tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-80598742024-03-12T23:44:29.064+00:00100 Black BoxesEach death is as different as people are different. Each is a story to be told.Alistair Gentryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12996097769000761139noreply@blogger.comBlogger100125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8059874.post-1095005871810374342004-09-12T16:17:00.000+00:002004-09-12T16:20:11.010+00:00100<div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family:lucida grande;">There was an old man called Michael Finnegan. Ourobouros. That's the word. Ourobouros, the snake that swallows its own tail. Between these shelves, between these books, between these words, I go round in circles. Swallowing myself. Imagine, swallowing yourself. A hit with the ladies, no mistake. But why would a man need a woman if he could swallow himself? The wind came round and blew them in again. Light's still a long way off and the library doesn't even open till nine. Thoughts going round but they can't get out. Thoughts in circles. Ourobouros. Poor old Michael Finnegan. <a href="http://100blackboxes.blogspot.com/2004/08/001.html">Begin again</a>.</span></div>Alistair Gentryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12996097769000761139noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8059874.post-1095005812705449412004-09-12T16:16:00.000+00:002004-09-12T16:16:52.706+00:00099<div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: lucida grande;">Ninety-nine. Twenty-two, he was, from the local paper. I had a war, six dead brothers, influenza and an abortion to my name by twenty-two. He said To what do you attribute your longevity? Very good grammar, most unusual in a boy so young. I said it's probably all the cocaine I took in the Twenties. They won't print that. They've all gone home. I never liked cake. That's what I should have said. I chalked up ninety-nine because I never liked cake. I made cake every year for James. Sixty-six cakes. No more children to outlive. Ninety-nine. Time for bed.</span></div> Alistair Gentryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12996097769000761139noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8059874.post-1095005683668252212004-09-12T16:14:00.000+00:002004-09-12T16:14:43.666+00:00098<div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: lucida grande;">I admit perhaps to physical unmanliness. Some people even deemed me mental. If that is what they think, that is what they must think regardless. My own thoughts have been a permanent friend to me over the years and helped me not to regret my ignorance of life and how people are supposed to live in it. The person who is born introverted has such a tiny impact on events and why I was even born into the pod of the world's green peas, I will never guess. I was slapped the very moment I came out into the world.</span></div> Alistair Gentryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12996097769000761139noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8059874.post-1095005603143159942004-09-12T16:13:00.000+00:002004-09-12T16:13:23.143+00:00097<div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: lucida grande;">A burglar mid-crime on the telly. Making a collage from the catalogue. The smell of glue. He tiptoes up. I see him reflected in the screen, but I let him put ice cream down my shirt anyway. The telly flutters, vertical hold gone so the image rolls. Revenge for stealing that bad poem from his typewriter, his primary school effort. But I devoured his every rhyme, only put it back- with the speed of a synonym- when I heard him come in. I put it back upside down. Never thought I'd ever dream of happy and wake up into it.</span></div> Alistair Gentryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12996097769000761139noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8059874.post-1095005563299291592004-09-12T16:12:00.000+00:002004-09-12T16:12:43.300+00:00096<div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: lucida grande;">Another day, another town. Another load of fat smug faces you'd as soon punch as look at. Hello, how are you, nice to meet you, we mean you no harm; we bring only electronic novelties for your young, can I interest you in a load of old crap? When you're new in a strange town you never see the things you'd want to see, and you get to see all kinds of things that you don't. All the slappers and junkies, unloved and unlovely. Madam I am drunk and you are ugly but in the morning I will be sober.</span></div> Alistair Gentryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12996097769000761139noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8059874.post-1095005476124405202004-09-12T16:11:00.001+00:002004-09-12T16:15:53.546+00:00094<div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family:lucida grande;">All because of a tumour so small it's almost impossible to visualise, in my heart, and because it broke loose. Nothing anybody could do. Now there's small parts of it all over me. And they keep growing. Dad had it, too. Men are usually reptiles when it comes to expressing their emotions. The back of the brain is the oldest part. It deals with the most basic ways of responding to things. Like an angry crocodile lashing out when it's attacked. He lashed out. Women are more like monkeys. They sit down and have a little chat about it. Yes.</span></div>Alistair Gentryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12996097769000761139noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8059874.post-1095005514120557582004-09-12T16:11:00.000+00:002004-09-12T16:11:54.120+00:00095<div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: lucida grande;">He told me he liked all those kinds of things. Wanking off winos and tramps. I don't really understand it myself, the dirtier the better almost. The boys, the clean boys, you might be able to understand, but those filthy old bastards, I don't know. At least there was a purpose in what I did, in such a way though a person goes through so much, no… because a person goes through so much it's possible that a person has to be, what you would call anaesthesia. That's a word from a crossword puzzle. Anaesthesia. How do you spell that?</span></div> Alistair Gentryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12996097769000761139noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8059874.post-1095005431126875982004-09-12T16:10:00.000+00:002004-09-12T16:10:31.126+00:00093<div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: lucida grande;">Could have been a great lover, but never had chance because nobody ever threw themselves at my feet. Nobody ever made it easy. I was a clever lad, maybe could have been a teacher. But the seats in the library was too hard and I always thought I knew best. When I was young I always said I'd have myself done away with if I turned into a cripple or something. I say have myself done away with. Never said I'd do myself away. Now I wish I could. Too late, 'cause choice has gone the same way as opportunity.</span></div> Alistair Gentryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12996097769000761139noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8059874.post-1095005378902429332004-09-12T16:09:00.000+00:002004-09-12T16:09:38.903+00:00092<div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: lucida grande;">Trois Gymnopédies. Lent et douloureux. Erik Satie, about 1890 I think. Somebody in the building plays it so well, note perfect, but it's transformed into something more elegant still- delicate as blue skies in summer- by the corridors and stairwells between us. The discreet touch of a stranger's fingertips to ivory. Fluid, unresolved, and the last note hangs for a few perfect seconds before the player returns to the start and the delicate bass chords begin again. Perhaps they're practising piano. Perhaps it's just someone's CD, running unattended, unheeded, unheard. It doesn't matter. Blue skies. Dada dada da dadada da.</span></div> Alistair Gentryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12996097769000761139noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8059874.post-1095005333401780162004-09-12T16:07:00.000+00:002004-09-12T16:08:53.400+00:00091<div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: lucida grande;">Sex. I remember sex. I know what's really going on. She's just not attracted to me anymore. I've been dispensed with. She's got what she needs from me. Now Toby's first, second and third. All I am is a very crappy fourth on her list of what's important now. And there's all that bollocks about she doesn't even know if she's attracted to herself anymore, she still feels like such a fat pig, well not to me. Anyway she's still my pig, and Toby's my son, my beautiful son and she's my beautiful wife. Watch where you're going, you fucking-</span></div> Alistair Gentryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12996097769000761139noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8059874.post-1095005215031562992004-09-12T16:06:00.000+00:002004-09-12T16:06:55.030+00:00090<div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: lucida grande;">When we play monsters and Mummy catches me, she never kills me, she only tickles me. Johnnie says play like a boy, not some girl. You want to grow up right, don't you, don't want to grow up a puff like your dad, do you? When we play monsters I sometimes let Mummy catch me because she tickles me where it tickles and not where it doesn't tickle. I don't want to play monsters with Johnnie, but Johnnie wants to play monsters with me. I want to play monsters with my real dad. Cause Johnnie hurts when he catches you.</span></div> Alistair Gentryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12996097769000761139noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8059874.post-1095005117061929822004-09-12T16:04:00.000+00:002004-09-12T16:05:17.060+00:00089<div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: lucida grande;">The copper says Can I ask you if you've been taking drugs, sir? I can't stop laughing, I say Who isn't on drugs? The other copper says Step out of the car, sir? I put my foot down and I kind of feel the copper's foot under the tires and hear him shout Fucking nigger drove over my fucking foot. They only stopped me because I'm a nice black man with a nice black car and I'm a handsome bastard with the right kind of hetero patois for hooking the honeys and those racist arsehole pigs can't stand it. Tree.</span></div> Alistair Gentryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12996097769000761139noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8059874.post-1095004905465851372004-09-12T16:01:00.000+00:002004-09-12T16:01:45.466+00:00088<div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: lucida grande;">I bet every father thinks their daughter is the most beautiful girl in the world. But it's true. The trouble is, I've never told her. I've never said, Lucy, one last thing: I want to tell you how beautiful you are and that you've the greatest heart of anyone I've ever met, and you won't always get what you deserve but I know you will make people as happy as you have made me in the twenty-five years it has been my honour to know you. I have never said that. Because I never even realised it until just now.</span></div> Alistair Gentryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12996097769000761139noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8059874.post-1094646559787529792004-09-08T13:28:00.000+00:002004-09-12T16:00:34.976+00:00087<div style="text-align: justify; font-family: lucida grande;">That's the thing about security. In the end you forget whether you meant to lock yourself in, or everybody else out. When Laurence is away I sometimes think there are prowlers on the security monitor. But when I check the tapes later, there's never anybody there. He's my security, I suppose. We'll both be fifty soon and I need him more than ever. He'll say: You menopausal old cow. I go checking all the locks on the ground floor. There's a shadow by the pool. It exhales cigarette smoke and points. I'm not alone here. My husband's upstairs. I'll scream.</div>Alistair Gentryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12996097769000761139noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8059874.post-1094218970360219802004-09-03T13:42:00.000+00:002004-09-03T13:42:50.360+00:00086<div style="text-align: justify; font-family: lucida grande;">I feel like I've got Tourette's syndrome. All I can do is spit and swear and scream. I'm a hearse bandit, wanting the end, looking backwards and forwards in anger. Anger rubs out my own mistakes and where they've got me. A toilet's flushing. Somehow a flushing toilet is the appropriate sound for this moment. Fact's hard to get at in a life like mine. I've made sure of it. They'll have me cremated. A stake through my heart and my ashes in the reservoir. Nobody wants to take any chances. Nobody wants me now. Nobody wants me coming back.</div> Alistair Gentryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12996097769000761139noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8059874.post-1094218931173735582004-09-03T13:41:00.000+00:002004-09-03T13:42:11.173+00:00085<div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: lucida grande;">This place is disgusting. Freezing cold, dank, scrawl on the walls. Dark grey walls and the smell of men. What do they call it? Battleship grey. Maybe I'm too ambitious to have morals. Very convenient, is what she'd say. I could still go to university or something. It would be good to help people instead of just using them. But I have to use them to get where I want to go, for now. Myself in the mirror, acne gone, ribs gone. There's nothing wrong with pushing yourself. I imagine each rep crushes her and all the shit she said.</span></div> Alistair Gentryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12996097769000761139noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8059874.post-1094218876792962172004-09-03T13:40:00.000+00:002004-09-03T13:41:16.793+00:00084<div style="text-align: justify; font-family: lucida grande;">Yeah? Come on then. Come on then. Fuck. Fuck off, that hurt. You're dead, fucker. Come on. You're dead. Fuckin kill you. Come here, I'll fuckin kill you. Gonna kill you. Yeah, you think I won't. Think I'm some kind of poof, do ya, think I'll do nowt about it? You're all mouth. Think you can talk to me like that and I'll do nowt about it. Fuckin show ya. I'm not taking that from youse, ya stupid little fucker youse. You've been waiting haven't ya, waiting to have a go. Have a go, then. Come on. You're dead, fucker.</div> Alistair Gentryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12996097769000761139noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8059874.post-1094218814977574842004-09-03T13:39:00.001+00:002004-09-03T13:40:14.976+00:00083<div style="text-align: justify; font-family: lucida grande;">Peter's gone. I'm positive now. Past scatterbrained, past confused, past senile, even. He screams whenever I turn out the light. He tries to drink from the cup but his hands are shaking and more sloshes onto his cardigan than into his mouth. I say his name, four or five times. Finally he looks at me, but I think it's my tone that does it, not his name. I watch carefully but he doesn't seem to feel the hot tea pouring into his lap. There's all kinds of ways to die out of this world. I'll not go like you, Peter.</div> Alistair Gentryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12996097769000761139noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8059874.post-1094218772396077052004-09-03T13:39:00.000+00:002004-09-03T13:39:32.396+00:00082<div style="text-align: justify; font-family: lucida grande;">Miranda sits by me, stands by me, lays beside me. I hate the way people smell when they've been sick. She hardly even flinched when I puked down her dress. Knelt beside me all night as I heaved over the toilet. Now I will her to sleep, bequeath her my share. It's no use to me. Lying in the dark, I concentrate on my hands instead. Pretend the cramps and pain are resting in the palms of my hands. If I just close my fist around them, if I just grab them and hold them, I know I'll be OK.</div> Alistair Gentryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12996097769000761139noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8059874.post-1094218727191646402004-09-03T13:37:00.000+00:002004-09-03T13:38:47.190+00:00081<div style="text-align: justify; font-family: lucida grande;">They make me sit down and eat more food than I'd normally eat in a whole day. They still expect me to get myself up in sari and bindi, a costume really, it means nothing to me at all. Makes me feel so guilty, even more English than normal. Auntie puts on some Hindi film music and asks me to dance for her. I feel about five again. I dance for Auntie in my weird, English, trying not to be too sexy way. It always makes her throw back her head and laugh so I see all her terrible teeth.</div> Alistair Gentryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12996097769000761139noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8059874.post-1094040254034869032004-09-01T12:03:00.000+00:002004-09-01T12:04:14.033+00:00080<div style="text-align: justify; font-family: lucida grande;">I wake up again and this time it hardly even worries me that I'm pinned here, upside down almost. I cried my eyes out, I cried for what I'd guess were hours after it happened, but I couldn't believe what happened to Dan as he died. The lines on his face seemed to just melt away, the look of pain dissolved. Now it's actually getting boring. The sun's coming up, I think. Haven't heard a car all night. A single bird sings, very far away. Later, a sparrow perches in the smashed window. He cocks his head, trying to understand.</div> Alistair Gentryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12996097769000761139noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8059874.post-1094040203855333202004-09-01T12:02:00.000+00:002004-09-01T12:03:23.856+00:00079<div style="text-align: justify; font-family: lucida grande;">I pop a couple as soon as I get there, saying I have to piss after the long drive. I find I can almost entirely put up with Maggie's whining, oppressive, negative attitude. What happens when we get together's as predictable- and vicious- as a cockfight. She should have worked for the KGB. She can twist anything, that woman. Anything you say is ammunition, with our own children as human shields. The Saddam Hussein of the Home Counties. Jack's hammering on the door. Daddy, are you on the toilet again? These things work as well as advertised, though. Maybe better.</div> Alistair Gentryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12996097769000761139noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8059874.post-1094040149026341322004-09-01T11:59:00.000+00:002004-09-01T12:02:29.026+00:00078I'm so tired, he says, and I say Well aren't we all? You're nothing special. He laughs, frowns. Not sure what I'm saying. He's got this knackered digital watch from Japan, from when he taught English in Fukuoka. Sometimes it just starts talking and goes on for hours, jabbering at random. It's polite as well. When it's finished with the digital diarrhoea it says Sank You VELLY much, in that irritating Japanese girl-woman helium voice. His arm slips from my shoulder and we both turn our faces to the thin strip of blue between buildings and some woman screams.Alistair Gentryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12996097769000761139noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8059874.post-1094039967015168112004-09-01T11:58:00.000+00:002004-09-01T11:59:27.016+00:00077<div style="text-align: justify; font-family: lucida grande;">The blinds are drawn and the heaters flutter like our daughter's heartbeat. The only other noise is Kim's elephant walk, her pregnant patrol across the tiles. This is the silence I forget myself in. Forget that I exist, or I won't much longer. No need to rehash what we would have done with our futures, futures that are now just black jokes, pure speculation. I feel like one of those cultists, waiting to be spirited off to some UFO, leaving Kim to attend to business on the planet. Kim. And the belly that- for now- stands in for our daughter.</div> Alistair Gentryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12996097769000761139noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8059874.post-1094039879422902962004-09-01T11:56:00.000+00:002004-09-01T11:57:59.423+00:00076<div style="text-align: justify; font-family: lucida grande;">Eyeliner pasted on thick like glue. Bruised eyeshadow, brown, yellow, purple. Tried to lipstick a smile over a grimace. It didn't work. Used to be so beautiful, oh and I knew it, I knew it. It's all gone now, and the people who were drawn by it. I'm broken. But still everything just happens, life goes on after beauty stops, God knows how or why. They'd need a crane to lift this face. A moment of temper and seven years bad luck. The pills take control of me. I'll sweep up the pieces of my shattered face in the morning.</div> Alistair Gentryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12996097769000761139noreply@blogger.com