Back to index of Nerve 9 - Autumn 2006

Short Stories and Poetry

Edited by Ade Jackson
All submissons by e-mail to: backtothemachinegun@hotmail.com

"Capital of Cultures" by Colin Watts

The culture of capital's come here to save us;
the great and the good and the movers and shakers.
Accountants, consultants, artistic stock-takers.
Butchers and bakers and candlestick makers.

Creative industries with hordes of directors.
Shareholders, stakeholders, outside investors.
Risky assessors, unhealthy inspectors.
Bucks to be made in all cultural sectors.

Ten Paddy's bars, chock-full of sham rockers.
Twenty-six Caverns and six Jacarandas.
Sing-along Lennons and look-alike Mackas.
Philandering dandies taking back-handers.

There'll be sushi and tapas and pina coladas,
hundreds of lagers and Tikka Masalas,
whiners in diners and pizzas in parlours.
Bizzies in pin-stripes will be lined up to guard us.

Lads chilling out with their hands down their trousers,
girls out in town in their slippers and 'jamas.
Rooneys and Gerrards on all the street corners,
Mathew Street swarming with wannabe Scousers.

We've mislaid a Grace and tramways elude us,
the buses left Paradise: 'freeze out the boozers'.
But we've yellow subs, Quackers and super-lamb 'nanas
and Gerry's still there on the ferries to charm us.

The Bistro's got luvvies and keen open-mikers,
the Casa is safe in the hands of the dockers.
Karl Marx guards the Swan with its juke-box and bikers.
The Revolution is here (with ten different vodkas).

We've got singers and sculptors and poets and painters,
a sub-counter culture that will surely sustain us,
when the spin has unspun and it's all small potaters
and we're shot of the freeloaders and 2008ers.

"Ghost and Vision" by Adam Baird

Saw a cat with a burnt face,
Lazing in the sun;

I went and got my gun.

When I came back
the cat was gone;

I shot myself

and laid out in the sun

"I’m the refugee in Europe" by Ahmed Awes (Translated by Mahdi Hussain)

Sentenced by time to leave family and land,
some of us meet our death on the sea.
And those who arrive, their fate is to be refused
by their destination.
I’m the refugee in Europe.

The solicitor told me: “Prepare
three reasons for an appeal.”
A blind person browsing a magazine,
a deaf man listening to the news
A speechless person singing at a party.
“£2,000 for me and leave the decision for the court.”
I’m the refugee in Europe.

The box is my mattress, my shoes my pillow,
and London frost my blanket,
If I find some lunch at all
I’ll be lucky to find any dinner.
I’m the refugee in Europe.

I knocked at the door of countless organisations,
“We cannot help you,” they said.
My name becomes a tool for the television,
the papers, the Parliamentary elections:
the refugee in Europe.

I do understand. I am not an animal.

I fight a war without fire
Not with weapons like the Germans' war,
like splitting up the Soviet Union by America
an angry war, a cold war,
Call it whatever you will
By law, I’m not allowed to work,
How can I live, what’s the solution?
I’m the refugee in Europe.

The UN symbol is the white dove,
And my symbol is eyes lined with blood,
I’m the refugee in Europe.

I laugh, I joke and play
You see me smile but it is a lie
Inside me is a furious sea,
Inside me is a flaming volcano,
I’m the refugee in Europe.

The law guarantees the animal rights,
And I sleep feeling cold and hungry,
Oh human being! Where is the humanity?
This is injustice, this is absolutism
Oh refugee! Don’t cry, don’t be sad,
God doesn’t accept this injustice at all,
I’m the refugee in Europe.

Ahmed is part of 'Connecting Cultures'-Refugee Artists Collective, managed by SOLA ARTS

"Broaden your Horizons" by John Owen

I took a ride today to broaden my mind
But I spread it too thin what was left
I’m out of most of the time
Educated in vices not virtues
I’ll pay my due to experience and fashion

Once when younger than now the world
The globe the big circular football we
Kicked about in the geography lesson
Just to wind the strait laced teacher up
It seemed such a beautiful and divine creation
Crafted by another’s hand
But it was somebody else’s oyster
Not in my hand Columbus had carved
A hippie trail and we the tourists pick up the pieces.

Life has not been sweet or a gift – it had
To be fought for - sweated and grunted over
From day one to the last breath in
Our old heart pump - nobody knows the
Reason why - we just know it when we die
Too late but only the good die young
Mostly still born abortions men without
Names - whose mothers miss them more
Than their living sons and daughters

Broaden my horizons - this I did and I have
Only a map smaller than a stamp in my
Head - the place is the same each time I
Go there in my dreams I travel light. No passport
Required just a free mind.

"Ladders" by Alicia Estaban

It had taken her a long time to come up with the idea that would once again make her famous. She'd put an advert in a national paper two days before inviting people to come and witness a one-act performance by herself, the once famous Dora Night. The performance was to take place outside a local theatre the following Saturday at midday. It was Saturday today, and as Dora applied the last touches of make-up she gazed at the dress spread out on the bed. Whenever she tried it on she'd see herself in the middle of a spot-light, in the middle of a darkened stage in a packed-out theatre. There would be 30 seconds of total silence, followed by a roar of applauding that would make the stage rattle. This was the dress that she'd worn on that night and this was the dress that she'd wear today on her come-back. The dress was a bit tight, a bit worn and a bit stained but it was still perfect.

As she looked down at the crowd below her queuing outside the theatre she smiled. She still had her fan base! It was five past twelve. The crowd was becoming impatient, she could tell. It was starting to drizzle. Now was the time. Dora Night opened her mouth and started to sing. Her voice came out croaky, she hadn't sung for six years, but she was glad that it still carried very well. A few members of the crowd looked up, puzzled. Half way through the piece, Dora Night had captured the entire crowd. She could sense (not see, for she always sung with her eyes closed) that all eyes were on her. The piece ended and there was silence. With that, she bowed and jumped off the building before the audience had a chance to clap, and as she did her dress billowed out around her making her look like an upside down umbrella and the tights that she had on were all laddered and the skin that showed through was grey with grime.

"Deep And Holy Pockets" by Sam B. Gill

Stop me in the street with your tins,
your bronze or mine?
You dress up fancy for a volunteer.
Sharp cast-offs, frayed trousers, red bibs like soccer urchins on the practice pitch, about to roll away in their flash cars.
Drive me across the street.
Chant for peace, save the manimals, world wildfire fund, shave the whale and feed the fourth dimension, worry and worriers sign on the line. New this week, direct debit away your guilt. I love to stain your sheets but I am my own charity. I'd like to take you home, give you a bath, but my roof is leaking excuses…

So I suck in the shop window, lollipops and steeped up prices. Step inside, a sofa and the newspapers left, you've changed or me, shorter and shorter with age. Attract more custom, more apologies, a mass huddle under musty bookcases, cherry pick the classics and take a few home with me, easy with a glass of wine, almost revolutionary.

Wake in the morning and know I'll fell the forest flying far to foreign lands. I know I cast chemical trances on fish, rivers winding worldwide with toilet demands and spoiled beach sand, I know I sew the labels on the sore red hands of labourers under masterplans, record prophets in their Jacuzzis. I'd boil the water if I could, but you've put out my fire, made me resent the hearth. Open arms, blanket sadness and a thousand mournful charity records. I fucking hate charity records, change it, change it. Where is the B-side, I am my own charity, don't feel sorry feel glad feel free. Get out of bed with your guilt and live your life in the pocket you fell into, comfortable, holy or otherwise yourself.