DNRC055 | EP | 2005 Read more
Author: Davey Dreamnation (page 139 of 237)
Davey Dreamnation (1972–?) is an Australalian musician, vocalist, pirate and record-label owner who now lives 'in the third person'.
For all the doubters who cast nasturtiums on my ability to grow a beard, new evidence has emerged in the form of archival photos and painful memories. Please, consider these first impressions of beard, taken whilst freezing my arse off in Sapporo, Japan. Given my albino skin colour, the presence of bed-hair in these shots and the location of the “shoot” inside a dormitory room in a hostel, I think it’s fair to say that my beard-modelling career is officially dead in the water.
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I got Mao’s text around 20:00. I was sitting in a dingy bar watching boxers spar on the TV. I’ll be late, don’t wait for me. So I ordered some more wasabi peas & massaged my stiff knees. It’s always like this: it’s always Mao who’s late. Something about make-up, a facelift, a mausoleum somewhere. I recalled what the old fortune teller told me about patience being the key to my future life, but I couldn’t help wondering what was keeping him this time: maybe rain, or a lost taxi? More beer, recharge my battery. I witnessed scuffles by the door as more peasants-turned-artists swarmed for stools & drink, until finally (finally!) there was a buzz by the window & his big moon face floating past. I shouted Mao! Mate! His head swivelled & I felt like the devil drinking Faust. I made way for the body of my hero, cold but shining in the wan electric ceiling light. What would you be drinking, then? I asked, without waiting for a reply—it’s always vodka for us, six shots each. Still, I was a little annoyed by his drunken silence, and I felt like stopping him from texting away on that big TV phone of his, a freebie from some company seeking advertising rights over him, or else the Madame. I asked how she was going. No reply. He was beginning to piss me off, not to mention the barman, who had once thought of Mao as an old friend. It seemed he had been keeping better company recently. Something about Lenin & Santa Claus. Mao finally spoke, going Ho, ho, Ho Chi Minh. This drew a laugh from the peanut gallery but I wouldn’t even look at him, preferring instead to pretend that the vodka bottle was a telescope & its contents a sea. Abruptly, having clearly had enough, the barman called last drinks but Mao didn’t even move. Dead drunk, I supposed, that great mug of his looking kind of fake in the bright light of dawn. Somehow we stumbled out into a hutong with no past, my arms around Mao’s slippery neck. We did a little dance together & tried to resurrect the name of the club we’d planned to visit, but to no avail. Thus, I was left with no choice but to pile him into a taxi & pay off the driver with a wink & ten yuan. I said, See this one gets home safely would you? Thanks. He’s a special mate of mine. Name’s Mao, Imaginary Mao. Bye, I said, bye. No reply.
| It | remains possible to believe there |
| was | nothing anyone could do about |
| the | melted bottles, burnt coins etc … as for the |
| corpses | lying in the streets and wreckage |
| of | Nagasaki, we tend to forget how |
| the | body resists history; we pretend that |
| Koreans | look different, or |
| that | victims are all the same, even when they |
| remained | silent, we could hear their voices, |
| scattered | across the unbelievably blue sky, hanging |
| in | trees, or from twisted crosses, populating |
| the | horror invisibly, keeping time, giving |
| ruins | a human aspect, a curtain of dead flesh |
| longer | than a shroud, sadder |
| than | silent bells, more dignified than |
| any | surrender, never to be buried like the |
| others. |
| One | day we shall know their names, the |
| reason | for their being there, that morning. Death |
| is | just another criminal, an adversary |
| that | does not need a motive, |
| although | we may wish to assign it one. The |
| many | cries, the stunned desolation of this |
| Japanese | port town in the moonlight – its |
| people | scattered like broken glass. Even the walls that |
| survived | bear shadows like execution drawings, and inside |
| the | museum, the pathetic legacy of |
| atomic | testing around the world lingers. We’re still |
| bombing, | while they sue for peace. Of course, it’s |
| very | hard to know who suffered the most. Was it the |
| few | who remained to bear witness, or the |
| Koreans | who disappeared? It’s hard to know what exactly |
| survived. |
| There | among the dead horses and railway girders, |
| was | an abandonment of sanity, from which |
| nothing | could be salvaged, despite the crows |
| we | saw circling in the blood-red skies. After this, |
| could | anything grow from evil? There was nothing left to |
| do. |
| Crows | are sacred in many cultures. That morning, as they |
| flew | about, making their raids, we sat with our heads |
| down | between shame and annihilation. Meaning existed |
| in | their grim and tidy circles, their flexing |
| flocks | and dusted beaks. They grew fat and sick |
| from | the flesh of the Koreans. We watched |
| the | dim carnival play itself out, while the |
| sky | burned into stillness |
| and | the shrieks grew faint. Scarily, we |
| ate | rice cakes sent from surrounding towns, as |
| the | rare medics wandered about dispensing water. Our |
| eyeballs | remained fixed in a groundward stare. Out |
| of | nowhere, the crows came again, seeking |
| the | remains, the plastic souls of those |
| Korean | dead with no names. They were no longer simply |
| corpses. |
| They | became ghosts that haunt our city still. We |
| ate | rice cakes that may or may not have carried |
| the | crows’ radiation. They ate the |
| eyeballs. |
who will carry me to saihou jodo what to bring there what to wear? take me to the top of a mountain leave something behind to forget who'll build another kogetsudai fire my body at the silvery moon? leave something behind to forget falling into orbit & spinning space who'll throw me into ginshadan drown all my past in the wet sand? falling into orbit & spinning space shutting my eyes in the darkness who will carry me to saihou jodo what to bring there what to wear? shutting my eyes in the darkness take me to the top of a mountain