One of the greater Western cultural impresarios of the last 40 years died on my 44th birthday the other day: Malcolm McLaren. He will be missed. I met him once in a Moroccan restaurant in Paris. Certain of his provocations, bands (not least Bow Wow Wow) and songs ('Madame Butterfly') are an indelible part of my earlier life, and his work in some ways influenced Tom Walsh and I when we worked on the Swifty Lazarus project a decade ago.
A poem for my mother, July 15 When she was dying And I was in a different country I dreamt I was there with her Flying over the ocean very quickly, And arriving in the room like a dream And I was a dream, but the meaning was more Than a dream has – it was a moving over time And land, over water, to get love across Fast enough, to be there, before she died, To lean over the small, huddled figure, In the dark, and without bothering her Even with apologies, and be a kiss in the air, A dream of a kiss, or even less, the thought of one, And when I woke, none of this had happened, She was still far distant, and we had not spoken.
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