Tall trees. A beard. Flooded subways and photographs of a mausoleum that looks like the one from the first Phantasm film. Searching my pockets for a lighter, random thoughts flicker in and out of my brain, but they’re not unpleasant by any means. There’s a Ferris wheel in there, and a waterfall of white wine that laps a shore of whores that wriggle and writhe as if pornography were not a sin but as natural as the wind. But it is, right? Flesh is just flesh. It might come across as obscene, but we’re just animals, and we seek out pleasure because it’s in our design. Sometimes, I think of myself as a man of morals, but that’s only because I’m crap with women. Well, not crap. Selfish. I’m a man of words and silence, and although love ignites me, it always seems to tangle with the other two. Like the legs of an octopus caught in the branches of a tree, or the arms of Slenderman slithering across the bedroom floor along with the snakes and spiders that have come up from the basement. Lighting a smoke as everyone else settles down, one by one I pluck my veins like a guitar. I had a guitar, once, but couldn’t play the thing for shit. In a drunken rage a few yeas back, I threw the fucker out the window and into the back garden. Smashing onto the paving slabs below, a few seconds later my fingers clutched a pair of scissors that cut those strings in a triumph that lasted as long as my attention span. The older I get, the less stuff affects me. It floats on the surface and then sinks like a turd. And to think of all those turds that have slipped out of view without a second thought. If you’ll be my woman, I won’t promise you a rose garden, and nor will I promise you a man who’ll treat you like a queen. But, in my own fucked up way, I’ll do the best I can. I’ll put you in a poem; I’ll put you in a painting. I’ll give you all I’ve got, and although it won’t be enough, it’s all I’ve got to give.