Junkie Love Page 15

  I hate the fuckers who supposedly control this machine, who reap the benefits and look down from the heights with deep satisfaction, and it gives me great pleasure each time they fuck up and increasingly expose themselves to scrutiny. But in seeking to be neither sheep nor wolf I’ve actually ended up by becoming a cockroach — so where do I go from here? There has to be some other way besides compliance or callous exploitation — (out-and-out rejection and rebellion having led me to where I am now) — some kind of working around and between things, of finding and making contact with people who have similar ideas, but have found some way to exist creatively at the margins without succumbing to negativity and despair. I guess it’s a hard, lonely road to travel, and you will have to live by your wits and instincts if you choose to take it — no company pension or health schemes; no pay-scales or annual increments — but I suppose being a junkie for ten years is good training for this.

  I’ll second-guess the power-addicts and control-freaks, the greed-heads and anal-retentive manager types all the way down the fucking line; and even if it means I end up shadow-boxing my own reflection in an infinitely receding hall of mirrors, it’s got to be more interesting and rewarding than what I’m doing right now. But for the moment, I’m just going to concentrate on getting well. Once the drugs are out of my system, I’ll teach myself how to think and feel again; and then I’ll take a long, hard look, and see how the world appears from the other side of the street.

  PHIL SHOENFELT was born in Bradford, England, in December 1952. After colliding with the London punk scene in the mid-1970s, he moved to New York where he lived and played in several bands, such as Khmer Rouge, and was active on the downtown Manhattan arts scene. Returning to London in 1984, he continued making music until encroaching heroin addiction brought a temporary halt to all such activity. Finally kicking the habit after eleven years, he embarked upon a solo career and in 1995 moved to Prague, where he currently lives. In recent years he has produced several CDs of his music on various independent labels: solo; with his band Southern Cross; and with the Berlin-based Australian group The Fatal Shore. Junkie Love is Shoenfelt’s second book. His first, a collection of his poetry and song lyrics entitled The Green Hotel, was published in 1998.

  The author would like to gratefully thank laura conway, curtis matthew, and howard sidenberg for their suggestions on the manuscript, and lubor mat’a, luboš snížek, and “zero” for their support and assistance.