The Time Being | Steve Kilbey

negative gearing?
nah
my brain lights up in a thousand white spots
oooh its gone all warm behind my eyes
all soft
all gooey in my mainbrain membrane terraplane
can you dig this gold?
can you silver my tongue?
can you understand that now i understand
no no not everything
that is not to be understood
it is unfathomable as the future we barely glimpse
it is as untouchable as the past that tears this present from our hands
wendy the white witch said to me
you should now have a staff
i said i thought that was my bass
no she said as she cut n pasted my etheric organs
she shook her head as she aligned the flow of my chakras
and made my little pingis to zingy
but my bass i protest
its full of all that energy and music n sweat n blood and
dont forget holy rocknroll that our loving god gave us
yes yes she smiled but it is not your staff
a staff? …i wondered
wow
gold screws of light descend down my spine
they return anticlockwise
out through my huge crown chakra
already half out of my head
it rebounds back down
clockwise
a gold screwing light as i am rooted to the earth
what does the gold do in my head
my minds mine
my velvet goldmind
lined in fools gold and gilt trips
man
anyway
thats all cleared up

jesus that last frame looks weird, huh
now watch operetta below

heres a vid i did

love
the
time being

oh i knew you would ask me for the rest of my tale
i a poor slave
who has worked hard his whole life
labouring in the field
out in the etruscan dusk
swooning under moons of musk
under the long dreamy hazes of middays
that drift through these lives of mine
oh the songs
the grape
oh the girls and their wild rites
deranged by wine and secret magical herbs
when venus herself appears all radiant and golden
when the summer is high and days are long
and water in the river runs sweet and warm
and stars above glow white dazzled yet still so distant
and we sleep so deeply so alive so alive
the music that i hear sad strings plucked so strangely
and the funny little steps of our dancing
oh would you understand them?
the faun comes kicking thru the woods finally at last
with his pipe and his goatish ways
maenads yes i have seen them raving fucking mad
under some spell i suppose they have lost their shame
and we drink some more and we laugh some more
and the music picks up speed
a dull drum has begun to thump in my temples
i see lights that are not there
hands touch me everywhere
i reach out stumbling laughing… who is there..?
why i cant see in this upside down twilight…i never ask myself..
i feel lips pressed against me
i feel the wine in my mouth slosh round my tongue
oh the bloody grape!
a small voice says my boy theyve put something in your wine
as i start to slowly spin round and round
i clutch at trees and fields
i clutch at strange faces and soft naked fleshies
i clutch at the blurry pink pink pink moon
i clutch at my name but its lost
who will remember it one week after i’m gone…?
who will hear the songs i thought would go on for forever
who will see these impressions i took
that i thought would last and last
who will understand how close i was
or what it took to get this far?
my name and my feet elude me
i fall facedown in the softness of my fantasies
eyes peer in to mine
they change into the eyes of an owl
these eyes that peer into mine
boring into my head and watching me squirm
and i push at nothing in the darkness
in the delirium of my life where every whisper is a lie
and the night has a thousand eyes
and how i was bound to go down
down down down to the bed with a shining glass sound
and how i was never found
never found again answering to my name
my name means something like dream
but more like a dream you cant remember
its a sad name its true
but still i can never remember it
not after all the wine
rich deep red wine
darkly oozing from a split skin
full of warp and woof
full of oblivion so warm and true
my name means something like that i was told
a dream within a grove
an arbour of flighty pheasants and vain peacocks
a story without a teller
just like the necropolis outlined against the nightsky

its already 2010
i got a friend called ricky
and one called donald
and one called nelg
and one called trevor who is also church lighting man
i live in bondi north bondi if you like
my friends come to my house
we and the fambley plus
amble off to the beach for a swim
we get there
the beach is closed because of
a) electric storm
b) jellyfish
c) tsunami
d) big sharky
e) all of the above
can you imagine
a lightning bolt strikes
a sharky bites
a jellyfish stings
the tsunami drowns
all at one time
we eat mexican n it starts to rain
cant pull a trick
do yoga this morning in the hot sun
i drift off into reveries of lives
i remember faces dimly in the interior mists
i remember nineveh
i remember albion
i remember rome
i was a slave boy
captured from somewhere else
i must have been a slave there
where i was before because i didnt mind being a slave here
we were outside of rome now
i worked in the vineyards of our owners whom we rarely saw
one day our mistress turned up in our midst unexpectedly
she looked rich with her jewelry and her robes
rumours swirled around the place about her
she had been sent home from rome
for misbehaviour nonetheless
she was suntanned and deliberate
as she made her way up the treelined avenues
of her splendid country home
they said she worshipped egyptian gods
they said she was a priestess of astarte
they said she had had an affair with some emperor
they said her husbands had been powerful men
they said she owned a house in africa
one day i was surprised to be called into her presence
what did she want with me?
would i be ever be a freed man?
would i be poisoned or promoted?
would i be flayed or fucked or fired?
it was with some trepidation therefore
that i approached her villa…..

do another sitting for andrew h today
for the big art prize
hes got 3 big pictures of me going n
small portraits of me all around the studio
andrew is one of the nicest guys i ever met
a true artist no matter what
the real deal
authenticity
his place is light n breezy
ocean zephyrs blow thru the white rooms
i discuss my face with andrew
he says “theres lots of concave isnt there?”
hed been doing me too big n hard
i point out small things to him
but hes doing a nice job
interesting to see how he works
painting in a drab greeny brown
swishing it all away with a turpsy rag
he does portraits the way i do
he starts with a very rough thing
and then he refines n refines n closes in n in
its nice to see my face emerging from the canvas
(only its board not canvas)
people walk in n make comments
an old scottish guy makes some funny cracks
ha ha
art n music
we listen to some spacious piano music by old whatsisname
ah youd know who i meant if you heard it
the french guy in the twenties monsieur whatsisname
anyway
(satie!)
deadline this friday
must go back for one more sitting tuesday night
only i mainly stand
andrew is such a lovely man
i wish he would bloody win the big prize
nah!
thatd just be too damn unlikely, wouldnt it?

been working on deadmans hand ep (duh!)
out at tims
sorry no blog yessaday …i was knackered
got 3 really good new songs ready for ya
gonna be giving this away at gigs in u.s.
really u#23 ish songs
they said it couldnt be done
you know what
i found me a new singing style
a new way of writing words
tim n me what a pair
what a modus operandi
we sculpt songs from the living rock itself
words fly to me outta i know not where
who whispers all these words to me
we worked on these songs
the gardener
stardust
dakota
the kicker
mellotron
guitarama
i played pedal bass today…its a huge sound
tim changes things all the time
i write n write n write
now i’m tired
now i need to replenish my thoughts
now i need to relax a little
its been a long day
wow i worked hard
gee me n tim are good
the weathers nice too
see ya tomorrow
sk

somedays i feel there is nothing left to write
you know it all
you know me through n through dont you
you read about how i single handedly saved rocknroll
but as i was about to claim my rewards
some strange quirk undid me
i was robbed
if only if only if only
if only once
i sold my lies to you and charged you for poetry
who me….nah….i never done any of that stuff i said
wrestling boas in some mayan jungle…who me….?
i been sitting here all along
look i never ever left canberra
i just made it all up what i wanted
and somehow you the audience came to life
with lives you imagine youre having
look theres nothing out there but a soft quiet afternoon
the house is empty and mercifully silent
i alone with me
all of us sitting here
on the other end of some computer
the real steve kilbey died in a horrific crash
they have a contest to replace him
you dont see him for a while
suddenly they bring on this new geezer
a spritely old coot bearing little resemblance
to his supposed former self
suddenly there he is everywhere
with his white beard n floaty hair
whatever happened to the real guy?
he must of written loads of po before he go, you kno?
i mean thats the stuff theyre dishing out now kilbos old stuff
i mean i’m saying i’m not him
it was a different man etc
even tho those are not my words or anybodys
kilbey was a construct designed by engineers
but they got the ratios wrong
too much malarkey not enough “oooh mama its satday nite!’
anyway i must be raving on again
i’m glad they let me use this ancient computer once a week
in here
in my tower where i am imprisoned within my own life
i never did yoga
i never wrote songs
i never smoked dope
i never even kissed a girl
i’m a doctored photo
i’m a whole pack of lies for a poker hand
i’m a guess at what a real kilbey may say
things are going wrong up here
sometimes they forget to feed me
sometimes they forget to lock me up
and i wander freely through the cities of these worlds
but like all cagey birds i cant fend for myself
i need my keepers to feed me
i need their assent
i need the stern hand of the system to guide me
i need my 3 square meals and my 2 round abouts
ha ha ha
whatever it is it aint gonna happen here
typey typey typey
should do something used full
bye-i