desolation is just a word
desolation is just a feeling
it’s nothing to do with me
yet i cry anyway
i plan to rise above it all
one of these days
when i can fill no more
when i begin to finally pour
let this last gasp elevate me
let this last gasp make me to soar
by TONY SINGLE
© All rights reserved 2018
i’d had loads to drink and got up on stage
ready to wipe their asses with my whole life’s page
so i said “blah blah” this and all “blah blah“ that
“are you ready to be in stitches? double drat!”
“i’m the queen of the office! the boss don’t scare me!
the fucking tapeworm in her guts, not her pubic flea!
she’d better step off, man! learn her goddam place!
i’d love to see that smile slapped off her face!”
and so on i ranted in a death metal voice
feigning confidence, as though i had some choice
and then i saw her there, boss behind my workmates
while they booed and hissed like a pack of primates
but she smiled and dropped some coins into my beer mug
“if career suicide’s what you crave then your grave’s dug”
well, i know whatever happens must happen for the best
my home’s a gutter now, and i got that shit off my chest!
by TETIANA ALEKSINA & TONY SINGLE
© All rights reserved 2018
It came to life in an expensive arty-farty Moleskine—maybe I fancied myself as the next Hemingway. I even bought a posh Parker pen. Only the best tools, right? But as time went on and times got desperate, the Moleskine got swapped out for paper from bins and skips, and the Parker for biros I’d stolen from cheap snack-bars and post offices.
But I didn’t give up. I continued to scribble beneath dim streetlights, in dingy alleyways, and as close to the neon glow of storefronts as their owners would allow. Come hell or high water, I’d complete this book.
by TETIANA ALEKSINA & TONY SINGLE
© All rights reserved 2018
Look what the cat dragged in. Two old cats like us. Alley cat. Honky cat. Cool cats. Wild cats of Kilkenny.
Okay, so we’re not from Kilkenny. I’m just trying to shoehorn as many song titles with the word ‘cat’ into this introduction as I possibly can. Cats without claws. That’s probably the level we’re working at here. Listen in as Peter and I attempt to bring the conversation back to moggies, but to no avail. Yup, you could even say that we’re just playing cat and mouse with the topic! (Insert groan here.)
Come to think of it, I suppose the title of this post is a bit misleading too. There are no musical numbers, and certainly no kitties wrestling in jelly pits. Oh well, maybe next time.
PS: This is a bit strange, but if you want to listen to the sound then you should click on the picture below. Yes, it’s real magic in the digital world, I tell ya!
by TONY SINGLE
© All rights reserved 2018
My dream. I ended up leaving my hometown for this.
Melbourne was too expensive. I’d lost my job and the rent was killing, so I upped stakes. I moved to deepest, darkest Peru where I burned through the remainder of my savings in under a year. Even though it was as cheap as chips to live there, I eventually found myself eking out a living on the streets.
I guess I didn’t think things through enough. Now I didn’t even have the money for a one-way ticket back to Australia.
Still, I had my dream. I would write a book.
by TETIANA ALEKSINA & TONY SINGLE
© All rights reserved 2018
unbolt me 