Death and the maybe

In the words Terry Pratchett gave to Sergeant Colon and Nobby Nobbs, as they balanced on the roof of the distillery with the dragon bearing down upon them:

What's up, Sarge? Do you want to live for ever?

 

Dunno. Ask me again in five hundred years.

 

 

And there is a fundamental point at work here, we live longer and longer, but we aren't 'designed' to live forever.

That said, Death is dying.  Very slowly and with, I am sure, a couple more twisty scythe-based manoeuvres up his sleeve, but we are slowly grinding away at all the things that can make a person not last forever.  There will come a last mortal generation and possibly we are it...

...although, actually, I doubt that, it takes surprisingly long to pull a fully fledged and medically-approved nano-technological body repair system out of your hat, or mind upload technology, or even body-part-on-demand cloning.  But even although it's going to take longer than we like, there is going to come a time when people become essentially undying and we have to face the ultimate socially awkward questions:

How long do you want to live?

How long to you want to live with me?

How long do we both want to live, if the kids have emigrated to Alpha Centauri, and idea of eternity with nothing on the TV is driving us nuts? 

But never mind, we may get hit by a comet...

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Naked celebrity photographs


There is no real connection
between the beautiful and the vertical;
it is only a rule of thumb
but it has held so far,

she thinks,

photographing another letter-Y incision
against the steel table.
It always seems wrong
for the roughly stitched flesh not to swell redly,

but it's not.

This one had a crucifix—
it's in an envelope upstairs—
and a PR agency
who do not now know what to do.

She examines the photo
crosses it off her todo list.



To wish upon


If a comet comes
perhaps by night
wandering through our atmosphere
at a thousand times the speed
of bullets from a gun

the air compressed and burning
a transient and bale-filled sun
that flash-fries everything along its drift
before stepping firmly down to lift
some small Midwestern town

from the planet's surface
like a stamp loosened
in warm water and floated free if badly torn
with a thousand cubic kilometres
of the rocky envelope beneath.

If you are not burned
as you stand wondering or smashed
by falling secondary ejecta
if you are lucky and if, in short,
you are far enough away

then you can flee
the monument
of swelling black
that's eerily silent
coming at you faster than sound.

There is no way to turn
but you could flee choosing
as the commentator put it
a slow death over a fast one but, foolish, I
choose the slow death every time.



Magic


An empty box, a glass of milk,
two table tennis balls, a silken scarf,
no doves in my waistcoat, and no rabbits
or other small mammals
concealed anywhere about my person

but enough of this penny ante stuff.  Let's do magic!
Observe this wand, which came to me from an old,
old magician.  Now,

does any member of the audience have
a recently deceased body, ideally someone dear to you?
A mother?  A son?
A close friend will do...
You Sir?  Your daughter?

Let's give him a big hand!
If you'll just wheel the trolley onto the stage...
Thank you!
I cover her with this cloth
and if I could have total silence
as I wave the wand and rip apart the borders
of the undiscovered country.

I like to call this trick
"And death shall have no dominion."

Acquaintance

Uriah Heap who, had he known
Mr Jethencorp, would not have presumed
upon the acquaintance.

Charles Dickens knew a thing or two!

And the principle things he knew about were:

1. Characters
2. Serialising a story into handy sized parts
3. Ending parts on a cliffhanger
   (A technique later used to great effect in Flash Gordon...)

None of which means I'm not prepared to mock a little...



(The sound quality here maybe isn't quite up to the usual standard.  Please remember that a shoestring would actually represent a 300% increase in my recording budget...)

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Acquaintance

My dear Mr Jethencorp, may I express delight?
How wonderful it is, that you are here tonight
and I wonder, friend, if I could prevail
upon the strength of long acquaintance
for a pint of ale?

...

Say no more, Mr Jethencorp, I would not desire
to make you uncomfortable, glum or perspire
with any hint of awkwardness or strain.
If you cannot spare the money --
no need to explain.

...

Why yes, Mr Jethencorp, I understand your claim
that in truth "Jethencorp" is no part of your name
but our friendship, possessed of such perfection,
I had to construct some term of affection
for all I have known you just a little time.

...

As little as a minute? Yet I have such respect
I quite failed to notice my great neglect
in asking your name. So "Jethencorp"
I coined for you which somehow expressed
the complex emotions inside my chest—

in deference I leave the exact pronunciation to you.
And now, I regret, I must bid you adieu
and wander along to see what I can do
for the price of- but ah!
Who do I see at the end of the bar?

A man, he looks quite well-to-do...
Why? It's dear Mr Scratsenfrew,
allow me to introduce you...

Releasing a single!

Or rather Hallam London, my musical collaborator, is releasing our song To the Sky, which we dedicate to David Bowie because, as often the case, we didn't realise quite what we had until it was gone.

As usual Hallam wrote the music and I provided the lyrics.  He also got other friends and professionals to contribute, see the bandcamp page for full credits...

This is the song I wrote about last week, explaining its creation story (no radioactive animals were involved, somebody may have fallen to Earth) and also see here for the lyrics.

Anyway, please enjoy the song and if you feel inspired to contribute a small sum to this enterprise, please buy it (for as little as 1€; for American friends 1€ is roughly $1.15 at today's prices...)

Please also share this song promiscuously.  You remember how Andy Warhol promised everybody 15 minutes of fame in the future?  Well it's been the future for over 15 years now and my fame still hasn't arrived...

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