Jackson

This is not my house. Waves of patchouli oil. This aromatherapy my suffocation. What would I have? Roses and coffee and nothing and jasmine coming in the windows First published in dotdotdash Read more

I’m still dressing up. I’m in the basement drinking with the street performers The heavyweights are upstairs sampling postmodern canapes If you weren’t gone, would you be down here, or up there? You’d be out walking in the night and I’d be with you. Read more

The world is so strange and beautiful now. Something has happened to it. An eerie light flicks and glows in the gloom like a searchlight on the horizon in a Blade Runner Neuromancer smog. Bands are trying to pretend the Gulf Wars and 9/11 and Iraq never happened. The 18-year-old rock singer at the next Read more

Wrinkled winter apple. Organic, scenty, fully ripened, gentle on the tooth and honeysweet, but nobody wants you. People don’t try senior apples. All they know are glossy new Pink Ladies, pricey, crunchy, vaguely fructosed. You’re in the bargain box, the “cooking-apple” box, good value. Read more

Polish the sconces Wax the china rails Beat the rugs Scrub the walls Launder the linen Stoke the fire Trim the wicks Wash the windows Sweep the hearth Dust and straighten the pictures Then write your book, Mr Furphy. Read more

No name for those steps I sat on, where the sun sings through the leaves, where the old stone is painted and marked by pilgrims who give what they have, words, marks, symbols. I used my little knife, carved a crude tetrahedron, its sides not as equal as I wanted, to say I’d be back Read more