Politburo Files

So I am in a museum cafe and my enthusiastic interlocutor tells me I am a bright young thing, that I could be something in the world of letters and I almost believe him as he tells me that he comes from a family butchers and knows what's what. Ah, my naiveté.

At the time, I have not even heard of Westminster School. Oh, Hampstead.

Ramadan

...and the accompanying book, it turns out, is 2666, and the accompanying drudgery is a translation on natural phenomena- winds, today, hamsin and the like.

Let's do this properly

Rory says when he realizes they need to burn the body of the Doctor. Properly, of course, is to put the body in a boat, set it alight, and let it float on the lake. Doctor who IS the Englishman's prayerbook. Nuff said.

My Blue Headscarf

The blue headscarf I was wearing that day has grown purplish in places, the places that come right above my forehead, the places that are exposed to the sun at the perfect angle.
Three years, I've had of it.

England, my England!

Returning from a dinner in Eton where my host did different accents at the table, including several shades of posh, I get off at the train station in Reading and start walking to my friend's place. A Russel Brand type of English guy approaches me and says 'I know this sounds very strange but do you have 60 p?' I smile, and when he realizes I won't pay up he starts 'Fucking...' and stops to consider, possibly, to go for a racial one and then thinking better of it '...bitch!' he says. All is well with the world.

English Words

Oh daughters of Jerusalem,

Give me today

My daily split infinitive

That I may speak about over

Dark coffee, sitting at dark benches

Hall-style

Oh daughters of Jerusalem

Give me today

My heavy expletive

That I may chuckle head tilted back

And brush it off with a hand gesture

Cutting through the thick fog of

Derision

Oh daughters of Jerusalem

Give me a moment or a lifetime

Of your speeches and soliloquies

as I listen and watch, through a glass,

darkly.