Above: Another great comic from Nedroid Check it out!

SO I promised more poems and by gum that's what you're going to get. No more shilly-shallying from me. Also, if you're reading this on the 14th of July, come to the Bowery tomorrow! There will be a load of fine poets and poems.

FYI that was dilly-dallying.

PS: OH MY GOODNESS I BOUGHT A NEIL GAIMAN NOVEL TODAY AND IT MADE ME SO HAPPY

POEM

Spring

Now that I’ve finished cleaning
all that’s left to clean away

is a jumbo tub of lemon Cif,
the meadow-sweet Febreze and Glade

Plug-In, a freshly-rustled bustle
of pot-pourri and Mr Muscle.

Perhaps it’s only the scented candles –
Camomile, Sage and Citrus, Evening Air –

but I am a child again
in my parents’ house, stamping dirt

and god-knows-what across the carpet
and my mother tuts and clicks and hauls

me to the kitchen sink and soaks
my fingers clean beside the feeding ferns –

Peace Lily, Narcissus, Mother-in-Law’s Tongue –
the scent of being young

and being one more thing to clean
is stronger now than it’s ever been.

See you tomorrow,
Dave.

Dave rattles on.

Over the holidays I stumbled across this pair of New Yorkers bangin out some fucking beautiful punk rock, the best I'd had the good fortune to hear in a long time. Besides bein probably the cutest couple in town, an the most earnestly joyous performers I've seen on any screen on the Intertubes, they lay down some bloody good tunes, the best of which can be found on YouTube, at this address:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4Yg-CgIwaHs



"Yea Yeah" to my ears speaks volumes about these crazy cats, and the catchiness of the song coupled with the barely co-ordinated spazzin out proves an essential law of rock: No matter how complex your time signature or chord progression might be, the truth remains that two twats with drums, keyboards and barrelloads of soul can and will blow you out the fuckin water.

On other matters, I arrived back in (Old) York the day, pumped to the gills with anticipation of havin in my possession a PS2, an housemates with a fuckin dance mat, did you ever. Also, Monday the 15th will see the last meetin between me and Joyce for manys a long year, in all likelihood. I'll miss the bastard, to be honest with you. Ulysses is probably the best work of fiction I'll ever set eyes upon, and encounterin some of the foremost thinkers on the subject last term is a memory I'll treasure.

Last, but by no means least, I gotta spill my guts about this dude, Neil Gaiman, and his outstandin graphic novel series, The Sandman. I've never been a big fan of comic books, and I always considered "graphic novel" to be the token of a genre strugglin to be taken seriously. After readin through the ten volumes and then some concernin this uniquely rich universe Gaiman has created, I recognised my brute ignorance. Between some fabulously engaging characters, a gloriously broad story arc containin a degree of care and intimacy I never thought possible, a truly original take on religion, history, fiction and all things in between, your man has made a series of graphic novels that are, above all, fun to read. Incredible, is what it is. That said, the collections are a little pricey, and while neither the sex nor the violence are excessive, they are there, which might put some folks off. Fair enough. But to dismiss The Sandman would be to dismiss one of the few occasions where graphic art and literature meet, and dream up something fantastic.

That's about it! Thanks for readin, hope you're suitably enlightened.

Dave.