The website of writer and poet Daniel Bennett
‘Nikolay Ivanovich Stupin lives in our house. He has a theory that everything is smoke. But in my view not everything is smoke. Maybe even there’s no smoke at all. Maybe there’s really nothing. There’s one category only. Or maybe there’s no category at all. It’s hard to say.’ On Phenomena and Existences, Daniil Kharms
'Ouside, a section of the building has collapsed, blocking the street. As they skirt the rubble, a pack of wild dogs rounds the corner. Billy holds up a hand, palm out, and the dogs are deflected as if they have hit a wall-- they slide sideways, one throwing a last yipe of terror and defiance … Continue reading Wild Dogs
‘Lewis and Benjamin gambolled ahead, put up grouse, played finger-football with rabbit droppings, peered over the precipice onto the backs of kestrels and ravens and, every now and then, crept off into the bracken, and hid. They liked to pretend they were lost in a forest, like the Twins in Grimms’ fairy-tale, and that each … Continue reading In The Green Shade
The other night, coming back from work, we came across an incident at our local tube station. It was a drizzly, wet evening, the end of the kind of winter day that puts a chill inside you. Queues of people were backing up at turnstiles. Armed police patrolled the inside of the station. A mobile … Continue reading Eastworld
'Pollen-skinned pond's edge by the dock where we stood and tried to describe it-- as yellow as the memory of yellow, a memory of light without context. We gave up and just looked. And walked further.' from 'Brookeside', Joseph Massey
Even those of us who lived through those days, we who learned the texture of history as it pushed against our cheeks, can barely understand the magnitude of what took place. The narrative is too grand, all-encompassing, planetary. Really it is the story of all of us. The children on the street corner, picking through … Continue reading The Events
