Important things I have learned this year:

1. Trust should be earned, not freely given.

2. Nobody's patience is endless.

3. Be careful what you wish for (and similarly: do not invoke arcane Gods to give you exactly what you want in the moment that you want it - as it turns out, there's probably a reason you didn't have it in the first place).

4. You can learn, grow and develop from every experience, no matter how bleak and awful it might seem at the time.

5. True friends do not give their love conditionally.

6. It is not necessary to let everybody into every facet of your life, and your every immediate thought and surge of emotion. In fact, it is probably best not to.

7. Soy by-products are very tasty.

In other news, everyone keeps telling me that I've lost weight. I don't see it, myself.

The second time I visited New Orleans, I saw a bird dying on the ground.

I was with Toby and Victoria. They'd just spent an hour watching me get a keyhole tattooed on my back. I was shakey and exhilirated from the adrenalin, riding the post-ink high until I spotted the little bird struggling to hold onto its life, in the gutter.

I don't really know why it upset me as much as it did. Perhaps because the thing looked so absolutely pathetic, emitting a soft sort of wheezing chirp as its chest rose and fell erratically, blinking rapidly from exertion. I wanted to do something. I wanted to help. I think that was the most upsetting thing of all - that there was nothing I could do.

"There will be birds long after we're gone." Viki said.

My third trip to New Orleans, the same little bird flew into a restaurant whilst Max and I were eating lunch. It flitted onto the floor near out table, and when I called to it, it hopped up on the back of the chair closest to mine, and watched me, head tilted to one side.

A waiter walked by and laughed.

Today I saw the very same little bird. It was lying on the bricked up driveway of a house near where I work, in a flurry of its own discarded feathers. A large black crow was picking into it with its sharp, oil-slick beak, its beady button eyes staring blankly at me as I observed. One, two, three - the beak pierced into the open, red chest of the sparrow.

When I approached, it took the limp body into its mouth and flew away.

Photograph (c) Jamie Elliot

I'm in New Orleans.

Everything is going to be fine.

As it turns out, I really am just a worthless whore.

Happy Birthday, J.

I'm late, I think. I apologise.

<3

I've got the ways and means
To New Orleans
I'm goin' down by the river
where its warm and green
I'm gonna have a drink
and walk around
I've got a lot to think about.

Longer letter later.

I'm getting to the end of my tether.

Say something.

Please.

Anything. Anything at all. Just something. A ripple in a well. I don't care what.

I just want to know I'm not alone, out here.

Yes, this is me begging.

I know some of you don't think a lot of what I have been putting myself through, lately. A lot of people have commented, online and off.

It feels like I've replaced a burning flame with an electric light.

And the bulb is stuttering out with an incessant, unsettling buzz.

Baby I'm sick. I need
nursing. Give me your breast.
My orifices bleed.
I cannot sleep. My chest
shakes like a window. Light
guts me. My head's not right.

Demon, we're old, old chap.
Born under the same sign
after some classic rape.
Gemini. Yours is mine.
Sickness and health. We'll share
the end of this affair.

Baby, I'm sick to death.
But I can't die. You do
the songs, you've got the breath.
Give them the old soft shoe.
Put on a lovely show.
Put on your wig, and go.

The service station flags, denticulate
plastic, snap in the wind. Hunched seabirds wait
for light to quench the unmeaning lights of town.
This day will bring the fabulous summer down.

Weather no memory can match will fade
to memory, leaf-drift in the pine's thick shade.

All night salt water stroked and shaped the sand.
All night I heard it. Your bravura hand

chimed me to shores beyond time's rocking swell.
The last cars leave the shabby beach motel.

Lovers and drunks unroofed ins obering air
disperse, ghost-coloured in the streetlight-glare.

Rock-a-bye Baby
in the motel
Baby will kiss
and Demon will tell.

One candle lights us. Night's cool airs begin
to lick the luminous edges of our skin.

When the bough bends
the apple will fall
Baby knows nothing
Demon knows all.

Draw up the voluptuously crumpled sheet.
In rose-dark silence gentle tongues repeat
the body's triumph through its grand eclipse.
I feel your pulsebeat through my fingertips.

I told you once that you were the only person who saw me.

And you said that was because I wouldn't let anybody else see.

As it turns out, the fact of the matter is that precious few others are interested in the revelation.

If you only ever listen to one song that I ever recommend to you, please let it be this one.



the words flow, decisions made
idea's mine, but the inspiration not
dreams of hangers on, dreams of getting well
spells of ezmerelda, emeralds foretold
splinters in the eye sentiments remain
bones that never rest where we going to
it was never up to me and yet i pushed until it broke

i love the open road and all that it suggests
wheel wagon dust weeds and infidelities and
always for a love never question why
in a wooden house immoveable and silent and
drinking strawberry wine forever lost in town
and through the sleeping streets night bound and heavy
wheels in the spoke still spoken for himself

now my gates are high, my friends even higher
forgotten in my mind, yet the sky still linger and
cloud the blue skies, i'm jealous of you birds
was the only truth in a world full of words?
hear the prairie sound in a friend called near
the heart is pointed down but my spirit pointed up
his voice for siren of greek mythology

i pause with my pen i begin to defend
every action taken, every moment sealed
when i was quick it coursed through open veins
the will to live the urgency to move
behind a paneled door sealing cherry stain
i play my guitar and live those lonesome notes

like a dog that's down
in a corner just a sigh
waiting to be called
waiting to be yours
ghosts of all my shame
without purpose or will

i often speak of you but the you is always me
cause when i speak of me it's me i ask of you
so let there be no truth just trickery in rhymes
time the only thing waiting still as death

i hope for resolution pray one defining moment
pause without restrain barren without child
a child is who i was a child is who i'll die
soot in my hair
and stars in my hands
soot in my hair
and stars in my hands
soot in my hair
and stars in my hands

BERKO (to Deb) I like you hair ... Are you OK?

DEB Why do you care? You didn't care last night.

BERKO Yes I did.

DEB Look this isn't about you, OK. I got home last night and I thought about everything that had happened. And then I thought about everything that had happened the night before that and the week before that, and the year before that. And, er, the only thing that was different was there was something else that was making me feel shitty.

BERKO I'm trying to say I'm sorry.

DEB I just said this wasn't about you. Look, you didn't do anything wrong - I'm screwed up, OK?

BERKO We're all screwed up.

DEB Don't touch me right now. I just want you to get up and I want you to walk away.

DEB PUTS HER HEADPHONES ON

She followed the voice through the darkness, drifting down, down, down…following the whispers that dripped and echoed like well-water.

At length, she found herself in a copse of dense trees. At the centre of the clearing was a pool of dark water - the surface as smooth as a window pane. On the other side of the pool stood the owner of the voice.

He was engulfed in shadow, his features masked by the absence of light.
Cora knew his name already – had it seen it written many times in the pages of the long since buried book. In the labyrinths of words on gilt edged paper, his name always stood out.

Morpheus.

This is the between He spoke without moving his lips, the words carried by the rumble of distant thunder. The boundary that separates dualities. You are in the gray between light and dark, the semi-conscious between sleep and wakefulness. You have been here for some time, a wraith moving listlessly through the world, neither alive nor dead. But you can recover what has been lost.

He gestured towards the pool.

She knew her role well, felt it resonate inside her like a single clear note. She carried in her the archetypal spark of every soul that had ever made its way into the heart of hell, fallen down rabbit holes and stepped through mirrors.

Cora stepped out over the smooth, solid surface of the water.

I looked up from the deep, upside-down, my feet fixed to the glassy ceiling.

She looked down at me. We stuck together, sole to sole, but still separate.

This is the beginning of Dream. The voice vibrated, ripples at last distorting our reflected bodies.

Descend.

With one bare foot step into silent water, we merged together.

Go down, down, down…

We became I.