A real journal, a surreal book. Hidden for years - until now.

“and here he was, with his wings not yet built, and his mind in the air where they were destined to fly, and he looked at the world with a clearer understanding. And then immediately a greater confusion where that destiny was kept at bay by his life, and this conflict had a mind of its own. Predictably, he was excluded, with nothing but the music in his head and the notes just beyond his memory, so that he had many to look forward to, but none to look back on.

he walked on, driving the fear from himself, and making friends with his confusion, and wishing for rain that would never taste the same again.”

(12.02.97) 

“suddenly trees began to spring from the ground, growing from nothing, fed by nothing, eating up the earth. Green blocked the sky and fought with the blue and the sun became gentler but the winds began to cool. Flocks of birds filled the heavens in formations that crisscrossed every inch of the sky but they were warplanes, the birds of conflict, and the drone of their engines was deafening.”

“he shielded his eyes from a shocked orange sun and watched as the undercarriages opened, a synchronised disembowelling, and black birds rained from the sky, swooping down over the trees, their wings flapping with a confusion that looked like order. In their beaks each held a scrap of paper, a message, an epiphany. With great cries of freedom they dropped them upon the forest in great cooling showers of knowledge, of the greatest treasure known to humankind, of answers. As soon as they released one, they regurgitated another that appeared in their beaks to be dropped, and on and on they gave up what was inside them. In a second he understood. The birds were his thoughts, the messages his feelings. He ran joyously to receive them, gathered them into his arms like children, as more and more rained upon him. He took the first with the realisation that the wait was finally over…”

(16.07.97)

“he stepped off the deck and was engulfed by the water that tasted of no salt. He floated serenely on his back and felt the fish that were sharks sniff at his body, and escort him to the place in which he could not live and was the only home he would ever know. When he arrived at the shore he felt that he should pay the sharks something for their guidance and knew only a piece of his flesh would mean anything to them. He laughed at the sight of the predictability that might become his trademark, and offered them the only organ he had no use for, his heart.”

(08.08.97) 

“when she turned to look at the world, the quiet world here, he looked at her, knowing that in his silence he had done the right thing. He was pleased to see that she looked well, that she had blossomed, that she was happy. And the pain stabbed at his heart as it always does when he does the right thing, for to give means to remove from yourself; a glass half full here always means a glass half emptied somewhere else.”

(21.12.99)

“the music grew louder and louder, drowning out the shouting and the sounds of ecstasy, a crescendo rising to meet the stars under which they moved, the stars so old they could not understand this moment, or the reason for the madness, or the people who valued time so much because they had so little of it. 

“the walker felt the pumping rhythm, too fast to think about, the speed of the foetus heart before it slows in an attempt to make the moments last. He felt the beat pass from person to person, making it all a dream as he moved within the knowledge that this was real. The colours of the dream throbbed with the music, dancing in this place where the past said hello to the future, where the rules gave way to chance, and cynicism met hope.”

(05.01.2000)

“all above him and behind him and before him was movement and chaos, meaningless and irritating thought it was, and he wanted desperately to burrow down into the earth under the concrete, and cover himself with what was once his keenest phobia, and stay there, unfeeling, unfelt, unwanting, unwanted, content. 

“but he breathed still, feeling his chest move through no will of his own, and he looked into the light, and he knew he could not give up.”

(23.01.2002)