sugar coated peach rings

Burroughs would have walked these streets looking to score. Score 14 year old rent boys or some of that junk. Of course it would not have been hard, even now drug dealers hiss like cobra’s from their dark corners to catch your attention as you walk by. The only difference is the cobra hisses in self defence, whereas in Tangier one (an unexperienced tourists at least) feels as though he is defending himself from these cobras.
Stepping up the steep slime wet alley’s your back foot slides out from beneath you as your front foot catches the weight. Everyone slides out every now and then, I’ve noticed, but you must keep your wit about you. Stay up, maybe even growl a little, this is a pirate town. In the odd opening between alleys, where there seems to be a missing building, bright green weeds fight for ground area. Fighting with trash, dumpsters, whitegoods, black goods and reeking food scraps. Mainly stray cats are the inhabitancies here. They are scared as anything whilst ripping at the last bit of fish head that they had to creep out of hiding for. The strays so much as see a shadow approaching and they’ll curl over like a child about to get beat up by a mother who’s flipped out and lost herself for a crazed moment. They’ll freeze in the shrubs hoping the passer by can not see them, but I can. Their eyes are shinning and open as wide as a cat’s eyes can go, staring with terror at what they conceive as their last minutes on this scrap heap island. Mainly cats, but every now and then you will see human life amongst these shrubs. I say human life but they seem to act more like the cats than the humans. Their soil covered faces pop out behind the dumpster just like the cats; and the eyes are just like the cats, a bone chilling stare waiting till you pass to get back to their nibbles. These men are not just your ordinary “homeless” men. They growl, crawl and scratch themselves rummaging through the weeds, not only do they not care what others think but it’s as if they are not even aware the others exist.

There are the shady characters by the docks, with their baggy robes, hoods over their heads, their husky voices trying to convince you they can get you anything you please.
“Bonjour, ca vas? Mi amigo” they try to guess where you come from.
“You want hash? You want taxi? Rent car, cheap hotel, tour guide, something else, anything?”
Or further down along the beach the clean shaven denim jacket wearing homosexuals walk looking like they’ve just returned from a night club running fingers through their greased hair. They point to their wrists and ask the time. I soon learn this is the way of saying “hello”, and I guess if you say yes you are in for some Moroccan man action. Luckily I forgot my watch. Unluckily I’m afraid to ask anyone for the time now. I try to guess by the sun, which is proving hard in grey skied Tangier.

I wonder if Burroughs used the “what’s the time” technique. Buroughs must have walked these streets looking to score junk and homosexuals. I walk the streets looking for candy and chocolate (no, not slang for anything. sugary candy and creamy milk chocolate). I always get a craving for something sweet after a hearty meal. I wish to fulfil it even if it means jeopardising my disguise of a careless tough guy in an effort to intimidate the pirates before they intimidate me.
Bill scored junk I score junk food. I Search the corner stores and markets for a hit while rambling to myself in my best slow grumbling Burroughs impression.
“Sugar coated peach rings are a personal favourite of mine. I recall my first experience with peach rings when I was around fourteen years of age, a boy from school had brought along a 100 gram packet to a lunch time circle. This kid we called “the fish”, for reasons unclear to me. I’d have called him “the snake”. His hair was perfectly straight and parted and he smelt of pack lunch…banana and peanut butter, he was despicable. But this one glorious lunch time he pulled out from his god damn red polished lunch box, this pack of sour sugar coated peach rings.”
I stopped rambling for a while as I stepped into one of the corner stores. I walk through to 5 loud Moroccans sitting around on stools, they stop laughing and shouting when they see me, and just stare. I quickly browse the almost empty shelves with my eyes but really pay no attention to what is on them. Clearly performing that they do not have what I am looking for I back away and step back out onto the dusty step outside. I turn and keep walking down the street dodging a robed man on his motorcycle.
“Sugar coated peach rings hit the tip of the tongue first, upon experiencing this sudden rush of sour the saliva glands swell and ooze an excess amount of saliva which spreads the sugar granules throughout the sections of the mouth, behind the teeth and back of the throat. The user is now, almost instantly, in a state of pleasure and in a few minutes will experience what they call in the business ‘a sugar rush”

so far, so good.

Some time has passed since I have returned from abroad. I had grown accustomed to it there; it was familiar to be in a strange place not knowing exactly where I am. I would wander in an ambiguous blur of smog, strangers, overwhelming landscapes and curious social activity.
It was hypnotising. Almost paralysing. For the most part, I just simply drifted along with it all, like a salesman drifts on his way to a routine day at the office, his head swaying and bumping along with the rhythm of the train as he stares out the window, staring at the world flickering by, but really seeing nothing at all.
And, so as to not allow the ‘drift’ to drag my mind through the blur I would purposely stop and force myself to recognise how pleasantly absurd it all was. I’d find myself consciously trying to form a memory. I would squint my eyes and pan through the surroundings, inhale and absorb all I could then delicately tattoo it onto my memory, more or less, the way I wanted to remember it. I loved these moments and would try to create them as often as I remembered to. I found that music is a good facilitator for this activity; a melody or phrase acting as the ink in my tattoo gun.
Sometimes if I’m lucky I’d get a little bonus occurrence in my memory-making moment. Like a high flying bird, apparently flying in slow motion; or a train with an endless amount of carriages speeding past some godforsaken backdrop, as if through a photograph. It made goose bumps, it made me smile and made everything better.


I sat on a grassy cliff top one time, below me roared the sea, sharing my field of vision with the overcast sky and far behind me a small deserted fishing village. The setup was almost perfect.
I had just started to feel very pleased with myself, pretending this part of the world was my own. No sooner had I made this declaration than I spotted a head appearing in the distance where the cliffs mellowed out into scalable rocks. It was a girl or perhaps a young woman; it was hard to tell from this distance. Her whole body suddenly emerged. She was carrying two suitcases and wearing a beret. She stopped and looked around while slowly spinning. She made two full rotations and sat down. I wasn’t sure if she had noticed me.
I whistled along to some vibraphone melody. It sounded a bit silly and a touch too sweet but suited the mood nicely. We shared the view for over an hour. She was so far away but it felt like we were sitting together.

fear and beauty.

lynx and hare.