FIRE!!!!

I walked out to my roof like every night... This time, it was different. There was a fire in the distance. A real high-flamed fire. With smoke and spirits and more flames. I knew, I knew my body was weak that day and I felt dizzy with the first puff. Vomity. I shacked, my leg did, out of control. I went out for a second time, this time with my camera. It only captured red shadows and night. Stupid amateur quality camera. I re-entered my room and light a candle. My Yankee candle reminds me of my step-grandparents step-love and it's smell... it's smell. London's burning in the distance I thought. Like the song. No, it was not London. It must have been an empty field, London is further away. I thought of the other two times when I've seen fires, one of them was in London, Camden was burning mercilessly. People gathered in the nearby park to watch, so did my friends and I, we even got to talk to some of the firemen. Some guy was smoking inside his flat, he fell asleep, they said. Everything is close and near in London, a fire like that could have consumed the whole borough.

The other fire I've seen was longer ago, before Camden, even before England. It happened in my little forest house in a valley back in Ecuador. I had a happy day that day, it was so happy that I fell asleep with excited exhaustion, holding his photograph with one hand and covering my eyes from the 3 o'clock Equatorial sun with the other. When I woke up, my house was flooded with dense smoke. I went outside and saw our four trees burning in a hellish fire. Fiercely. One of them fell over the wall that separated our house from the abandoned property next door. We had no hose. Only tiny useless buckets. I ran down the road and borrowed a hose from the neighbours and called the emergency number, then a fire engine. There was no access, from anywhere, to that bit of the forest, I've always lived in the edge between a town and a forest, I don't know why, it just happens. Forests come with a lot of spirits and stories.

I was incharged of the borrowed hose and of checking on the firemen that had to get to the fire through our garden. The more water they sprayed, the bigger the flames, the bigger the fire. My brother took the car and went to buy a bigger hose. I swear it took him what it felt like forever. I cannot also remember how long it took the firemen to put down the fire... maybe four hours... but I do remember that late that night, my brother, my friend Taya and I sat high up in the leftovers of the wall that once was (the one that the tree fell on), which by then had cooled down a little and was pleasant to sit on (not for extended periods of time though). We ended up that night putting down burnings ashes, little fires as we smoked cigarettes on the wall, trying to be one with the fire and taking turns with the brand-new-long-green hose.

It was a clear night besides the pink smokey cluds that we were creating, we could see the stars. The smell of burnt forrest that we liked so much at first began to make us sick. No on knew what will happen on the next day. One thing we did know, and that was that we did not have our four extremely tall trees anymore. That made my grandma happy, she thinks fire is Always a good thing and that those trees were threatening with falling on top of the actual house (which would have been completely crushed by even just one of them). We used to have five, one of them fell on another wall. It was such a mess. I don't remember having seen my mother at all that day, later on she told me how she she thought someone had started that fire on purpose and that she knew who it was. Someone who didn't like her and had access to that bit of the forrest, it made sense. Then we feared. She feared for Kanito our dog, who hungs out in the garden most of the time. She is always worrying about the dogs.

The candle has stolen all the air in my room. My body feels all weak again. I really need some sleep. I really do. Good night.

Failed Success

People are by nature, creatures in search of freedom. Choices make us. We choose, we decide and when we are constrained, we complain. Easy.
It stroke me when everything turned into the intense colour of reality. I walked past St. John's Square, to my interview... in the headquarters office, still wrapped in the bubble of hope. I looked at my watch, 3:15, late. I got slightly lost in the way there and asked one or too people for directions, both of them were builders taking a break, having a smoke, incredibly polite as they spoke knowingly of the roads of London. I got there, the clean office, one lonely guard, I know... I was late. He said he couldn't let me in, that's when it stroke me, reality. He told me to arrange another meeting and I left, he and a lady that had entered the building soon after I did, looked at me with sad eyes, as if they cared... I felt awful. I entered the room as a worthy human being in search of being productive, I left the building as a tourist, or even worst, a shopper, a consumer. I was too late to be one of those business people, and too early to be a Londoner, which I'm not, I'm a tourist. I walked away trying to get lost, I took the most random roads, crossed the streets when I shouldn't have had I did all the wrongs turnings, still, I ended up in the freaking tube stop.
In the way, there were several interesting views and characters. An office composed by a series of tiny white cubicles with a sign saying 'we provide space for individuality', more like 'boxes for individuality' I'll say... ha. Business people smoking outside they're offices, mums with babies, five colourful women in saris exchanging laughs, a smartly dressed lady walking really fast and drinking a beer, really fast, a girl all dressed in pink with an almost shaved head and a scary look in her eyes... some boys all dressed in black with a different kind of scary look in their eyes. Old people, young people. Everyone.
There's no use, I can't get lost. I reluctantly entered the station, a pretty girl handed me a flayer, it distracted me and I fell, a pretty boy lifted me up, up till that moment, besides the disappointment, everything felt somehow pretty, the sun was shinning. The sun is my friend, the rain is too, summer and winter are my home.
Down at the platform, out of boredom I started reading the posters on the walls, one advertised a book titled 'What would humanity do if God existed?' I thought about it for a minute, the thought was unpleasant, if God existed then someone, or a group of people would have to be right... the Christians, the Muslims, the Deists... someone. God lays in the human confusion, in the human heart. End of the discussion for me today.
There was a curly haired guy chatting up girls with stories about his trip to Mexico City, the girls looked at him with an unimpressed stare, but then looked at each other and giggled, girls...
My own train of thought got interrupted by a 'Costumers Announcement', a female voice announced that: delays in the service are due to a person under a train in Hammer Smiths. Suddenly, everyone thought about death. You could tell. Suicide. Others worried about being late, the news will get them later. The curly haired guy didn't quite get it and when the girls explained him what happened, he said: 'once in Mexico City...' basically, the same thing.
I struggled to enter the train, twas extremely overcrowded... I wasn't even sure where I was going... after all, the purpose of my whole being there was the interview.
The train took me to Piccadilly Circus, yeah, why not.
I walked up the escalators even though I had no rush... a song came to my head 'no body knows where you are... just how near or how far... shine on you craaazy diamond...'. No one knows anyone in London. I wore my sun glasses and hid behind purple frames. Perfect, I wanted to be the observer. As I walked out of the Station, the first thing I saw was a guy standing on a step, a megaphone in his one hand, a fist with the other. As I walked, trying to follow the busy-fast flow of Piccadilly Circus, I tried to read his t-shirt, it said: 'no matter how much you jog, you are still going to die'. There was a crowd around him, he said something about people rushing to Mc Donald's... Was he stopping them? encouraging them? why does he care anyways, he is going to die too. Does it really matter? What matters? The present. The present matters. The future does too, and the past does.
Places like this are usually good spots for people-watching, although you run the risk of getting people-sick. I was up for some people watching, but I didn't want people to watch me.
There were two hobos right in front of me. Under different circumstances, they would have never been friends... but their un-kept beards, hobo coats and unlucky circumstances have made them friends... one of them smoked, the other one smiled... I wondered, what do they talk about? their loyal little dogs, alcohol? their life stories... they made each other less lonely. I kept walking, I knew where I could go, I had a gift card for this shop in Carnaby Street. I got it almost a year ago... Would it still work?
The walk was the same that I had already had started, good. I almost collided with this kid, he was around twelve but tall as a lamp post, he was surrounded by a bubble of money and parental care, he held a Hamleys bag in his hand. But he didn't smile, he had that cocky expression that rich people wear when they go out. A Friend of mine would have called him a phony, all of them: PHONIES, he would have said. People passed, I met them for a fraction of a second, a fraction of a smile sometimes... A little girl dressed like her mum stopped and took a picture of a street-sweeper and a post box, they do make a good photo. The scene kept me smiling for a good five minutes. I remembered little primary school secrets: when someone touches his hair, he wants to talk to you, when a person looks away, he doesn't, when people have their hands in their pockets, they're hiding something. Who makes those things up? They are like an ear bug in my head sometimes...
I was reaching Carnaby Street, I could smell the stylish owners of the garmetes of the week and the tourists, of course. What? was that music that I was hearing? Of course, the Carnaby Krishna lovers approached me with their singing pace, bells, drums, saris, I hoped they didn't talk to me. I wanted to tell them that Krishna won't come... but hey, he might do, I don't really know. After all, what would humanity do if God existed?
They walked past, too into their chants to notice the world around. One of them, a woman, had stopped in a book shop and with the new book in her hands, she accelerated her pace to reach her rhythmic colleagues.
There I was, Carnaby, oh, wait, one more... a guy with big grey eyes (part of the strategy, this charity people do know what they're doing!) stopped me. He asked 'May I ask you where arefrom and how old are you? If I'm not too forward' Yes, I was surprised. I haven't had spoken to anyone since I spoke to the guard in the building of my failed interview, did I still remember words? I did. I told him my age, he looked disappointed and said that he's charity that looks after hobos is only interested in over-twenty-ones. That was OK. I wasn't up for charity-ing anyway. He still asked where I am from, 'Its a long story' I said, 'I'm English but I speak weird' then I walked away. He said 'take care'. A couple of extremely orange guys repeated 'take care' after him and laughed. I Didn't look back, I could tell the way they looked by their voices, they looked gay.
The place looked somehow familiar... yes, I knew why... it was were Phorm is. Phorm, form, phorm, shape, phorm, form. The word danced in my head. Suddenly, the city looked even more lonely. An invisible needle ached. I miss someone from Phorm I met... A gypsy that is now in California. How I miss him, how i miss that gypsy.
I could see the shop where my gift card belonged to from there. Carnaby will still feed and shatter egos, and make you feel as if you had it all, until you look at a shop window.

x
Azile

Today...

Today the wind blows so strong in England that it seems that its going to break all the windows and blow all the trees away... I think spirits use strong winds like this to travel around. The wind transports their invisible beings and then both transparent friends carry stories along the long distances of time, through the ears and skins of whoever happens to pass by.

Today the wind blows so strong, that it makes you feel small, fragile, helpless, cold, alive. Your hair rushes to your face and there is nothing you can do to stop it and to stop the wind. The wind always carries news. Birds, flowers, pollen and news. I got a phone call from the wind. You can worry as much as you want, but at the end of the day, the unexpected will be worse (or better) than any of the things you imagined or worried about.

Today the wind blows and brings and takes and feels like a curtain of invisible ice.
Today the wind rushes you to look for shelter. run, hide, seek, dance.

Where will you end up if you go just to where the wind blows?

Theneverendinglifecycle

Its been long since I've written poetry,
but at the same time,
I've never stopped.

No one ever stops.
A night of sleep doesn't mean you're stopping, a holiday doesn't either.
You never stop being,
you never stop poetry.

Life is a continuous cycle of mornings, nights, twilight and dawns
of creating yourself, again and again
a restless struggle with time
of adjusting your dreams to meeting deadlines.

luckily, not always.

Luckily you'll find some time,
to look at the moon
some time to wonder
some time to feel,
and some time to sleep without thinking of today or tomorrow.

Perhaps you'll find yourself doing
something you love and enjoy so much
that it wont mean any effort at all.

and perhaps this life cycle of never ending moons and suns
will not consume you
and you will stop racing and start looking at the things
that you walked past before
because you were in a rush.

and perhaps,
the fire that chases you from behind your feet
will cool off
and let you rest
and let you sleep
and let you be.

azile
x

D is for Dreams

I've been running, unable to stop, since I can remember.
From the very first moment when I knew the place where I was born, was not my place.
To the moment when I longed for something further than the Earth and even the stars.
From caging my thoughts in words,
To freeing myself in love.
From the corner of an abandoned dusty road, with cows grassing by my side,
To a grey place that I can now call home, at least for a while.
From a world of confusion in which I thought I could never wake up,
to the safety of a warm bed and an arm to hold me.
From the nightmare, to the dream.
Yet again, I can't stay, I must run.
And when I think I can stop, that's when I get be pushed harder,
to the limit,
always to the limit, always to the extreme.
Just kissing the edge of the cliff.
Licking the frontiers of madness.
For that I keep my scars.
Keeping myself here with you,
in subtle, gentle balance
that keeps me from falling and keeps me running.

His Struggle to find the light Switch

The tyres squeaked violently as the car accelerated away from his drive. They had dropped him feeling absolutely clueless in front of his own doorstep. But on his current condition, he could not recognise the same doorstep he crossed two years ago, when he fell in love with the house, or when he showed it to his second wife Nora; he couldn't even remember picking up the newspaper from that very doorstep, every morning. No, he rang the bell and waited, as any stranger would have done. Slowly he realized that no one would open the door for him anymore. The uncomfortable weight that he had to carry around all night in his pocket, were the keys to that door. The third key, after the chain and the hotel logo was the front door key. He leaned on the door and counted: one, tow, three... It worked! as the door opened he lost support and when it was fully open, he fell straight over the green carpet, like an old tree over the grass. An old tree he was. The carpet smelt of the detergent Nora used to like. He stayed there, in that position for a while, remembering and then avoiding the painful spot in his memory and thinking 'I'm going to be sick any minute'. He battled to take off his coat, laying on the floor, like a fish out of water. One arm off. The room was dark and packed with useless old furniture, inherited from ancient pretencious unknown relatives. From memory, if he stretched his left arm he should reach the light switch next to flower pot. A little stretch and... on! The light was overwhelming. It inundated the whole room and drowned him in a sea of guilt. He could barely drag himself up to the sofa, but no, he could not face his life under full bright light, no, not tonight. Darkness and sweet dreams awaited for this broken prince.

Moon Stories

Life runs from the generals to the particulars, that is, everything happens to everyone, but it is how YOU experience it what makes it different, unique.
Everybody, well, almost everybody falls in love (or at least believes so...) how it happens has inspired a million of films, novels, songs, art...
Love and life can be told in short stories, short stories of people who experienced them with intensity, people who at least for that moment, felt trully alive.
These are, my moon stories.