not much (9/Sept/18)

I didn’t sleep last night
well, not much anyway
a little I suppose, an hour then another
and a few more here and there, but
not that much
I don’t know how I make it through each restless day without the sleep I should have slept
but I do, I suppose, in a kind of twisted way
I limp and lope and clamber through
while all the time awake, though
not exactly firing on all cogs, or grinding on the rust
not much
which I must say try their best to keep me upright on my feet, except
when I’m lying down as I do at least the once
or when I get the chance or make the chance or conjure it from dust,
that unrelenting dust that one day you clean away and the next is back again in a frustrating déjà vu, but
there are moments in such days, when
I feel a certain haze, reminiscent
of a daze skimming over me with a “maybe I should sleep” vibe, and yes
I want to sleep, would like to sleep, but
with mind and body not in sync it only makes me think that it will come and then it doesn’t,
so predictable, so written in a blink that I should better know by now
then it passes, urge relents and once again I’m not asleep, but
not without a sense of loss as now I have to wait for bedtime, time for bed and all,
in the hope that yes tonight, tonight will be
a chance to sleep
more than just
not much…

© 2018 robert greig

bedscape (26/August/18)

I’m making mountains in my duvet… bedscapes in which to escape… time away from the rotting decay… out there, there, beyond the folds, this quiet space, this quiet time, this pretence of safety and sanity, where a dabble of delusion never hurts before the daily flood begins anew, the streaming bile of stagnancy, absurdity, stupidity… it’s there, always there… roll up, roll up as ignorance does somersaults headlong into the finest cup of scorn shaken and then stirred with some over-processed  spite and a shot or two of over-cooked contempt… to a feast of pain and people blind to everything but that which directly concerns them… usually no further than their doormat, or their noses, or their ability to remember anything beyond yesterday or the latest tabloid feckless headline or the last but one Tweet they spied before a million more brought another avalanche of trivial banality, distracting pettifoggery, puerile mentality… welcome to the trashy, tawdry, tokenistic and the testimony of many a-writer of one-time fantasy or sci-fi now bearing real fruit but not the kind you’d want to even touch their poison skin or eat their toxic seed… perhaps I could boil them within an inch of their integrity in smotherings of vinegar then seal them in jars to store on a shelf in the darkest recesses of a rarely-opened kitchen cupboard  behind last years and the years before and the decades before that chutneys and preserves long forgotten, and don’t forget to label them in ink that surely fades before you ever find them again…… I’ll have to get up soon, it’s raining… perhaps that’s really all there is to say and all else is moot, wouldn’t have saved a lot of words, and time, so here is my alternative blog of the day…

…… it’s raining… the end.

© 2018 robert greig

half-asleep attentions (25/August/18)

as slowly as I fell asleep words crept furtive fleet of feet to the sound, to the sound, to the sound of the rain, a rain descending restless, coming and going, coming and going, coming and going in fits and starts, stops and measures measuring each outburst with random-like precision… I sit up, listen, wait… then comes another to the sound, to the sound, to the sound of rain and the sound of rain means one thing only, it’s raining… the obvious is always very obvious as that’s the nature of the beast and rain, for one, will not be distracted by the half-asleep attentions of one who should be fastly sleeping soundly instead of listening, listening, listening to the sound, the sound, the sound of rain a rain that doesn’t covet my attention or even indeed yours, it’s not a narcissistic leader of some petty State, nor a bully wielding fists and fear and weak intimidation, nor feels the need to shout the loudest nor even craves my affirmation it just is the is it is and does the does it does, no motive nor no favour, no intent malign no self-inclined while merely just three weeks ago the night enthused a warmth so warm as sleep became a struggle now just three weeks a mere three weeks a change is one the way as single figures in the Celsius make sleep again a pleasure not a chore to the sound, to the sound, to the sound of the rain, to the sound, to the sound, to the sound of the autumn born of summer kindles winter in its reign……

© 2018 robert greig