June: a list

June, longer than any that’s gone before; how time stretches when it’s this full. Memory can’t keep up, I am worn out and thin by experience but made richer by it all than I ever could’ve hoped to be. I am deep in making a new novel, it has me by the skin, the nape of my neck; I do not know what it will do to me, only that it will. Below: a list of June things.

so sad, so sexy

when the bell rings at the end of Sopranos and cut -

London rooftops at dusk

insect bites; see, you can still feel

crossing yourself in Rome

the Edna O’Brien documentary

see, you almost believe again

writing a sunset only to turn round in Cagliari and there it is

Naples, every time

as if you have written a thing into being

swallows darting all over the place

black as a personality substitute

Lykke Li on the red eye

stanstead: possibly worse than Euston

summer solstice

and it’s been four years since you died

and nothing between here and Africa where you did your dying

things the Swallows know

maybe if I kept swimming, I’d get home

we’ve all taken up poetry

anchovies

signs and portents

the way the water’s green once you’re past the rocks

espresso at 11pm

also a metaphor in that

gin tonics

crossing yourself in Sardinia

Sabrina Carpenter

the air the morning after a thunder storm

the Colosseum

Frank O’Hara

long lunches with people more interesting than you

becoming lost in translation

Eva Hesse’s diaries, again

just because it looks fun, doesn’t mean it is

when you walk out the plane and the heat hits you

John Fowles’ The Collector, again

chasing moths around the house

Hunter S. Thompson, again

bold kids are the future

illegal wars, again

are memes the new novel - think on it

could you live on a boat?

just because it’s legal, doesn’t mean it’s ok

think less, write more

pink walls

scampi fries and beer

just because it’s pop doesn’t mean it’s not art

almost outrunning the rain

the scent of jasmine at night

not insisting on everything being art

2 euro for an espresso

the slow coastal train

summer parties as a torture device