In the waiting room

The book has had a fall, and now we are sitting in a waiting room, waiting to be seen. This … More

Leaving the house

We have left the house. At first our walking is clumsy, comical, even. The book is three yards ahead of … More

Heaven on Earth Now that it is night, you fetch the wash from outer space, from the frozen … More

because of the words and because of the books because of the woman in the anorak at the swimming baths … More

The book and I are passing each other messages through a third party. Neither of us bothers with the niceties … More

I am visiting the book. We have already been through a lot together, including the part where I killed it and … More

Reading Arthur W. Frank’s astonishing At the Will of the Body recently has given me pause to reflect on the relationship … More

I have murdered my darling. Like a bird of a certain blue vintage, it is ex, dead, kaput, finished. The … More

My first reader was a man called Fergus. A friend of a flatmate at university, I never got to … More

Cut through to what happens when you listen. Cut through to making it happen, listening for it, failing, then doing … More

Dear Ant Looking forward to 2015 it’s tempting to think it will never reach the heights of 2014. Big mistake. Huge. … More

I am at a thing. A historic thing. (An historic thing? I will never know). Poets are there. Household names. … More

In 1991 we moved to a house in Brixton, south London. Of all our welcomes, that of our neighbour, the … More

Someone who knows me very well knocked me sideways with a comment the other day. Remarking on this blog, … More

I am driving to a thing. Not a famous thing, an out of the way thing. A classroom, perhaps. … More

I am not at a thing. The things have dried up (or I have stopped going). I am thingless. I … More

You think it will be about your childhood. It turns out to be about an onion. Or a night in … More

For now, at least, it has gone. The notebooks with promising phrases, the backs of envelopes with doodles: they are … More