Debut single by Run Out Grooves (c) Black Coffee Records, 2024. Recorded at Sweet & Low studios, January 2024.

NOTHING GOLD

My box set of  The Wedding Present,
kept it safe for days but then he found it,
now there’s mud and rain upon the sleeve.

A triple vinyl, limited edition
of the 24 songs project.
Can’t I keep a single thing pristine?

My new James Lovegrove, hardback book  
where Sherlock Holmes does battle with the Great Old Ones
(perhaps the best one yet),

has dirt upon the page I’m reading
a smear across the endpapers, it won’t come off.
Why can’t my stuff ever just say clean?

Searching the web for Pangur Ban, I see an image all too familiar:
a grubby paw print mucking up a scribe’s best work.

Illuminated manuscript, ruined by a cat’s additions
back to the drawing board
for that guy, I think.

Paws on the page, down through the ages.
Robert Frost said it best:
“nothing gold can stay”.
Paws on the page, let go your rages
just embrace the entropy as every dawn becomes day.

My old guitar, of sentimental 
value, that I learned my rudimentary skills on,
(the other cat involved this time; I must be clear).

As I was moving that guitar, she started scratching
interfering with my new Wedding Present LP 
(aforementioned).

I tried to save the brand new Wedding Present LP
(pale grey vinyl) - keep it flawless.

The guitar fell. 
The head broke off. 
Nothing gold can stay.

Paws on the page, down through the ages
Robert Frost said it best:
"nothing gold can stay."
Paws on the page, let go your rages
just embrace the entropy as every dawn becomes day.

---

[Nature’s first green is gold,
Her hardest hue to hold.
Her early leaf’s a flower;
But only so an hour.
Then leaf subsides to leaf.
So Eden sank to grief,
So dawn goes down to day.
Nothing gold can stay.]

Dead Wax

Nothing Gold

The Night We Met
by Run Out Grooves

Recorded at Sweet & Low Jan-Feb 2024
(c) Black Coffee Records 2024
Published by Chapter & Verse

The night we met, I had walked down The Tything
Passing through the Saturday crowds like a tall ghost.
Conspicuous, dressed as St George, 
As if I had stepped from the cover of the Daily Express.
Ironic. I'm the least nationalist person I know.

My jingoistic attire was offset by the sage suede pixie boots. 
I had borrowed from my neighbour: 
One of the girls who lived on the other side of the flats.
It occurred to me I was walking around town in women’s shoes.
I didn’t mind; I was just glad of something to wear.

The night we met
Was cold and rainy,
Darker than your eyes
Darker than your eyes.

The sun which set
Behind the houses
Was about to rise
Was about to rise.

The night we me I saw you
Coming out of the greenhouse,
An exotic bird with jet black plumage,
Looking like you didn’t want to be seen.
Looking like a phantom which didn’t believe it existed.
Which didn’t want to be believed in.

You were like an orchid, closed against the sun,
Furled like a jet black umbrella still damp from the rain.
Your stealthy movements matte like well-applied mascara.
A vine of pale jewels clung to your dark skirt like mistletoe.

Chorus

The night we met we spoke by the radiator.
You pinned me to the fridge like a magnet.
Talking about postmodern poetry: ghazals, roundelays, sestinas…
I pretended I knew Paul Muldoon,
An educated guess, a wishful thought,
I suppose I must have seen a copy of Hay in Waterstones.

We went to the pub with the rest of them
And I offered you a drink, but as I had no pockets in my shining armour
I had decided to store my money in my velvet toe.
And you laughed as I took my shoe off to pay for your Diet Coke.
With a handful of warm change, the first of many disrobings.

Chorus

The night we met we had what people call “the night”.
Talking for hours to the exclusion of everyone around us.
Can we even remember any of their names?
“Dancing in the Moonlight” played somewhere, which seemed very far away to me,
But we didn’t dance, and we were indoors, so there was no moonlight.

We talked about Tate Modern, and Henri Mattisse’s cut outs. 
I didn’t know his fronds of seaweed waved 
in the depths of your mind ; watermarked your soul.
And we rejoiced over The Snail’s tightly wound rainbow.
A poster paint freak flag we would one day wave - together!

Chorus

The Night We Met

Recorded at Sweet & Low February 2024. (C) Black Coffee Records. Published by Chapter & Verse.

Verse Chorus Verse
By Run Out Grooves

Fake authenticates to real
Just as bitterness blossoms into sweet
The bargaining resolves into the deal
As disorder smartens into neat
And better always follows worse
Just as versus follows chorus 
and chorus follows verse

Night thins out into day
As death decays into birth
Work degrades into pay
And poverty is polished into worth
And better always follows worse
Just as versus follows chorus 
and chorus follows verse

Different tends to settle into same
And lying leaves a tidemark of the truth
Anonymous leaves behind a name
Just as age dissipates into youth
And better always follows worse
Just as versus follows chorus 
and chorus follows verse