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Growth Spurts

by Ashley Reaks

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1.
She wipes her baby’s tears She strokes her baby’s head Anoints him like a God Mother sees her baby crawl Floating through the evening The moon rises the moon falls The moon rises the moon falls Divorced from the body Divorced from the soul
2.
3.
Metal Fang 02:53
4.
There’s a great loneliness screaming Like sunken marble in the overhead sun Kathryn whispers – Kathryn whispers My life flashes my story My nightmare my sacrifice Girls tiptoe down a hallway Glittering trembling Without anaesthesia Strangers beating children and laughing Without anaesthesia
5.
On your marks! Get set! Ready? GO! Race to ignore the traffic sounds Beneath, in the streets and reach toward The landscape beyond, fight to see trees Or squint and see the heritage houses covered in ivy! It is not a gentle art to “ignore”: It is VIOLENT and takes energy To divert our thoughts, beliefs, bodies Beyond the reality of these NOISY fucking cities! On your marks! Get set! Ready? GO! Bolt to Nature, for what is “natural” is indeed Where you notice your body retreating RELAXING, your body and being floating A branch scratches calves, humbling with its markings. GO! Buy that boat you’ll only use sparingly! GO! Get the tent you’ll use only at vacation! GO! Purchase hiking boots, which replaces therapy! GO! Spend gas to get peace that’s temporary! On your marks! Get set! Ready? GO! The Man in the Suit has won “his place” in City By devastating his nature and his being He expends efforts, sweats violent urges Covers up his wish to surrender… Because can you really enjoy a thunderstorm? You hear it. Or the hot sun heating your skin You feel it. Or the long Canadian winter It depressed us. You can pump your paddle & fight the current Upstream, but you’ll never win. Nature – the forests, deserts and our ecosystems within is where we rage our harshest devastations. Rumi says we’ve got a voice inside with no words, do you listen? Sorry, what did you just say? Too busy fighting Modernity, Technology, the Traffic outside my building, promising “an investment” for me in what – my insanity? See the man with the hands down on ground Trying to feel the Earth, dirt, create roots somehow But his position is back-breaking in spite of his class He is on his mark, set and ready to take it up the ass. Humans may have evolved to stand up right But they are Devastators, few are getting it right. The trees though, they stand tall and straight Until a natural, noble force breaks them. Or until Human Devastators cut them down Much like they’re doing to themselves right about now … Fighting so hard to ignore the sounds, a shout Saying: THIS IS NOT WHAT I WANT!! Get me out. I’m clawing my way out. Thought I had evolved But I can only grow if I crawl now.
6.
Open bird hole so warm to touch Overcoat draped round her shoulders Fizzy pop bottles exploding in the rain Butterflies glide past roses drenched in tears Cats and dogs and monkeys disappear Slugs and snails are bringing up the rear Slugs and snails forever Climbing up the drain Slugs and snails forever Forever may they reign Slugs and snails forever Sliding down the drain Slugs and snails forever Forever may they reign Forever
7.
At 5.30am, I distracted a rat as it sped across Church Lane. It ran headlong into the kerb, bounced off and landed on its back. Very briefly supine, it thrashed about inexpertly, righting itself in a shower of street-lit puddle water before diving for cover under the leggy buddleia on the verge. I saw a rat yesterday too. This one was also flat on its back. Dead. All bedraggled fur and gaping incisors. It was on the pavement outside the newsagent's shop where they display their 'value' pregnancy testing kits on the counter next to the fizzy love hearts and candy foam bananas.
8.
9.
A massive bird dribbles its fresh juices down me, like a mother's love I hear the thunder-flash of London and the groans of abandoned children. Johnny holds back, saying, “Slide it in, and pull me onto what is born again’. In the circumstances, I can hardly say no. Things in London are broken and have melted away. Blackbirds halt my spluttering engine, as I lay over the edge of innocence. I’m experiencing a stillness like never before. I’m cupping Johnny’s opening, as I stroke myself faster than a Cobbett rising. Another lost son cries for mercy as I position myself just nano-seconds away from Nature’s tool. His little wobble speaks to me, as I reach down his sweat pants to feel my friend's affection unloading in shock. The fire of adolescence fizzles out, just as Johnny is fucking up his own dazzling life. I find some used needles in the hills. A girl is partying in my psychic wounds, as an uninvited guest nudges his incredibly thick muscle against my childhood pain. I’ve seen worse than him before, so I suck him clean. He groans with disappointment, like a herd of gypsies slowing down some horses. Johnny pulls my head out of his shoulders, and starts to gracefully massage his big purple knob all over my broken heart. The four horsemen of the Apocalypse flutter their hollow eyes, before trampling me to death and burying me amongst the debris. The king blows his horn. After what feels like a hundred lifetimes, I’m free to breathe again.
10.
Pain free the only way to be Pain free the only way I saw her soft white hole in the gleaming hell I dived in all alone Even my lover’s soul couldn’t make me well Couldn’t find my way back home I want to live in morphine

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released December 6, 2016

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Ashley Reaks Harrogate, UK

Genre-hopping musician and collage artist.


"an incomparable talent and a true original, a man who often borders on genius" - Louder Than War (UK)

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