Somethong and Nothong

Half of what I was going to say has just got lost in my head but that's  alright nobody is listening or reading anyway (and if you are, many blessings on you x) yet I may as well write here because otherwise I would just talk it to myself.

(I must stop putting 'just' in sentences.)

I love poetry, and songwriting, and I do particularly enjoy making something out of what appeared to be nothing. (Or as my typing fingers seem insistent on tonight somethong out of nothong. Actually - that's another word I overuse - that's the title of this bit now.) And let's make an individual list of the words we all use too much. Those words are our frailties and foibles.

Here's mine, obviously there's more:

Obviously

Actually

Just

Simple

Not Necessarily

Perhaps

There's lots more.

I don't know how to do a comments bit yet, so pretend if you want. That's what I do, a lot. X

I have to say I do not get to fuck

Here is the original poem, bit, start, whatever we call it

2010

That Is That

If woman have record no.

Of babies in their 40s

How come I cannot have sex

Even in my 30s

Or 40s? –

I’m not going out Again –

I’m not drinking Again –

I’m reading every book in my house

And That is That.

Presume some report goaded me into this. It lacks venom, anger, it lacks me being unfucked, I would say. Not too interesting.

Maybe just move the words around and see if it can be made into something stupid.

woman in her 30s

has 40 books

in my house

and is not going

out again, she says

that is that,

and calls all 

my records

her babies

I drink again

when all i want 

to do is fuck

but my songs

and her stories

don't straddle well

I like that. X

Tossed Songs

Nothing should be discarded if you write.

I can remember the titles of songs I threw into the big black binliners, song after song.

My Friend Ed The Boxer was the first song I wrote. It was based on a Madness' tune, presumably Baggy Trousers but now I can't be certain. It's gone. Maybe that's ok. Other's I've tried resurrecting. Here's a list, of what comes to memory:

A Picture of Tomorrow

The Laird of the Semtex

I Could Join The Statues In The Square

Heaven Needs An Aviator Tonight

The Grand Old Men

Looking North From Comolungma

Another Scalp For Cleopatra

On My Stream, Floating

Any Last Regrets

Hey, Mr.Time

Sigh A Day Away

Sweetest String

so many others.

As I said I've tried my best to revivivify some. (Revivivify, having that.) But there's lots more.

I know I'm talking about songs when it is meant to be junked poetry, but to me they are the same, the voice, sound, communication. And just making a noise for the thrill of being able to.

Next, I promise I will get onto poetry.

Junk This? Not My Girlfriend Yet

Going through my old notebooks - computer files and folders, in truth, typed up laboriously many years ago, but for nostalgia still referred to as notebooks - I found the following:

My new girlfriend’s not my girlfriend yet,

which is something of a dilemma –

I suppose I ought to tell her

but I fear that earth might tremor –

I fear her staring back at me 

with her dark glamorous eyes 

meeting mine with a look that promises 

life can be hard with surprise.

The date on it is 25th October 2001, or in my more efficient computerese 011025. That means I wrote it 18 years ago. I have no memory who, if anyone, it refers to. I cannot recall it at all. And it is rubbish.

Now, I am loathe to throw out things I have written and taken the trouble to digitalise, but I must clear the backlog somehow. I could make another folder for it - Rubbish, Rejects, Crap, To Be Banned, something like that, but I suspect such a folder would soon end up inside another folder.

But I do have a liking for it. After all, I wrote it, there must have been a reason. So I look a bit longer. It's a song, I think, and a tune, or energy, or thrust, comes.

And picking my guitar from its faithful stand, soon I have this:

She’s Not My Girlfriend Yet

My new girlfriend’s not my girlfriend yet, 

which is something of a dilemma – 

I suppose I ought to tell her 

but I fear that earth might tremor 

I fear her staring back at me 

with her dark glamorous eyes 

meeting mine with a look that promises 

life can be hard with surprise. 

My new girlfriend’s not my girlfriend yet, 

I haven’t thought to tell her – 

Certainty’s a bit of a risk 

and she’s still got another fella 

caution comes in handy 

when aversion is no therapy 

I fear her too conclusively CONVINCINGLY 

to barge in shouting out about our destiny. 

She’s not my girlfriend yet 

She’s not my girlfriend yet 

She’s not my girlfriend yet 

oh, dear 

My new girlfriend’s not my girlfriend yet, 

what am I to do 

put the turkey in the oven 

and shove my head in too? - That wouldn’t do - 

I’ve got to see this through 

got to see her dark glamorous eyes 

stunned with surprise 

at my agile arcing acrobatic loving grooving lies 

She’s gonna be 

She’s gonna be 

She’s gonna be 

with me 

She’s gonna be 

She’s gonna be 

She’s gonna be 

with me 

This new new girlfriend is my girlfriend now 

I won a better battle - 

and we’re jigging round the world 

wondering where we’re gonna settle –

Now it is a song. With bashed hard chords, still a lot of F-Em-Dm, D-C-Bb-Am rundowns, which atypically among guitarists, I hit hard and fast on the whole chord.

Possibly it needs more work, maybe it is not a very good song. But I haven't junked it, I have made it more.

When I know how to do it I will come back and post the song. 

For now I want to post this as it stands and begin connecting.