Youse here for the jazz or the rave? both

A vegan bar wow I am just going to stay here

Can I get a samosa, an onion bhaji and a crumptons oak please

a man with piercings picks up a purse and gives it to a girl with blue hair. He is thanked and smiles shyly.

we should go and listen to the jazz

dancing. that’s my lab technician!, he’s surely on holiday right now quelhomme musicologists with their hairy chests out in love not in hate and ponytail old men with boots and a backpack jiving holding hands with women and bumping bums with men. Geordies smoking geordies talking greeting hugging applauding singing encoring dissipating smiling touching saying goodbye coming back and leaving.

raving. In this black room I’m going to get stabbed by a needle in the rib. I see myself sinking to the ground like a foolish sorry lifedrunk child. My mind is leaving but for one moment still I can smile about the triumph and the despair that in the end is all equanimity and then I’m gone.

But no one stabs me, a man with big arms softly touches and slides switches on the board in front of him. He wears a cap and a tight top and has a shaved head. short skinny boys in big jumpers move their limbs gently in space and big men with beards in thick jackets sit on chairs in the back with their elbows on their knees. A foggy window looks on to a drop into some bushes and the lights of the city are blotches in the condensation and the cathedral on a hill is far away.

I think of Klute and your sway, although you think you’re in control you’re tall the fuck is he looking at oh he isn’t looking all right chilled someone looking at me faces close together you don’t know do you want to caress his cheek or lay him down on the floor a girl comes along pulls your arm you leave with a glare why do I why is this a place of hate I want to bounce off the walls because it wouldn’t hurt. I look around now and all I have is myself, the others are around me but they are not infringing and i don’t want to impose everyone in their little pouch soft like a blanket and warm and eventually you get a stitch and sweat on your brow and you leave for the smoking area where you can lean on a railing and look at the lights of the city much clearer now and yellow but still far away and quiet.