Upside Down Snow

An old one. A long one. One that means the most.

They told me she was ill
N' on that bright to sterile Monday
Doctors came to take her away
Make her better they say
N I stared long into the night, under the hospital moon's glaring white and bright light
The fluorescent Ambulance trails gone
No longer bright
Make her better

When we went to visit her in hospital, my brother and me
(Our Dad left, when we were only three. You see?)
She was stick thin: sallow
Her breathing was laboured and desperate and shallow
In the to starched, to white hospital bed
She looked to starched, stiff and half dead
And inside I cried
Not outside
No I can't cry outside I've got to hide my tears cos he and she needs me strong
So inside cry and but never outside
And her skeleton breath racked her skeleton body and bloody hell she looked like lukewarm death
Make her better

School was hard
Hardly never went but when I did
They gave me shun- off looks and half pitied glares
I went to make sure that my bro was ok
And we walked home beneath chalked on clouds
And the watered veneer of day
"They got her better?" He asked
"No." I'd say.
Then he'd give me a f*g and an awkward brother punch
And me and the Camels would just sit and drown the night in smoke while he was out doing coke
And hell make her better

The pit we called home
Estate flat two stories up
Messed up, effed up and benefit ridden
Bad place and all but we managed
She was the tacky glue that held together our tattered home
N without her I was lost
Brother made money the wrong way
N I only saw him every couple days
She had been happy to
Smoking, laughing and drinking and joking
Soon though her smile faded like her lipstick
And she was tired and her life light was but a pinprick

Lung cancer
Black smoke had caught in there
Choking from the inside
And under no amount of cheap makeup that she could hide
And when she died
I died inside and outside
But only inside I cried
Why didn't you make her better?

I watched her go in the to white place
Brother weren't allowed in- drugs he was to high
He was arrested
I saw her ghost to
Like some bizarre snowflake
It fell from the concrete ground and rose to the Tarmac sky
I waved from the mud splattered hospital window
She tried to wave back but now was to high

Sent my brother a card
In jail he was
Years at the most
I was on my own now
Just me and the Camel's and an inside stream of tears
They spurted like eternal internal blood
Like some drunk I Tequila-ed and Vodka-ed away my unspent tears
My grief was thrown up in the (dirty) s****y bathroom and hangover hammered into my head

That's when the gang found me
My brother had been in it
They said that I could make money by mugging
By running errands
Getting them crack, weed, heroin and LSD
I was to drunk and broken to disagree
Soon switchblade in my hand
Dirty jobs and theoretically bloodied hands
Caged in shadows and alleyways and not free
Make me better

The only refuge I could find was the nights
The ones when the mornings still baby fresh
With bum bare, not there yet but happenin' sun
I would go and run
Not on the ground though
No
I would run up above with the stars
And the metal stars below were all just aluminium
Electric: constellations of cars
Up where the buildings and the sky were to incredibly sheer
Life is so fresh and sharp up here
Sharp as my concealed switchblade- knife edge air

The moon garrotted by clouds
The people below me
One dimensional shadow shrouds
The leaps and the jumps and the freedom
Gave me a high
A natural buzz more potent then any powder or drug
The jumps were perilous
The angles intense
But I flew like a bird on night mottled wings
And with my new secret joy
Strength came
And muscles bloomed, hence

I drew as well to make extra dough
My sketches were good
That's what mum had said
I had the liking for the macabre
The obscene undead
I got but pittance for my artistic endeavours
But filthy money rolled in from the gang
And in disgust I watched it criminal fall through my fingers
Like ruined, green peacock feathers

I've got a girl to
She met me through my art
Owns a tattoo parlour
Says that she wants me to design her one
I did as well
My best
It was a twisted skull with a crescent moon on its forehead
And with it's vampire teeth it bit down
On a heart inked blood red

We inked our love on each others skin
Bleeding out and out and in
I had a map on my back of my favourite haunt
The fastest most perilous free running track
And on my arms there was stars and red cars
A feather on my left wrist and a small skull on my right
It was my right that I waved my mother's ghost away
On that inside white, outside black death-night
I think I'm gonna be ok
I'm now held together by ink veins and a gentle love
And I can run
The gang is just an ugly festering thought now
I'll leave em
Somehow

That's when I found out
Gang's coming for me
Brother spragged them up in prison
They want revenge and that means
Kill me

I have to run
I took my tattoos
And kissed my short lived love life goodbye
I fled over the rooftops with a faded canvas bag
It held a sketch book, money wads, my Mum's old makeup
And some tattered memory's I found stuffed in my brother's sock draw
Smelled of cheese and feet but it was all I could find
In the nick of time I left
My Camel's in my pocket and switchblade in my sleeve
Run away and leave the ashes of my past life behind
Tears still bled inside
Years of tears bitter and un-cried

I didn't get far
Slept rough for a week
Had to share my nights with hobos and druggies
Dangerous, filthy, hungry men
I was grabbed from a doorway and I ran

Ran through car star constellations
Ran hard and fast
Carried only half a canvas bag
As the memories had fallen through a hole
So I ran alone but days of hunger took their toll

I was beaten and punched
Bloodied and broken
My veins ran red and black onto the streets
My tattoos started to shrivel and weep
And to their jeers I felt my inside tears fall outside at last
I felt peace and in my drug addled
Adrenaline heady mind
I was detached and floating free
The pain was just a dull thud
Though perpetual it didn't seemed to physically hurt me
In my mind I was dying but finally free

I realised I was dead
When I drifted like ghost smoke out of my mind, body and head
I left my killers with a haunting sonorous scream
And like a bizarre snowflake
I slipped from the ground
Linked hands with my Mum
And floated high
Upside down snow
I fell from the earth to the sky
Made me better