She is to marry."Of course.
It would not be one of the facelessly handsome. A corporate merger. Damaged goods would sour the deal. He drove her to the clinic, a brass plate on an automatic gate.
She shuddered when she rejoined him behind the armour glass plate between them and the driver. "Ugly."
He tried not to imagine the stirrups, the speculum, the latex fingers. Probing. Damaging her innocence.
"They should use MRI," he said.
"It is the church," she said. "They do not trust technology. Daddy too."
She had never spoken of The Boss so intimately till then. Doing so now made him also somehow part of the family. Another link, like the hitherto unconsidered prohibition.
"You will need clothes for the wedding."Oh no. He was just getting used to the Brooks Brothers suit, the Gucci shoes, the Turnbull & Asser shirt and tie.
He'd seen society weddings on the box. The shade-eyed minders morning-suited, muttering into their Bluetooths. He could not play that role.
"You may not refuse.""You must come," she said. "I'll need you there."
So once again the tailor's measure, the inside leg, the quick slashing chalk, the big tacked stitches, the tightness under the arms, at the crotch.
He had an image of the groom, though he had never clicked him through. He drove them together sometimes, though then he sat upfront, with the driver. He looked to see some happiness on their faces.
In vain.
When he shopped with her without the groom, now, she was if anything more provocative, more borderline between the compulsory and the forbidden. Linking her arm through his, almost dancing him through the swish of automatic doors. Twirling.
He drew the line at lingerie departments, and she danced away from him, laughing. Her breasts more real to him after, though actually he could see no discernible difference.
He tried to imagine them that first night together but he could not. For all her Barbie-doll prettiness she was real flesh. Though he could not detect it under the Chanel, there would be the perfume of sweat, feminine juices. Her groom-to-be was a shop-window dummy, a front for corporate ambition. He was too clean-shaven, talcummed. Probably shaved his pubis.
"You can go with her if you wish. She has asked that."She behaved as if it were already decided. Now, they shopped for furniture. Art galleries. Kitchen equipment he knew she would never use. A circular king-size, gadget-controlled.
Become her minder? And his? Manage their diaries? Diary?
He shook his head.
"Don't decide now. Plenty of time."
He wondered why the groom did not come on these expeditions. But did not ask. She made it seem such a question would be an irrelevance.
They – she and him – were the couple. The Boss still picked up the tab. Would do so in future, he imagined.
Locker-room said the marriage was buying in nanotechnology, the groom the junior partner in the deal. A new apartment was being grown for them tectonically on the penthouse floor. He would join her there. But he would still need to be clicked through.
He applied for a transfer. Denied.He had learned what The Boss was reminding him of, back in the hood. And it had lost him his lawman's shield. Knowing that, why had he been picked up, dusted down, dressed in Hilfiger, set on this course that could have only one end?
"This job is not about feelings," said The Boss. "Feelings will let you down.
"So you have bonded. That's good. You can keep an eye on my investment.
"And don't look at me like that."
He wasn't jealous of the groom. He even felt a little bit sorry for the poor bastard. Under those shellac nails would be claws, he knew. She was her father's daughter, after all. Though she had never unsheathed them to him.
He imagined them raking down his cheek. Tried to think what would provoke such an attack.
Failed.
Probably she didn't care enough. Unless he refused to follow her into this loveless marriage.
But what then did he know of marriage? His old man had beat up on his mother. Then afterwards he'd hear them grunting and groaning in the alcove above the big old stove. He'd sworn to kill him one day when he was big enough. Instead of which the old man had died in a hail of bullets, her too, in a supermarket hold-up, not even on duty, so there was no fancy funeral, bullets fired over the coffin, no pension. Just The Home, for him and his rat of a brother. Who he put away for ten to life, to die in the joint, stabbed with a sharpened screwdriver in the woodworking class.
He had an image of what a marriage should be, and it was a feeling in his gut. Like how she danced away gaily looking at brassieres. Which she didn't hardly need. Or perhaps they were so skilfully made they looked like nothing at all.
What did he know? The whores he went to all had silicone implants, their tits impossibly huge and elevated like hot-air balloons. But he'd stopped visiting the cat-house after that first coffee-house drink.
"You seem to have gone off sex." The Boss knew, of course, everything he did. Or did not do.
"You could have entry now to a higher-class establishment." Pushed a neat little, business-like business card across the desk. "Check it out."
An instruction. Not an invitation.
So he went. They were very skilful. High class indeed. His suit was steamed and pressed for him when he was done, his Gucci's polished to the sort of high gloss workers of a certain age preferred. He scuffed them up as he walked back, dismissing the limo. He showered as hot as he could stand as soon as he reached his pad, though he'd been soaped and sponged all over after.
Because he'd been soaped and sponged all over after.
He felt uncomfortable next time in the coffee house. But her natural innocence soon dispelled his discomfort. And he never went back to the high-class brothel. Even though the madam had said the tab was covered. And always would be.
Because she said that.
He was finding it hard to pay for coffee now, spending so much time with her, others taking over his clients. So not much top to cream off.
"You're on salary now. I don't want you on the streets. It endangers her. Run a tab. It will be debited from your salary so don't get proud."He felt as if he was being enclosed in a warm cocoon he didn't know how to get out of. A job for life, they had told him when they picked him up on Skid Row, and they meant it. You couldn't resign.
He didn't know if he would, even if he could. He didn't want to be her minder. But how else could he protect her?
From what? From the shop-window dummy? Herself?
Although he'd refused, he realised he would accept it. No one else seemed ever to have doubted it.
Jammy bastard, was the locker-room verdict.
The tectonics were done, and she took him up and showed him his rooms, his own kitchen and shower, bedroom, even a living room.
No furniture, apart from the hob, washing machine and fridge-freezer, the wall plasma in the living room.
"I thought we could choose the rest together." Her eyes wide, guileless, laughing, knowing he knew the game she was playing. Powerless to do anything but play along.
He had minimalist tastes. She did not interfere, except to buy him a big, disturbing abstract for the wall over the single bed.
"Get to be a tight fit if you're entertaining a guest," she said. "Or – "
"Or?" He couldn't resist rising to the bait. But she was already leaving the gallery. Ahead of him, which was contraindicated by his training. She was a very valuable property, especially now. Not everyone was happy about this marriage. There had been other shop-window dummies before this one.
He moved into the apartment before the wedding.
And placed at the bedside a photo of her he'd dumped from the CCTV footage. Blurry, but he didn't mind that.
How he thought of her, when he closed his eyes that night. Imprecise. Uncertain. Dangerous.
Like her dancing eyes.
The wedding picture-III
He was a very small cog in a very large wheel on the wedding day. Planned and co-ordinated from the very top. His moves controlled by his Bluetooth.
Except she was a loose cannon, and he had to stick close to her. Even when she went to the can. He couldn't go in with her, but he cleared it for her. Even a duchess would have to quit whatever she was doing, then.
When she was dressing, too. Outside the door, checking seamstresses in and out. So many sharps. Made him nervous.
Then, inviting him in. Twirling.
Not a Princess any more. A Goddess.
The seamstresses exchanging complicit smiles, this twirling for a foot-soldier, the unconcealed devotion in his eyes.
The cathedral was huge, full of worrying nooks and crannies. Not his problem. It had been swept and double-swept. Then swept again.
But still he worried.
He confiscated a toy raygun from a kid in the VVIP section. Mods were possible, turning toys into lethal weapons. Invitations had been explicit: no handguns or replicas.
He crushed the toy into a tangle of pink and green plastic. Handed it to a startled parent, who would no doubt complain. Who gave a shit?
He was in place for the wedding march, as close as possible to being by her side as she glided down the aisle.
Locker-room said he should have been best man, but that was impossible. One of the top lieutenants would be there, the two rings in his vest pocket.
By the side of her, The Boss. He realised this was the first time he had ever seen them together. He walked like a man with a not too favourite mistress. Arm candy.
Their eyes touched for a nanosecond, then both looked away. In the older man's, something akin to boredom. A story already printed and published, headlines yellowing with age. Done and dusted.
Most of the time his eyes were ranging the hall. Choir: sorted. Military band: OK, no weaponry. Bridesmaids, matron of honour: more Barbies, checked and triple-checked. Again, not his problem. But still a worry.
He didn't look at her. Her veil covered her eyes anyway. What the fuck was he doing here? What had to be done. Like always: his father rutting away in the alcove, protecting his butt in The Home, staying out of the line of fire, drinking coffee. Necessity.
The archbishop was intoning the ritual words. One of the altar boys made a strange move and everything dropped into that slow-motion speeded-up reality he remembered from the street.
Most of the minders didn't pack, but there were sharp-shooters with telescopics in the gallery. He had a flechette sewn into the right arm of his jacket, activated by his forefinger, pointing. Its darts would shred its target into beefsteak tartare if he could get a clear shot. If necessary, he would take out innocent bystanders at the same time if he had no other option.
The ugly little handgun in the boy's hand seemed to close all other doors. If only he could get past the archbishop, who was waving his arms, pushing away from the line of fire.
The gun went plop, and the best man went down. He triggered the darts, and a mist of blood clouded his vision. The altar boy was still standing.
All he had done with his flechette was to give the gunsel a clearer target. He threw himself in front of her, trusting that the kevlar armour under his shirt would protect him, and her.
As he felt the armour-piercing shells stitch across his chest he realised this was no longer an option.
"You fool," hissed The Boss in his ear, "didn't you realise this was planned? Why did you have to get in the way?"
He was lying in her lap and he worried that his blood would be ruining her gown. There were tears in her eyes. She stroked his cheek.
Her face morphed into the stolen screen-dump by his bedside.
It was the last thing he saw.
Blurry.
27/3/06 15:03
III
He was a very small cog in a very large wheel on the wedding day. Planned and co-ordinated from the very top. His moves controlled by his Bluetooth.
Except she was a loose cannon, and he had to stick close to her. Even when she went to the can. He couldn't go in with her, but he cleared it for her. Even a duchess would have to quit whatever she was doing, then.
When she was dressing, too. Outside the door, checking seamstresses in and out. So many sharps. Made him nervous.
Then, inviting him in. Twirling.
Not a Princess any more. A Goddess.
The seamstresses exchanging complicit smiles, this twirling for a foot-soldier, the unconcealed devotion in his eyes.
The cathedral was huge, full of worrying nooks and crannies. Not his problem. It had been swept and double-swept. Then swept again.
But still he worried.
He confiscated a toy raygun from a kid in the VVIP section. Mods were possible, turning toys into lethal weapons. Invitations had been explicit: no handguns or replicas.
He crushed the toy into a tangle of pink and green plastic. Handed it to a startled parent, who would no doubt complain. Who gave a shit?
He was in place for the wedding march, as close as possible to being by her side as she glided down the aisle.
Locker-room said he should have been best man, but that was impossible. One of the top lieutenants would be there, the two rings in his vest pocket.
By the side of her, The Boss. He realised this was the first time he had ever seen them together. He walked like a man with a not too favourite mistress. Arm candy.
Their eyes touched for a nanosecond, then both looked away. In the older man's, something akin to boredom. A story already printed and published, headlines yellowing with age. Done and dusted.
Most of the time his eyes were ranging the hall. Choir: sorted. Military band: OK, no weaponry. Bridesmaids, matron of honour: more Barbies, checked and triple-checked. Again, not his problem. But still a worry.
He didn't look at her. Her veil covered her eyes anyway. What the fuck was he doing here? What had to be done. Like always: his father rutting away in the alcove, protecting his butt in The Home, staying out of the line of fire, drinking coffee. Necessity.
The archbishop was intoning the ritual words. One of the altar boys made a strange move and everything dropped into that slow-motion speeded-up reality he remembered from the street.
Most of the minders didn't pack, but there were sharp-shooters with telescopics in the gallery. He had a flechette sewn into the right arm of his jacket, activated by his forefinger, pointing. Its darts would shred its target into beefsteak tartare if he could get a clear shot. If necessary, he would take out innocent bystanders at the same time if he had no other option.
The ugly little handgun in the boy's hand seemed to close all other doors. If only he could get past the archbishop, who was waving his arms, pushing away from the line of fire.
The gun went plop, and the best man went down. He triggered the darts, and a mist of blood clouded his vision. The altar boy was still standing.
All he had done with his flechette was to give the gunsel a clearer target. He threw himself in front of her, trusting that the kevlar armour under his shirt would protect him, and her.
As he felt the armour-piercing shells stitch across his chest he realised this was no longer an option.
"You fool," hissed The Boss in his ear, "didn't you realise this was planned? Why did you have to get in the way?"
He was lying in her lap and he worried that his blood would be ruining her gown. There were tears in her eyes. She stroked his cheek.
Her face morphed into the stolen screen-dump by his bedside.
It was the last thing he saw.
Blurry.
27/3/06 15:03
An aphorism
If a married man loves another woman, he will love his wife more. If he does not, his new love is not a true love; it is mere infatuation.
I don’t know if it is true of all men, but it is certainly true of me.
I don’t know if it is true of all men, but it is certainly true of me.
Thursday, March 23, 2006
My first comedy stand-up spot.
Well, I did it.
Though I’m not sure why! ("Because it’s there"?) On Thursday night, I arose from my bronchitic sickbed and did a comedy stand-up spot at the "Just Fair Laughs" Fair Trade comedy club in Leeds, and summoning up all the adrenaline rush I could muster, I think I pulled it off. I’ve never thought of myself as a comic writer or performer, so it was amazing to me, hearing people roaring with laughter at stories taken from my emotional life over the past 75 years.
You can make your own mind up, by clicking on http://jfl.leedscommunity.com/mp3s/16-Mar-06/06-KarlDallas.mp3, where you can hear the full performance, as well as others' spots.
Another performer on the bill gave me a very positive critique: "Keep that bit in", he said, about one particular riff, "it’s really funny". The set wasn’t very political (except in the sense, as I once wrote in the Daily Worker, the most political songs I know are love songs) or religious, except in the sense that I was talking about love, the greatest gift of creation.
This bi-monthly comedy club is enormously successful. There were ninety people packed into Holy Trinity Church café, an absolute sell-out. They’re thinking of putting it on in Bradford, which would be a great attraction for the Priestley.
I’m not sure if I’ll do it again, if only because I don’t know of any similar system on the comedy circuit to folk’s floor spots, but I hope the experience will feed into my regular gigs, which I want to develop further, having taken last year off from performing to concentrate on directing my Into the War Zone play. Speaking of which, though I wasn’t involved and haven’t been informed officially, I gather some of the cast met and decided not to go ahead with the Huddersfield, Halifax and Barnsley bookings. As soon as I’m well enough, I want to go back into the studio to complete the radio version of the play. There’s also some video footage I’d like to edit into some kind of a showreel, though the quality isn’t very good.
I’ve submitted a scene from my Trial of Josef Stalin play for the Page2Stage presentation at the Priestley on April 8, but my main dramatic activity for this year will be a very loose street theatre group I’m hoping to set up under the working title of Guerrilla Broadsides. My idea is that it will be quite improvisational and topical, just four or five people who decide to go to any particular demo or event and play it by ear, presenting poetry, song, mime, dance, whatever. I am hoping to have it up and running in time for the blockade of the Faslane nuclear submarine base in October.
Meanwhile, I’m waiting to see if I’ve got anywhere in the HarperCollins children’s book competition. Since the promise was notification to the winner by the end of this month I assume I haven’t made it. However, now I’ve got some "product" to offer, perhaps another publisher will pick it up. In fact, I’m so pleased with the book, I’ve already started work on a sequel.
My illness prevented me from attending the Topic in its new home very often at the Cock and Bottle, though I gather attendances are very good. I was especially sad to miss Steve Ashley’s 60th birthday bash. However, he’s coming to the Topic on April 27.
On Saturday April 29, Gloria will join me in the ranks of the septuagenarian-and-a-half survivors, so we’re having a joint 150th birthday party on that evening at St Paul’s church hall, Manningham. Anyone who feels like coming along to sing, say, or play, will be more than welcome. It’d be nice to have a ceilidh band, but I don’t think we can afford it. Any offers? Perhaps we could take a collection for Christian Aid or appropriate charity.
Last thing in my diary is the Saltaire Day of Dance on May 13, when I’m running a songwriting workshop from 5pm-6.30pm. There are nearly 46 dance, music and song workshops and the day runs from nine in the morning until 11.15 at night. The event has raised literally thousands for CND, Oxfam, Campaign Against the Arms Trade, and Chernobyl Children’s Project. Details from louise@dayofdance.co.uk.
Love and peace to all.
Though I’m not sure why! ("Because it’s there"?) On Thursday night, I arose from my bronchitic sickbed and did a comedy stand-up spot at the "Just Fair Laughs" Fair Trade comedy club in Leeds, and summoning up all the adrenaline rush I could muster, I think I pulled it off. I’ve never thought of myself as a comic writer or performer, so it was amazing to me, hearing people roaring with laughter at stories taken from my emotional life over the past 75 years.
You can make your own mind up, by clicking on http://jfl.leedscommunity.com/mp3s/16-Mar-06/06-KarlDallas.mp3, where you can hear the full performance, as well as others' spots.
Another performer on the bill gave me a very positive critique: "Keep that bit in", he said, about one particular riff, "it’s really funny". The set wasn’t very political (except in the sense, as I once wrote in the Daily Worker, the most political songs I know are love songs) or religious, except in the sense that I was talking about love, the greatest gift of creation.
This bi-monthly comedy club is enormously successful. There were ninety people packed into Holy Trinity Church café, an absolute sell-out. They’re thinking of putting it on in Bradford, which would be a great attraction for the Priestley.
I’m not sure if I’ll do it again, if only because I don’t know of any similar system on the comedy circuit to folk’s floor spots, but I hope the experience will feed into my regular gigs, which I want to develop further, having taken last year off from performing to concentrate on directing my Into the War Zone play. Speaking of which, though I wasn’t involved and haven’t been informed officially, I gather some of the cast met and decided not to go ahead with the Huddersfield, Halifax and Barnsley bookings. As soon as I’m well enough, I want to go back into the studio to complete the radio version of the play. There’s also some video footage I’d like to edit into some kind of a showreel, though the quality isn’t very good.
I’ve submitted a scene from my Trial of Josef Stalin play for the Page2Stage presentation at the Priestley on April 8, but my main dramatic activity for this year will be a very loose street theatre group I’m hoping to set up under the working title of Guerrilla Broadsides. My idea is that it will be quite improvisational and topical, just four or five people who decide to go to any particular demo or event and play it by ear, presenting poetry, song, mime, dance, whatever. I am hoping to have it up and running in time for the blockade of the Faslane nuclear submarine base in October.
Meanwhile, I’m waiting to see if I’ve got anywhere in the HarperCollins children’s book competition. Since the promise was notification to the winner by the end of this month I assume I haven’t made it. However, now I’ve got some "product" to offer, perhaps another publisher will pick it up. In fact, I’m so pleased with the book, I’ve already started work on a sequel.
My illness prevented me from attending the Topic in its new home very often at the Cock and Bottle, though I gather attendances are very good. I was especially sad to miss Steve Ashley’s 60th birthday bash. However, he’s coming to the Topic on April 27.
On Saturday April 29, Gloria will join me in the ranks of the septuagenarian-and-a-half survivors, so we’re having a joint 150th birthday party on that evening at St Paul’s church hall, Manningham. Anyone who feels like coming along to sing, say, or play, will be more than welcome. It’d be nice to have a ceilidh band, but I don’t think we can afford it. Any offers? Perhaps we could take a collection for Christian Aid or appropriate charity.
Last thing in my diary is the Saltaire Day of Dance on May 13, when I’m running a songwriting workshop from 5pm-6.30pm. There are nearly 46 dance, music and song workshops and the day runs from nine in the morning until 11.15 at night. The event has raised literally thousands for CND, Oxfam, Campaign Against the Arms Trade, and Chernobyl Children’s Project. Details from louise@dayofdance.co.uk.
Love and peace to all.
Saturday, January 28, 2006
Second skin to the power of infinity
Once again we have the chance
to be born again.
Behind us we leave the trail
of an infinitude of skins
sloughed off
as time moves on.
We can see what we've been,
but as we look back we see also the shape
of what we can be.
Each year we revisit
the place of our birth,
how we started out
and what we have made with how we were born.
It is a day unlike any other day
yet just the same:
day follows night,
yet all twentyfour hours are one,
shading greyly one into another,
a flickering screen of single frames,
flying before us like a riffling pack of cards,
reprising all our various roles: Jack Queen King,
and sometimes the lonely one-is-one and evermore shall be so,
the Ace.
We are none of these Masks we wear
but all.
Our clocks gobble up the days between New Year and the turkey-time.
But here, just for an instant,
like mice in the great ploughman's hands,
we're given pause
to see ourselves as eternity sees us:
a moment writ like all our names,
on water.
A poem for my 75th birthday
(and for any other birthday boys or girls who might find it appropriate to them)
(and for any other birthday boys or girls who might find it appropriate to them)
Once again we have the chance
to be born again.
Behind us we leave the trail
of an infinitude of skins
sloughed off
as time moves on.
We can see what we've been,
but as we look back we see also the shape
of what we can be.
Each year we revisit
the place of our birth,
how we started out
and what we have made with how we were born.
It is a day unlike any other day
yet just the same:
day follows night,
yet all twentyfour hours are one,
shading greyly one into another,
a flickering screen of single frames,
flying before us like a riffling pack of cards,
reprising all our various roles: Jack Queen King,
and sometimes the lonely one-is-one and evermore shall be so,
the Ace.
We are none of these Masks we wear
but all.
Our clocks gobble up the days between New Year and the turkey-time.
But here, just for an instant,
like mice in the great ploughman's hands,
we're given pause
to see ourselves as eternity sees us:
a moment writ like all our names,
on water.
Wednesday, January 25, 2006
Another test
A Valentine message to she-knows-who
(If you have a pop-up blocker, you'll need to press CTRL key when you click on this link.)
A Valentine message to she-knows-who
(If you have a pop-up blocker, you'll need to press CTRL key when you click on this link.)
Tuesday, January 24, 2006
Some of my songs
I have an on-going programme, uploading my songs and poems to my website at http://www.karldallas.com. The following links will be constantly updated, so please check back and listen to the new postings (additional items will be marked with an asterisk)
Songs about loving Songs about politics etc My songs sung by other people Ewan MacColl Teddy Munro
The Dransfields
(acc. Peggy Seeger)
