Solo/s

never mind me

twenty five years, and still far from home. One or two more 25s won’t do. I wonder if I should get off before I drift much farther. A 120 days ago I were reset for another lifetime, then again weeks ago, then again in 250 days. The destinations are becoming farther. The energy has worn out. And the girls man, pale. The liquor is dry. The smoke is heavy. No tolerance for tales. No mercy for the doomed. No remorse. No pity. Madness is outrageously disregarded, and our attempts ring mute among their bells. Which song to play next?

Sympathy for the Devil.

No.

Blues.

No.

Paranoid eyes?

No.

Sailing makes sense now, I’ve read about a month-long training programme to join a tall-ship crew for a year sailing along the shores of Scotland and southern seas. I wonder if one could get music on-board. How else can I put up with the anxiety?

There are no set playlists for this trip. No rules. You ride the tide. Fantastic. Blame the tide. All I needed throughout this journey was to be able to blame the tide. But no. I’d be blamed for riding it. And it’s true in a sense, at least in terms of physics. The shore is where the party is. Everyone who knows anything knows that. They know it. The girls know it. They’re chemically attracted to the sea, but they know once they give in - they’ve lost, they come at such arguments early in life — porn triggers these questions. You can’t win over the ocean. But you win over everything you left behind - all that’s pale, dry and heavy.

There are no set co-ordinates. I can’t recall a point of departure. Just today I was reminded of my birth which almost killed my mother, I was finally surgically evicted, my mother went on morphine and I went on probation. We met days later. There are fewer witnesses to that now since many of them have been long dead. At one point, all witnesses would be dead, morphine would still be around. No departure point, indeed.

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