(SR) L’Intermidi II: THE SAGA OF THE YOUNG KURT COBAIN – BLEACH
For Emily
They usually go through childhood thinking they’re special. Its partly instinctual & maybe they’ve been told by their parents or teachers that theyre special, maybe they’re put in a gifted children overachieve class in a grade school. For whatever reason they end up molding into a person aware of their abilities & not understanding them & having bloated egos caused by society’s insistence that those with an overly functional insight should be prais’d & consider’d on a higher level.
Kurt Cobain
L’Intermidi II
THE SAGA OF THE YOUNG KURT COBAIN: Bleach
I like to write poetry
I like to ignore other people’s poetry
Kurt Cobain
The stars returning to the very spot
They shone, align’d in astral jamboree
When Kurt left Earth – Muse! free the cosmic knot
That binds past lives, release, thro’ alchemy,
In me, a poet stirring up his pot
Of mimesi, to shake those visions free
That clammy, from the vortex, ruffle forth,
To verse-conversing Ollamhs of the North.
Of copious mind-gifts, the Sonneteer
Presents, to us, an art most magical,
In which the fleshspots of the past appear,
As powerful as if them Biblical;
Vividly breathing, moving & sincere,
So much, such proves a lucid miracle,
As live again, unbent from history,
The best of those who’d mark posterity.
Where left, we, Kurt? Alone in muddy streets,
Barely alive, halfway to thirty,
In pockets copies of ‘Perfume’ & Keats
He passes by houses; ramshack, dirty –
A time to triumph tear out from defeats
To funny be, & foxy, & flirty,
& with a brash electric in his hand,
Light up the world, & front a famous band.
Led on his back Kurt look‘d up to the skies
& felt the sun’s transparency thro’ lids
Clos’d by teenage tears; ‘cross x-ray eyes
Microscopic plankton & arachnids
Danc’d to a tune he‘d started to devise,
Some melody to elevate the kids
From ill-starr‘d debates of negative things
To music & moshing & geetah strings!
On Aberdeen God seem’d to piss each day
With seven foot of rainfall ev’ry year,
A dungeon always overcast & grey,
Place pitiless with nothing nice to cheer,
America’s unwanted stowaway
Whose dwellers drown in dreariness & beer;
Nothing much comes in, hardly anything
Goes out – a lonely gull with wounded wing!
O! Rock & Roll! What force hast thou become?
No more about the music, but the hair,
The 80s saw a dirge of big bass drum,
Divided by an ever-steady snare,
& basslines like a harvest tractor’s hum,
As guitar licks slash razors thro’ the air,
But stagnant as abandon’d billabong,
With riffage pretty much the same each song!
Kurt sits & stares atop the shining seas,
To Tokyo, Kamchatka, over there
Somewhere; his soul, he sens’d, was Socrates,
This portion of Pacific his new share
Of Planet Earth – behind him giant trees
Form‘d his own estate, continuous store xx
Of unspoil’d air to keep his mind alive,
While winter’s sharpest trials he’d survive!
Most days he’d drifted to the timberland,
To dream himself a Catcher in the Rye;
Down dim-lit streets, by oceanic strand,
Crept into basements, slept ‘neath open sky,
A kid unwanted, clearly, out of hand,
Whom, in his darkest moments, just to cry,
Would sneak a night in that same hospital
His life began, & all his damn trouble!
‘Neath Young Street Bridge, one special, dreary day,
As the period of a pendulum
Began, in doleful rains, to drift away
From lowest ebb, t’wards joyous fate to come;
Kurt first time sings his ‘Something in the Way’
A string had snapped, but an internal drum
Still kept the beat, while forlorn droned, in tune,
This bridge-bat caterwauling to the moon.
The mysterious manna from Heaven
Which, thro’ our art, moves us, & consumes us
Drives us helpless, blindly, as obsession
Uses, confuses us & illumes us;
Remnants of ectoplasmic possession
Oozes thro’ juvenilia, dooms us
In dedication to a waste of life –
Or not, for Art is Art & Art is Life!
As felt, Kurt, bless’d with femininity,
He gravitates to the gay kid in town
Shared Myer Loftin’s notoriety
“Fuckin’ faggots!” “Cover your butts!” “Don’t bend down!”
But, revelling in non-conformity,
Wearing, proudly, an anti-redneck crown,
Kurt phantasised on fucking men in sweat,
But not in Aberdeen, no, not just yet.
One morning Kurt awoke & hop’d to speak
The words of birds, who in a hellsome rage
Disturb’d the earth with truth, ‘I’m not a freak,
Kurt thought, ‘just a grasshopper in a cage!
But, let me loose in the long grass to seek
Likeminded types to swipe this dusty age
From crap, & grate with noises too clean ears…’
Such visions thrill’d as, to his fate, time steers.
Punk music pierces the parking lot of
Montesano’s only grocery store,
Where grizzleback Melvins shunt, grind & shove
Young tastes away from poppycocks that bore
Inanity in brains – Kurt fell in love,
Thinking, ‘god, this is what I’m looking for!’
Becomes, at once, their captain superfan
Paints posters, roadies, even drove the van!
A punk was born, completely appetis‘d
For spiritmorph, who slicks & spike-backs hair,
Joins with the ‘Supercool Disenfranchise’d
Society,’ at which rough Rednecks stare
With shock, disgust & horror – just despis’d!
Responding, Kurt daubs spraypaint ev’rywhere,
“Forever Punk” on posters, walls & cars,
Less graffiti – more great artist’s memoirs.
O! Irony of ironies, Kurt got
The job of janitor at his old school
A place, it seems, where all his dreams now rot,
But overalls he thought were kinda cool
One day, imagining perfect film shot,
For a video, this gym vestibule
Fill’d with a pep rally, which round his band
Whips up a phrenzied, mosh-pit Dixieland.
Unable punk to buy in Aberdeen
He’d have to make his own, with amp’s ten watts
Full power straining, screams for Halloween
Gnashing a prototune called ‘Papercuts’,
Then slumps exhausted, all a-sweat, serene,
After the blast – he felt it in his guts,
With just three chords he could have, after all
Something to contribute to rock & roll.
Aunt Mari had a four-track, now & then
Kurt puts songs down, percussion wooden spoons
Upon an empty suitcase; denizen
Of low distorted holes, guttural croons
Evolving somewhere into something ‘zen,’
That once or twice resemble actual tunes
& now, with ‘Fecal Matter’, he’d record
A formal demo, t’where his soul outpour’d.
That demo did the rounds of Aberdeen,
‘Illiteracy Will Prevail,’ its name,
Bloodcurdling gusto agitating spleen
& perfect grounds to hurt, to hate, to blame,
On one song Krist Novoselich grew keen
& made the call, the birth of all his fame;
“Hey Kurt, it’s Krist!” “Hey, man”, “I’ve listen’d to
Your tape, I’m really loving that ‘Spank Thru.’
Some summon kindred spirits in their dreams,
Handfuls will get to meet them in the flesh,
As Krist did Kurt, vice versa, sharing schemes,
A sense of humour, cigs, & tastes that mesh –
Six foot seven, head banging on the beams,
& five foot 9 (taller than Bangladesh
Still,) they look’d an odd-ball couple, but held
A universe between them, in the meld.
“JESUSFUCKINGCHRISTALMIGHTY !” what roar
From Kurt erupted, flicking thro‘ vinyl,
“Krist! What the fuck! Whatcha owning these for?
The Eagles, Carpenters, Yes, & Lionel
Richie! Wow! Joni Mitchel’s a puss-faced whore!
They’ve all got to go, man, & that‘s final!”
Krist laughs, then chucks the lot in next door’s skip,
Cause dedicate, & definitely hip.
When Kurt departs Krist’s mum was all a rage
“Son, this new friend of yours is pure white trash,
Don’t like his vibes at all, it’s just a stage
You’re going thro’, it’ll pass in a flash…”
“But ma!” “But nothing… son, please don’t engage
With him anymore, shave off that moustache
Too, you look ridiculous, doncha think…”
Then left to drown her anger with a drink.
Exciting when first a band rehearses
Experimental stuffage toss’d at walls,
To see what sticks, something real emerges,
Beginning what the grinning critic calls
Embryonic, neolithic cursus
Of style – Kurt vomits words like Niagara Falls,
Turn’d anti-establishment anarchist
Who’ll rage against the world with open fist!
Thinking that country rock could go down well
In Aberdeen, & pay them well, they oughta
Learn some classic covers, found they gel
Best doing songs of Credence Clearwater
Krist took the geetah, Kurt took the cowbell,
& for a fresh accoutrement, bought a
Bass for Stevie Newman, off a school friend,
Away they roar’d, less band more ‘let’s pretend!’
Next drops their own apartment, with its chores
Its bills & rent – those feudal overheads,
So scores some low job, Kurt, at Ocean Shores,
A handyman with several tool sheds,
But all he did was open hotel doors
With passkeys on a hunt for empty beds
To catch up on his sleep after a night
Of jamming… jamming til the dawn of light!
The very day Kurt got his own wee place,
With happy heart his artistry extols
Sets dark macabre crawling ev’ry space,
A gallery of quarter’d, hung-drawn dolls,
Paintings of death, deformity, disgrace,
& multitudes of scarr’d, scour’d gangster molls
All fix’d like targets, in a votive mix
Of offerings to Punk’s Imperatrix!
It was the fifth rehearsal, sixth, perhaps,
When Kurt & Stevie drank themselves insane,
& came to blows, fought first like playground saps,
Then ante upp’d, Steve wriggles to obtain
A vacuum cleaner, brandishing with slaps,
While Kurt, with two by four, bash’d Stevie’s brain –
It hardly took no time to understand
As faded did the bruises, so the band.
How proud was Kurt of his horrible home
Feeding off french fries cruddy oven burnt,
The rent he felt the tyrant tax of rome
But paid it off with money that he’d earned
Out Ocean Shores, where wave-breaks endless comb
The restless grey Pacific, licks he’d learnt
Last night escorting labours – Sonic Youth,
Bad Brains, Scratch Acid – rancid & uncouth.
There’s genius in unexpected towns,
Among the rednecks – ballet dancing blooms,
Among the trailer parks – a girl makes gowns,
Flea market fabric magic at the looms;
To souls untaught they seem like silly clowns,
To laugh’d at be from smoky, tin-can rooms
In states of stale decay, how waste they lives,
While one block down bohemianic thrives.
Och! Still a name would not appear that rocks,
Both ‘Puking Worms’ & ‘Pukearrhea’ tried,
Now ‘Spina Bifida,’ now ‘Poo Poo Box’,
‘Egg Flog’ & ‘Whisker Biscuit,’ who’ll decide
This something so important for the flocks
To pin their fleeces on, out-puff their pride
‘Pen Cap Chew,’ ‘Ted Ed Fred,’ ‘Skidrow’ & ‘Bliss’,
All used a gig or two, but none they’d miss.
Kurt knew a dealer back in Amsterdam,
& caught a bus, a one-way trip to hell
He’d never once condon’d that cruel scene
But here he was buzzing the back doorbell
Of some mad apartment, whiff’d with chlorine
& ask’d the dealer if he could him sell
A bag of white, or brown, he did not mind,
Just something strong to pain push from his mind.
So Kurt slam danc’d with heroin – yeah, mate,
Dress it as you like, smack is just a bitch,
The drug that’s guaranteed to fuck ya fate,
Destroy memory cells, make your soul itch,
Skin sallow, sunken cheeks like sewer grate,
& looking like you’d just slept in a ditch
Insidious, destroying not just yours,
But all those lives about you, scratching sores!
From scatologic drudge to Buddhist thought,
The band name chang’d, one night of heroin
When transcendentalism truly sought,
When, with Kurt’s vision blurring in a spin
He found ‘Nirvana’ like Brahma afloat
Upon eternal ocean, heard its din,
Its melodies, its lyrics, & its heat –
Dreaming his Xanadu life deem’d complete.
‘Nirvana,’ name of beauty, anger-free
A flower midst the noisome, punkish park,
Assaulting ear lobage relentlessly
But not Cobain’s lot, somewhere from the dark
Recesses of his mind, a silent sea
Where oozes slimy things, below a spark
Of lyrics swept by melody, to snatch
& catch them, & them to new songs attach.
March Eighty-Seven, Nirvana debuts
A rural Raymond beer-bash, pass by
The address, Seventeen Nussbaum Road, cruise
By slowly, acolytical, & high
Upon your pilgrimage – action renews
As two dozen strangers at the band cry
Those songs are awful, play something we know
Led Zeppelin’s heartbreaker’s quite the show.
The very first ‘Nirvana gig was out
Some backwater hicksville, split pork & beans,
It didn’t take their hosts too long to doubt
They’d done the right thing, as the guitar screams
By Krist’s booming bass, abuse Kurt would shout
At mullet-headed, metal-wedded teens
& pogoing, yanketh out his cable
Twyx the sofa & the coffee table.
The moment booms – y’know, we’ve all been there,
It’s time to go, it’s time to go right now,
A flash of insight & a slamming door,
To carpet spills Nirvana took their bow
& dash’d outside, “Fuck off!” lost fans declare
The truck doors bang when, with a screeching plough,
The wheel tore hot, until the breaks releas’d
Sweeping this troupe of minstrels from the feast.
They sped back home that night, thro scatter’d cars,
The fevers of the night still muster’d well,
Euphorical, they kinda felt like stars
‘Til glowering forests, a fast-food hell
Then trailer park pock-marks, boarded up scars
Of recessional assaults which befell
Small town America, Aberdeen worst.
‘To be born ‘here,’ Kurt thought, one must be curs’d…
There was no scene in Aberdeen, whose dull
Streets made of tumbleweeds rooted in dirt
& so to Olympia’s capital,
Goes all those hopes for music, where young Kurt
A maverick among the beautiful
Cleancut images, drives an eager spurt
Of new adventure vibes – as antics pass’d
Each day felt even better than the last!
Krist went along to Kurt’s, steps thro’ teh door
Yelps, “Dude, gotta listen to this CD,
I’ve just pick’d it up down Dill’s dollar store,”
On came Shocking Blue, electricity
Crackles thro’ Love Buzz – listens, Kurt, in awe,
Then, later that day, at practice, when he
First growl’d that loud riff, gave a simple, “shit
That’s really good, yeah, let’s cover it!”
“Well, who are you,” “Tracey,” “Nice name, I‘m Kurt…”
Sprang up, between them, banterment pacey,
Then came the date, he wore an iron‘d shirt,
She, underneath, hinting something lacy,
Soon, dancing tongues have surg‘d beyond the flirt
To flooding hot-blood realms, chasteless, racy,
Them, by the morning, symbiotic were,
& made the perfect couple, all concur.
Into a studio apartment thrust
Two lives entwin’d, fix’d by her hymen glue;
A place to cook, to sleep, to laugh, to lust,
To live their lives among a mini-zoo:
Four rats, five cats, kurt’s turtles were a must
Two rabbits, & a talking cockatoo;
Kurt’s job to feed the lot, while Tracey spent
Her days at work to pay the endless rent.
Great artists have a knack for anything
Artistic, how Kurt loves to sketch & draw,
& fling acrylic at each new painting,
On backs of old board games, or a thrift store
Canvas; or now wildly ripping-snipping
Images from textbooks’ flesh & gore
& now a portrait of Charlie Manson
Now sculpting some flesh-eating alien!
Sometimes he loved that Shelli hung around,
Other times all he could do was hate her
For being, as the common gossip found,
Such an overbearing dominator,
That like a puppy with a whimper sound
Krist doted on her, always placates her,
While Tracey adores her friend forever –
So that was that, four lives sewn together.
Tracey supports her poet shift-on-shift,
Grateful as cats, happily unemploy’d,
Kurt plugs into bohemia, the drift
Of days, of art, of boozing, unannoy’d
By all the wasted hours of graft & grift
Out-plucking visions from the darkling void
Them given awesome bodies by his art –
As long as on chore-lists he’d ‘made a start!’
Emerg’d an imburgeon’d repertoire,
From dog-ear’d notebooks stain’d with burns & rings,
When all of Pear Street felt his fledgeling star,
Beneath his window passing as he sings
Who stops the second hears, he, Tracey‘s car,
& sprints & dashes thro‘ the list of things
She’d left for him to do, while she’s at work
Else tantrum-slam back in, her way, bezerk!
Dale Crover got a call from Kurt one night,
Who said, “I‘ve got some songs, can you record ‘em?”
On first impressions Dale thought they were tight,
& lets his best abilities accord ‘em
The best sound that he can, a rapid flight
One afternoon thro‘ ten songs, & stor‘d ‘em
For posterity – Downer, Paper Cuts,
& Floyd the Barber, grabbing by the guts!
Endino pass’d along the demo tape
To Jonathan Ponemon of Subpop,
Who, feeling bristles brush & snake his nape.
Found winsome whistle-longs could hardly stop,
Infested by bold earworms, no escape
From each excitement of a heavy drop,
Mulling this band sounds worthy of a deal,
Whose singer’s fate, in shotgun blood, did seal.
One night Kurt sketch‘d his manifesto‘s plot:
To infiltrate the system, trusted, pos’d
As one of them, to slowly start the rot
From deep within an empire, discompos‘d
The chance his parents’ generation got
To change the world, but fluff‘d it, juxtapos‘d
By his era’s eager sincerity –
To do his bit thro’ truth & poetry.
Enthrall’d with love’s minutiae’s growing list
Kurt, to Tracy, says one day, ‘I love you!
I love you coz you are a pacifist,
& all your womanhood is lovely too –
She smiles & hugs him, after they had kiss’d
She heats up his dinner, with a brand new
Microwave, less his girlfriend, more a mum
Unto a royal, spoil’d & pamper’d bum.
Alas, for Dave, he would not fit just right,
& living far away could barely make
Practice enough for Kurt to feel them tight,
Making decisions for the band’s best sake,
A need to practice almost ev’ry night –
A letter sent, & at that selfish wake
Downs beers with Krist who laughs, “Don’t worry man
When things go wrong just make another plan!”
Listening to the Beatles, suddenly
Tracey turns to Kurt, gurns with face confus’d,
Spurtling, you‘ve not written a song for me –
Later, in the bath, while his lover snooz’d
Guitar in hand, chords mov’d in harmony,
Metadialogues, melodies infus’d,
Bas’d upon arguments they’d had a while
Back – well, soppy love songs were not Kurt’s style.
Kurt, Tracey, woke; naked, bathtub-dripping,
Roll’d up a smoke, toke’d once, pass’d on, then flew
Into his jangle-jangle banger, gripping
The room; “I need an easy Friend, I do
With an ear to lend…” with heart-beats skipping
Tracey swoons… “I do think you fit this shoe…”
She smiles, the song was great, he’d done alright
Then laugh’d at, “I can’t see you every night!”
Tick-Dolly-Row, once, & a band call’d Bliss,
The stage had shared, Nirvana still fledgling
Whose drummer ‘was alright,’ Kurt said to Krist;
A mutual acquaintance thought that she’d bring
All parties together – just like a kiss
Between lovers when at first Chad Channing
Jamm’d with the band, & before he knew it,
Was of the sound a part, pulsing through it!
While all the lads look’d on, alarm’d, obtuse,
Kurt turn’d into a modern Don Juan,
Girls clucking for their darling amoureuse
Down at the front, burn Bacchanalian,
As if they’d Soma supp’d, souls cutting loose
Hair spouting up like geysers ‘twards the sun –
Great songs, a killer voice, & sex appeal,
Thought Ponemon, ‘let’s give these lads a deal!’
Seattle‘s central tavern, ‘88,
With Ponemon assured of their merit
& Jack Endino smitten, both must wait
Their main honcho to convince, Bruce Paviit
Whom, hearing Love Buzz, bluster‘d, ‘that was great!
Let‘s make a record, & the disc must have it!‘
That is the single, let’s cut quick the track
Starting Nirvana on our heart’s attack!‘
Love Buzz was nail’d, the response ecstatic,
Tho’ Kurt sulk’d, burden’d, misgivings chronic
Thinking the song better in his attic
When thrashing a heavy supersonic,
But still, vibrant chunks of rock electric
Serves to the public a grungey tonic
Who now want more, an album’s worth
Of bangers waiting for the pangs of birth.
Reciprocal Recording Studios
The sacred site forechosen, like the ground
Where Sparta block’d Persian, whose tape deck glows
With buttons, lights & sliders – storing sound,
Jack Endino goes to work – one who knows
The system inside out, who’d gone & found
The guts of grunge, & as their boat unmoor’d
Nirvana’s album’s ready to record.
Kurt’s secret weapon was his blasting screams
As if stuck fast & drowning in life’s drudge,
His stomach, too, was scratching at the seams,
Hatching internal acid-worms in sludge
To numb the pain, found opiates dull dreams,
Like heroin, the curse that will not budge,
Refus’d to move on like stubborn mule,
Rebranding ‘I’m addicted’, with ‘it’s cool!’
With high-end toms, & a hitty stick-sound,
The snare twyx mid & low-mid frequence tuned,
A full beat kick-drum where the Chas-feet pound,
& sloshy hi-hats like a spurting wound,
With cymbals crashing in the black background
The sound comes at ya like a whale harpoon’d,
But thrashing in the ocean while it lives,
& in whose stark death-song Human sin forgives!
Dissonant punk, with poppy overtones,
To make the people dance a merry fit,
Whose pounding drums, & heavy gee-tah drones,
Create a deep dichotometric grit
Which, counterpoising, spits out microphones
In campfire hooks, minds nibbling, bit-by-bit
Until, each one, remember we, with ease,
Like memories of lovers, overseas.
Ye songs of stunning bonecrunching music,
Heavy, atonal, crushing, bleakness sour’d,
A sonic splurge of watching your car-wreck
Slow-motionly thro’ finger-slits, cower’d
Helpless behind the wheel, claustrophobic
Dreading, rides a rollercoaster, power’d
By mad dynamics, spiteful with harshness –
But cracks of light in Kurt’s darkest darkness.
Now, re-recording PAPER CUTS, the band,
All the time Dale Crover’s drums preferr’d,
Such super-sludgy slog, & understand
If magical then keep it – then they heard
The story of the song – a madman slamm’d
His children in a basement, made them turd
On newspaper sheets, Kurt knew one of ’em,
His dealer’s accomplice, call’d Donovan.
I thought I’d try to find two rhymes for Grunge,
& realise its essence in this song –
It hits you like a barracuda’s lunge,
& leaves flesh quaking like a sumo gong,
Upsoaking blood & sweat into a sponge,
While squeezing drops of poison from the tongue,
Of singers, all across Seattle’s scene,
All ruthless as a guillotining queen!
Endino sat, chain-smoking Winston Lights,
Capturing the burgeoning Pacific
Sound, whose breathless energy sets to rights
The zeitgeist with a scorch’d earth, specific,
Fanbase-pleasing grunginess – loud & tight,
Ominous, unsettling & uncivic –
Tailoring Kurt’s album, to its profit,
Like an unapologetic prophet.
Exhilarating vitriol avails
The final mix, whose caustic abandon,
Whose angst of modern living scrapes it wails,
Whose ominous, & wit-acerbic fun,
Fills ears with dread, as dead, under its nails
Festers the soil of rural washington,
But shot thro’ with moments of staggering
Heartfelt beauty, & boy that boy can sing!
Recording might be over, but then came
Delays on post-production, each edit
Fed thro’ Pavitt’s litmus test; some became
Gospel, others discarded as ‘pure shit!’
& still the album lacks a proper name,
‘Til on a poster Kurt simply found it
Advising junkies “Bleach Your Works”, i.e.
Clean needles curb the spread of HIV.
Kurt seems a member of the legend gang,
Those master singers, & a brother bard,
Who knew just how to tune a guitar’s twang,
To hypnotise those hellhounds in the yard,
Who’ll croon with tramps ancestral, as he sang
Each word the turning of a tarot card,
Shall energize & mystify us, inspire
Our souls like faces shining by a fire.
The record steady sells – spits, claws its worth
Into our modern music taste ferment,
Help‘d on by English critics at the birth
Quoth NME, “this is the biggest, bent
& baddest sound Sub Pop did yet unearth
So far…” – says Kurt “why don‘t we circumvent
America, like Jimi did, & tour
Europa, for to elevate us more!“
The band were met by a man nam’d Murdo
From the Edinburgh band, the Cateran,
Who, collecting wide-eye’d lads at Heathrow,
Bundl’d them all in the back of his van
& drove them to their digs at Pimlico,
A manky flat, but laid on by a fan
For free, who’d Love Buzz bought, loving the band,
& welcomes likely lads to Limeyland!
Kurt could not help reflecting on that night
When Jimi Hendrix first play’d London Town,
Unknown back home, but England sets alight,
With licks so hot they burnt the Sixties down;
Now he was here, the next Seattlite
Ambitioning to fix a victor’s crown
Upon his head, the one great songsmiths don,
When recognis’d as king by ev’ryone.
They disappear’d into the Underground
That sunders London with its tentacles,
Upon the Circle line went round & round;
Bitters, draining, one-by-one, in bottles,
On surfacing one random stop they found
A cool old English pub, jukebox, pool tables,
Joking, smoking, bantering with locals,
While shrieking out Johnny Rotten’s vocals.
I took a bus to Manchester to see
This band, this mystery this Kurt Cobain,
I met him in the dunny, shared a pee,
& offered him a sniffle of cocaine,
“I am alive,“ I said, “in poetry!“
He asked me there & then, outright, explain,
This statement in my best, glorious rhyme,
“Not now,“ said I, “perhaps another time.“
After the gig, half-way down an alley
I pass‘d a lass, head-turn‘d towards her friend,
Who said, “what are you on about, Sally,
I span around, & watch‘d them reach the end,
Then disappear – behind me a scally
Chirps, “that gig was fucking ace, what a blend
Of lyrics & distortion – what say you…
“That girl, I sens‘d she was my soul mate true.“
& so I dash‘d on down that cobbl’d lane
But seem’d she gone forever! Cursing fate,
I found that Scally by me yet again.,
Chewing his face off, saying, “Ee-ya, mate,
“I‘ve got some pills at home my name is Wayne,
I‘ve just bought Bleach, I think dem tunes are great,
Fancy a dance at mine, I‘ve got skunk too!“
I flash‘d a smile, “of course I fucking do!“
Kurt‘s youthtime now has ended, one hundred
Fifty stanzas of ottava rima
Have from this pen unfolded, some thunder‘d
In scribbling hurricanes, some star-streamer,
Dangling words in drips, while others plunder‘d
From Scottish glens, where my lucid dreamer
Stroll’d, straddling consciousness – how words did flow!
Preaching two cantos – Bleach, In Utero!
Mumble Words 