PoV Magazine issue 1 by Benjamin Turner

Streets New WRITING POETRY ART PHOTOGRAPHY on a common theme

Cover image by J端rgen B端rgin SPECIAL THANKS: Emma Seymour for a being proof-reading-wonder-kid Railroad Poetry Project for introducing us to some amazing talent (http://railroadpoetryproject.wordpress.com)

WELCOME TO ISSUE ONE Ben, left, and Chris

Hello and welcome to PoV

we’re happy to have you on board By some daring means (probably involving an evil wizard and possibly a troll) you have found your way here, to issue one of PoV Magazine. Congratulations and don't worry you can relax now, your work is done. Just sit back – making sure you can still see the screen – and we'll look after you. As this is the first time we've met we should probably introduce ourselves and give you a bit of background. We're Ben and Chris, the co-creators of PoV, it's nice to meet you. Ben is a designer (in fact he designed the pages of this very magazine) who also dabbles in the worlds of photography and slightly-bad-eyesight. Chris is a film editor who more than just dabbles in the world of writing and is also trying to break the record for most tea drunk in 10 minutes.* PoV is a quarterly, themed magazine where you provide the content. We will choose a theme for every issue and let our contributors loose to do with it what they will. It's a chance for people to create what they want to, not something for their bosses at work and the only stipulation is to make it fit the theme. Oh, and it helps if it's really great. Got it? Good. So this is issue one, the theme is STREETS and you're in for a treat. Our contributors come from all over the world – the UK, Holland, Germany and the US to name a few – so expect a few ‘centres’ along with one or two ‘centers’. We’ve got some stunning art and illustrations, awesome photography, some excellent poetry AND the best new writing around. I mean, come on, what are you waiting for?

Ben Turner and Chris Pilkington Founders of the feast Visit: www.povmagazine.co.uk Follow: @pov_magazine Email: hello@povmagazine.co.uk *He’s up to 18 mugs

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WELCOME: CONTENTS

6 10

MEET THE CONTRIBUTORS NEW YORK STREET PHOTOGRAPHY

By James Maher

30 37 38 54

IT ISN’T WHAT YOU THINK

Director Tom Morgan on homelessness

A STREET DREAM

By Chris Pilkington

TAPE ART

Max Zorn shows off his stunning street art

STORIES FROM THE STREET PART ONE

Two extracts from Joe Clifford’s memoir

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PASSING OUT // PASSING BY

Photographs on the streets of London by Ben Turner

MOBILE REVOLUTION

The Twitterati’s view on a year of protest and demonstration by Emma Seymour

MY CHILDHOOD STREET

Sgt. Pilko takes a walk down memory lane

STREET POETRY PART ONE

By Jade Leaf Willetts

SCRATCHING THE SURFACE

Photography on the streets of Tel Aviv by Daniel D. Moses

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THE ARRANGED LINE OF BRICK BOXES FOR PEOPLE STORAGE

Chris Pilkington takes a look behind closed doors

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STREET ART OR A FORM OF INTERNATIONAL UNDERGROUND COMMUNICATION?

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THE STORYTELLER

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Elly Lacey uncovers a mystery

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Sony world.. photographer of the year .. nominee Jurgen Burgin

STORIES FROM THE STREET PART TWO

Two true events from the life of Tom Pitts

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STREET SPECTRE

Nothing is straightforward for Sgt. Pilko, even a stroll to the shops

RIVIERA-ON-THAMES

Illustrations by Chris Mount

VOX POP

Ben Turner has a chat on Brick Lane

CONCRETE COMPANION

By Jeff Chandler

THE LASTING EVENT

A short story by Chris Pilkington

THE TEA AND TOAST CLUB

This issue’s topic: My streets as a kid

STREET POETRY PART TWO

By Kyrsten Bean

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SAY HELLO TO WELCOME: MEET THE CONTRIBUTORS

Kyrsten Bean

Kyrsten Bean is a writer and a musician. She pens freelance articles for publications, including Groovemine and Bound by Ink. Her poems have been published in Children, Churches and Daddies, The Railroad Poetry Project, Amphibi.us, The Camel Saloon, The Delinquent, Breadcrumb Scabs, Gutter Eloquence, Censored Poets and others. She writes to motivate artists, writers and musicians to keep going in spite of difficulty at thestifledartist.com. More than anything, she encourages people to try and fail over and over again, because as Steven Pressfield put it in The War of Art: “because this is war, baby. And war is hell.” Kyrsten’s homepage: http://thestifledartist.com/

.. .. Jurgen Burgin

Jürgen Bürgin was born in Lörrach in Germany in 1971. He was studying German literature, linguistics and economy in Freiburg and received a degree at the Albert-Ludwigs Universität in Freiburg in 1998. He began to work in the movie business in Berlin in 1999 as public relations manager for a film PR agency and has since participated in the PR for numerous movie releases in Germany. In 2009 he started to develop his passion as an urban photographer, since then shooting in Berlin, Barcelona, Paris, London and New York. He is publishing his work on his webpage and on his vivid Facebook fanpage with more than 3,300 fans. On Twitter he is being followed by more than 10,000 followers, on Google+ more than 20,000. In 2011 he was shortlisted for a Sony World Photography Awards in the category After Dark. Jürgen’s homepage: http://www.juergenbuergin.com/ On Facebook: http://goo.gl/1W92H On Twitter: @JuergenBuergin http://goo.gl/829c4

Jeff Chandler

Joe Clifford

Jeff currently lives in London where he works as a professional actor and singer. Being faced with a crossroads in his life, he began to write. His weekly blog entitled ‘Malleable Reality’ marries together his passion for writing and photography covering love, life and everything in between.

Joe Clifford is the producer of Lip Service West, a “gritty, real, raw” reading series in Oakland, CA. His work has appeared in Big Bridge, the Connecticut Review, Shotgun Honey, Thuglit, Word Riot, and Underground Voices, among others. He has been to jail but never prison.

Jeff’s blog: http://goo.gl/45E2a

Joe’s rants and writing can be found at: http://goo.gl/B1Njh And on his homepage: http://www.joeclifford.com

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TO OUR Elly Lacey

James Maher

Tom Morgan

Daniel D. Moses

Elly has left the shores of Blighty for that place across the pond. You know, the US of something. Anyway, she’s having a marvellous time and has rather come to love writing again; whether it’s about her incredible adventures on her blog, as a prolific tweeter or in her e-newsletter (‘e’ for Elly and electronic - clever huh?) to her friends back home. She’s written a few press releases in her time too but is quite enjoying being on the dark side for now. She also couldn’t live without potatoes.

James is a freelance studio and fine art street photographer based in New York City. He credits his inspiration to the city’s endless supply of characters roaming the streets as well as to the unique and magical moments that can be found on a daily basis on every single street corner.

Tom Morgan is the producer of These Storied Streets, a documentary film about homelessness in the United States due out in April of 2012.

James’ homepage: www.jamesmaherphotography.com

On Twitter: @storiedstreets http://goo.gl/rqVW6

Daniel D. Moses is a London based freelance photographer and filmmaker and has directed comedy, music videos, short films, campaign films and virals. With a reportage style that has been described as “non intrusive, but very inclusive” he strives to capture dynamic imagery, whilst creating engaging narratives that allow messages to be heard and stories to be told better.

Elly’s blog: http://goo.gl/74dl2

On facebook http://goo.gl/pZsor On Google+ http://goo.gl/hJgA1

These Storied Streets homepage: http://www.storiedstreets.com/ On Facebook: http://goo.gl/glUKL

Tom’s blog: http://goo.gl/FhaOJ

Daniel’s homepage: http://www.danielmoses.com

On Twitter @jamesmaherphoto http://goo.gl/RJuwb

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SAY HELLO TO WELCOME: MEET THE CONTRIBUTORS

Chris Mount

Chris Pilkington

Tom Pitts

Emma Seymour

When not illustrating for new up and coming magazines, Chris can be found bringing audio / visual delights to the world as one half of DJ/VJ/AV collective Fade In Fade Out. If you call between 9 and 5, he’ll be shaping the future of web and mobile design in sunny Maidenhead.

A drummer, father and husband, he is a film editor and cocreator of PoV. A staunch fan of tea drinking thanks to his father that has also led him on many a journey and occupation. Having worked as a removal man, trolley collector and paint mixer he finally found his calling when rediscovering his creative spark during the re-wiring of his stereo. As a film editor he is highly creative and yet loves the techy stuff, plus very grateful for a job that allows him to drink lots of tea. Currently playing drums in one of the UK’s few Cajun/ Zydeco bands Rough Chowder, he can be found looking online at vintage drums of the Premier/ Beverley/Ludwig/Slingerland variety. He has a dislike of buttons (pearlescent ones on shirts in particular) and looking smart.

Tom received his education firsthand on the streets of San Francisco. His work has appeared in Junk (a literary fix), Shotgun Honey, A Twist of Noir, and others. Look for him in upcoming issues of Darkest before Dawn and The Sims Review. He’s also a popular contributor at SF’s reading series Lip Service West.

Emma Seymour is a writer and journalist based in London. Starting out as a reporter on regional newspapers in Kent and the capital, she now works in corporate publishing. Her heart lies in writing about real life, people and what makes them tick. Other interests include human rights, politics, animal welfare and international development.

Tom’s blog: http://tom-pitts.blogspot.com/

Read her Only Human blog at: http://goo.gl/Tuygf

Fade In Fade Out homepage: http://www.fadeinfadeout.co.uk/

Check his drumming: http://www.roughchowder.co.uk And some of his video work: http://goo.gl/0KSP4

Contact Tom: revtompitts@gmail.com

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TO OUR Sgt. Pilko

Ben Turner

Jade Leaf Willetts Max Zorn

Born in the wrong century, I’m the type who would love to harp on about exotic foreign trips, filled with peculiar women who have tempted my gaze with silver trays laden with shiny puddings. But alas the nearest I have come to this was to be holding the form for a trip to poke a peasant whilst he clutched at his Nokia 3310...

Film lover / book reader / music listener / Stephen Fry worshipper / photographer / designer. Oh and co-creator of this very magazine, thanks for reading by the way. Having worked on corporate publications for the last few years where everything you do is checked by the complete and utter hell that is a “Branding Team” this is a breath of fresh air. A chance to design something I love with content by people I admire. Can’t ask for more than that eh? I also make film posters for the films you love. You should look at them with your eyes and maybe let your heart buy one. Or two.

Jade Leaf Willetts is a writer, artist and musician. He blogs at What would Neal Do? and is currently in the process of setting up the Jade Leaf Willetts Poetry Protest. This is not so much a protest, more another weird idea that he justifies in the ‘name of writing’. It basically involves him trying to convince strangers to create videos to showcase his work.

The only way to contact Sgt. Pilko is by séance

Jade’s blog http://jlwilletts.wordpress.com/

Ben’s homepage: http://www.ben-turner.co.uk

Born in Amsterdam in 1982 I haven’t much memory of the city as it was back then because – due to my father’s job – we moved in 1986 and wouldn’t stay more than two years at one place. Interestingly I have lately found a scratch book with a bunch of photos I took of different street lamps around the world during these years of travelling and I remember how intrigued I was back then about the fact that lights would give each city a very unique atmosphere. At least by night. Well, that might have been an initial trigger for the idea to use street lights as an unused but perfect exhibition spot for street art. When I moved back to Amsterdam a year ago I finally realized the idea to use lamps as a natural canvas. I started with different materials, well, obviously the tape was the winner eventually.

ributors On Twitter: @benturner83 http://goo.gl/DjLo8

Max’s homepage: http://www.maxzorn.com/

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New York was his town and it always would be...

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THE STREETS OF NEW YORK: JAMES MAHER

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THE STREETS OF NEW YORK: JAMES MAHER

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THE STREETS OF NEW YORK: JAMES MAHER

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THE STREETS OF NEW YORK: JAMES MAHER

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THE STREETS OF NEW YORK: JAMES MAHER

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THE STREETS OF NEW YORK: JAMES MAHER

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THE STREETS OF NEW YORK: JAMES MAHER

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THE STREETS OF NEW YORK: JAMES MAHER

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THE STREETS OF NEW YORK: JAMES MAHER

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HOMELESSNESS: TOM MORGAN

IT ISNâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;T WHAT YOU THINK

Nobody wants to be homeless

You may think this is a statement of the obvious. But in 250 hours of interviews I conducted this year on this topic, one of the most common things that people believe about the homeless is that they want to be homeless. See opening statement. As someone who had no previous experience with homelessness but who has since over the past year immersed

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himself into a documentary film on the topic, I thought I would share seven things that I think any smart, well-read, socially-aware person needs to know. 1. The leading cause of homelessness in the US is lack of affordable housing.

On average, states have seen an increase in minimum wage of 9% since 2000. Rents, on the other hand, have increased on average 41% in the same time period. Further contributing to the issue has been the lack of up-keep and the ageing of current affordable housing units. It is estimated that over the next four years 300,000 units will

Mark is homeless in Denver. He picks through dumpsters looking for metal scraps he can take to the recycling center, getting pennies per pound

be lost due to expiring contracts and lack of funding. The most impactful statistic is from the National Low Income Housing Coalition. Their research shows that currently there is no county in the US where even a one bedroom apartment at fair market rent is affordable for a person working fulltime at minimum wage. 2. Logically, the second leading cause of homelessness is the lack of a livable wage.

Several of the homeless we interviewed had full time jobs, and they were still homeless. If you were lucky enough to be employed, particularly in these

economic times, you most likely are making minimum wage. Half of all of the jobs created in the US right now are minimum wage. If you are making the minimum wage, you need to work 89 hours a week in order to afford an average two bedroom apartment in the average city, based on affordable housing guidelines. This flies direct in the face of the passerby who yells out to the person on the street, “Get a job!” The answer is, yes, we need to give them a job but we have to pay wages that allow everyone to afford a place to live. Hand-in-hand with liveable wage is the notion of how one “gets out” of homelessness. This sounds so simple

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(get employed, find a home) but quickly becomes a dizzying logistical dance. You can’t get a place without an ID. Getting some form of an ID is more difficult that it sounds. Depending on where you live, identification costs a minimum of $10, and if you are lucky to have the money, you also need to have to have an address. Here is the Catch-22. You cannot get an ID without an address, but you can’t get an address without an ID. Then, if you have no home, you have no place to store belongings – interviewing for jobs with the clothes on your back puts you at a serious disadvantage. Even if you get the job, your first paycheck doesn’t arrive for two weeks. During that two weeks you may not have the money to eat or for transportation to and from the job. Here is a true example that I saw first hand that illustrates what I am talking about. I met a man named Ted who, on the day we met, was going in for a second interview at an oil change garage. He was really excited about the opportunity, as he had previously worked as a manager at a competitor. A few days later I saw Ted sitting on a bench mid-day. I asked him how it went. He proceeded to tell me that he had got the job that day, and was really excited. He lived at the shelter, which had no place for him to keep his clothes, but a local church had agreed to let him a locker there. For his first day, he had to get up at 4:30 am, catch the bus to the church, change his clothes and “bathe” in the sink. Then he caught another bus across town to work. “The first day went pretty well,” he said. At lunch he sat outback and drank water, as there was not a soup kitchen or anything nearby. When the day was over, Ted hopped on the bus and rode across town to the shelter. He arrived too late to get in and so he had to stay under a nearby overpass. Because he missed dinner he “scrapped” meaning he went through the dumpsters outback of restaurants looking for food. The next day, he was up at 4 am and back on the bus. When he got to the church, someone had moved his clothes. He panicked. He told me “The last thing I wanted was

HOMELESSNESS: TOM MORGAN for anyone at the job to know I was homeless.” Realizing the time, he ran out to the bus stop – just in time to see the bus pull away. He called his boss and explained that he had missed the bus and that he would be 30 minutes late. When he got to work, his boss let him go stating, “You really need to learn to be punctual and responsible if you want to hold a job.” Ted told me the story with tears welling up in his eyes. I asked if I could call the manager. I think, initially, Ted thought I was calling to confirm his story. Instead I was calling to ask the manager to reconsider. I explained that he had an opportunity to really make an impact, to help this man who was homeless get back on his feet. I went on to say how excited Ted had been for the opportunity and explained what had made him late. There was a pause, then his response, which I can still hear as if he were talking to me now. He said, “If I had known he was homeless, I would have never hired him in the first place.” Then, a click on the other end of the phone. 3. Drug and alcohol addiction is not in the top five reasons people become homeless

It is true that of the chronic homeless – which is a small portion of the overall homeless population – drug and alcohol addiction is higher. However, the chronic homeless are only 25% of the overall homeless population and of all those who are homeless and struggle with addiction nearly half became addicted after they became homeless. 4. More than 3.5 million people will experience homelessness in the US this year. Over 1.5 million of them will be children.

Some estimate the actual number of homeless to be much higher – closer to 5 million people. That makes homelessness the 22nd largest state in the US. Surprising to me was that there is no standard method of counting the homeless; the politics around how we count tends to get more air time that the issue of homelessness itself. The government count is through

Housing and Urban Development (HUD) which consists of a count in January of anyone at a shelter and those they can find outside. The count is done every two years. This does not include those living out of motels, cars, campgrounds, or anyone doubled up. It also doesn’t take into account any of those who become homeless and get off the streets in less than two years. Interestingly, because of the new McKinney Vento Act, we count children who are in temporary housing situations differently now but do not include their parents – who are in the same situation – as homeless.

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5. There are four to six times as many animal shelters in the US as there are human shelters.

This statistic pains me. There is a shortage of beds for the homeless across the country yet we care more for animals? I saw this first hand in Virginia Beach where they have criminalized homelessness by issuing tickets to people who sleep outside between 8:00 pm and 8:00 am or who are caught panhandling. Because there is little shelter space, many are forced to hide in the woods. If the woods are owned by the city, the police come through and issue tickets for trespassing and

Jose who was abandoned by his family at 14, lived in the football stands of his high school stadium. Through the help of a Las Vegas organization he graduated high school and is in his first year of college

The homeless are bankers, grandmothers, middle-class, administrators, teachers and they come from every walk of life cut down any tents or camps they may have. One particular stand of trees served as a makeshift camp for as many as 100 homeless in Virginia Beach. The city bought the land, pushed out the homeless, cut down the trees, and built a $10 million no-kill animal shelter. This is a city that says they don’t have the money to build a human shelter, but was able to find public funds to build an animal shelter and displace homeless families with nowhere to go. 6. The fastest growing demographic of the homeless

population is the family.

With not nearly enough shelters to accommodate a family, more and more find themselves living in cars, tents, motels (when they can afford to), or other make-shift accommodations. The majority of shelters split up men and women, adults and children, leaving families with no options other than to go to separate shelters, often miles apart, with no means to communicate. 7. Many of the homeless have lead lives just like yours. It could truly be you or I one day.

The homeless are bankers,

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grandmothers, middle-class, administrators, teachers and they come from every walk of life. Many of those we interviewed had lead lives that were not so unlike mine, and then, as if hit by a bolt of lightning, events conspired to change their course. In some cases, an injury or an illness, a loss of a job or a relationship, or a natural disaster that had destroyed their homes, their businesses and left them with nothing. Some, of course, described households where parents were alcoholics or addicts, others were abandoned at a young age, and yet others told stories of horrific abuse which caused them to run with homelessness being a better alternative to remaining in an abusive home. Several recounted their dreams as kids of what they hoped they would be. Many talked about their plan to get housed and what they were doing to get there. And almost all talked about the shame and humiliation they experienced in being homeless. Homelessness is right outside your window, on your way to work, in the bus station, on the Tube right in front of us. The issue is massive and making change seems like it will require unlimited resources, willpower and tenacity of the masses. But it will not be because our governments have figured out what to do – it will occur when we decide as individuals that we want to do something about it. Squelch the stereotypes that fuel unfounded fear that holds you back from helping. Figure out what you can do, and do it. Mardy Gilyard, homeless as a college student and now a professional football player for the St. Louis Rams, summed it up. “When I was living in my car and I was hungry, I prayed a lot. I wasn’t praying for a god to come down, scoop me up and give me a home. I was just praying for a god to walk across that parking lot and hand me a sandwich.” Get involved, volunteer, figure out what you can do on your own, do something. I mean really, we could all walk across a parking lot and hand someone a sandwich.

QUOTE SPACE: BEN TURNER

Subu

urbia Bill Vaughan

BORED? LONELY? WEEKS BEFORE THE NEXT PoV MAGAZINE COMES OUT? Well chin up, stop sitting staring blankly at the wall and log on to the PoV Symposium, a brand new site from the minds behind PoV Magazine. The PoV Symposium is the place to go to keep you entertained between issues with more amazing work from our brilliant contributors and we want you to get involved. If you’ve been inspired to write a short story or poem, take a photo or paint a picture by the themes of the magazine send them to us on hello@povmagazine.co.uk and you could see your work online. The PoV Symposium – better than a poke in the eye.

HTTP://POVSYMPOSIUM.TUMBLR.COM

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DREAM A LITTLE DREAM: CHRIS PILKINGTON

STREET DREAM Picture this:

It is the early 1990’s, not sure where exactly, well I know where geographically, it is my bedroom and at night but I ‘m talking about the year and exact date. I had been watching ‘The Bill’. Even though I hated the program at that young age I still watched it. I am asleep in the night with thoughts of Scalextric and the like of which I would never own beyond the basic figure of 8 metro set, when my brain decides to descend into the real dream world. Now we all have this but I am lucky to experience very vivd dreams/hallucinations and suffer from mild “Parasomnia”. This means I often wake confused, or wake up but still dreaming so that reality and dreams merge, I sleep walk, talk and jump out of bed in fright for no reason. I have woken up to the sound of someone shouting in the room, possibly me or someone in my dream – all sorts. It’s loads of fun and probably has something to do with fragile/volatile brain chemistry and a penchant for licking batteries as a child. I want to relate a street based dream that has remained as clear as day to me since I woke from having it nearly 20 years ago. The scene: two coppers from

The Bill, not sure who one is but the other is good old Reg. Now I know that in the dream they are in london, sitting in orange and white striped deck chairs in the middle of the road chatting idly. They are sat near a manhole cover with the lid off. They are searching for a missing boy who was lost/missing and had been reported last seen entering the sewer system. I can still recall the loud thud/metal dong of something hitting a metal pipe. The two spring into action and enter the sewer. They emerge soon after with the boy, but his head is missing. I replay the boy being washed along a current of sewer water and impacting into an over hanging pipe. No blood or gore just noise and the feeling of shock. Up on street level there appeared to be one solution to saving the boy’s life, Reg and co accost a street cleaner and hassle him for his broom and take 10 inches off the top of the handle and insert it into the open neck wound of the boy. Next thing I see is a press conference, again the middle of the same road in which the now broomhandled-headed boy is nodding to questions and gesticulating with his hands in answer to questions. It was at that point I awoke screaming.

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By Max Zorn

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Deciding to work with tape instead of paint was inspired by a friend who worked as a car designer. These guys often use slim tapes to outline their ideas on large boards. I was surprised to see how fast they could create stunning sketches with it. The last few years has seen that kind of tape-art also conquer the streets as a new form of urban art. However, it is widely practised by using colored tape on walls or streets. The idea to use light as a medium was born during a nightly run through Amterdam. The nice old street lamps with their golden light seemed perfect to be used as an open gallery for the first test of my modified tape-art. The installation was very simple by just clamping the taped glass onto street lamps. Once the light illuminates the many layers of tape it creates a very graphic picture that seems to be selfglowing. All that is needed are flexible Plexiglass, some brown translucent tape and a cutter. The rest is taping, cutting, taping, cuttingâ&#x20AC;Ś

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TAPE ART: MAX ZORN

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TAPE ART: MAX ZORN

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TAPE ART: MAX ZORN

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TAPE ART: MAX ZORN

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TAPE ART: MAX ZORN

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TAPE ART: MAX ZORN

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TAPE ART: MAX ZORN

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streets? it’s as much about the context of the writer and writer’s mind as it is the content.

STORIES from the STREETS Part one

In which Tom Pitts introduces the work of

Joe Clifford

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Introduction by Tom Pitts

I first met Joe in a horrific house that was widely known as Hepatitis Heights. I initiated our friendship by offering half of a very healthy speedball (sharing anything was very unusual for junkies of our ilk). No wonder he warmed up to me so fast. It wasn’t long after that I heard Joe refer to me as “just a thug.” (Although later that same day I saw him leap across the room and attack a poor soul for trying to rip him off.) For a delicate flower such as I was, I took the tough guy reference as a compliment. Joe and I soon became thick as thieves, quite literally in this case. Beyond sharing a spoon, we were stealing, scamming, and scoring on a daily basis. We didn’t talk about books. We didn’t talk about music. We mostly just fretted over the next fix. One day, as Joe and I sat sick on a street corner, anxiously awaiting the arrival of the man, he said to me, “Tom, you know, later, when you’re in some rehab somewhere, it’ll be moments like these that we’ll miss the most.” That always stuck with me. There was a sick camaraderie there, a form of friendship that could not have blossomed under any other circumstance. Years later when Joe resurfaced, we found ourselves still friends, bonded with a kind of post traumatic stress syndrome that only street junkies can appreciate. It is no small miracle that we can both be here, alive, and able to share the stories that the ones who didn’t make it out will never tell. You can find some documentation of this madness in the excerpts from his heartbreaking memoir, Candy and Cigarettes, at www.joeclifford.com

CLOSE CALLS PT.III From the memoir, Candy & Cigarettes

I hit the street in search of Becky’s car. I need to find food or at least some sugar. It is the middle of the night. Becky is in jail. She skipped her court date for the Safeway arrest and they picked her up during sweeps’ week. When I get to the car, I find Gavin in the back.

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This happens a lot since I broke the locks. I’ll come out of some skid row hotel or music studio and one of my homeless friends will be sleeping in the back. Gavin isn’t sleeping, though. He’s tweaking on speed, cutting up magazines under a penlight, like a kidnapper pasting ransom demands, a mad scientist piecing together the keys to the universe in an old parked car. I ask Gavin if he has any needles on him. I won’t drive with needles. He says he doesn’t and slinks to get in front with me. Inside the 7-11, Gavin stalks the aisles, wheezing with asthma, which draws the attention of the clerk, since it is just the two of us in there. Watching Gavin move is fascinating. With

STORIES FROM THE STREETS: PART ONE – JOE CLIFFORD those metal rods stretching his neck and atrophied muscles pinning his gimpy arm to his chest, he shuffles along like a retarded runt Tyrannosaurus. I look like shit, I know that. I am underweight and the opiates have drained most of the blood from my face. I probably haven’t showered in a while and my clothes are filthy, but I am still a handsome man if you can look past the minor skin eruptions, and that counts for something. Besides, next to Gavin, anybody looks good. While I am filling a Big Gulp and contemplating stealing a Twinkie, two cops walk in. I hear one of them say the word “tweaked,” and know we are fucked. After we pay, we walk out to find the cops searching the back of the car. They don’t need warrants for people like us. When Gavin was arrested in Sacramento six months ago, they brought him into a back room. There was a football helmet on the floor. When he asked what it was for, the cops told him to shut up and put it on. He put it on, and they beat the shit out of him with billy clubs. The cops tell us to put our hands on the car. They ask me if there are any needles inside. I say no. One of the cops says if he pricks his finger on one of our diseased needles he is bashing our skulls in. I tell them there are no needles. They search the car and find Gavin’s needles. I am livid. Not at the cops. I am used to this. I am furious at Gavin for lying to me. The bigger of the two strides up next to me. Hand on his gun, he asks whose car this is. I say it’s mine, I mean my girlfriend’s. He tells me to put my hands behind my back. I am starting to, when his partner comes up and grabs me, spins me around, jabs a

mean finger into my chest. “What the fuck is wrong with you, kid?” he says. “Don’t you know you catch HIV from this shit?” I know that. I get tested at the free clinic, a lot. It scares the hell out of me every time. But I do it, faithfully, anxiously awaiting the results and its possible walking death sentence. “I don’t have HIV,” I tell him. “Yeah?” he says. “How the fuck do you know?”

“the cops tell us to put our hands on the car. They ask me if there are any needles inside. i say no. one of the cops says if he pricks his finger on one of our diseased needles he is bashing our skulls in.”

“I was just tested.” “When?” “Last week,” I say. And I was. I got the results from the Haight-Ashbury Clinic yesterday. “And?” “Negative.” The cop takes his finger out of my chest and looks me in the eye. He looks long enough to make me uncomfortable, before finally dropping his hands. “Good,” he says. “That’s good.”

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THE SHACK

From the memoir, Candy & Cigarettes

I met my ex-wife Haley at Gluehead’s shack. Gluehead was our speed dealer. But he was much more than that. We called ourselves the Gluehead Army. There were a lot of people in the Gluehead Army. There was Kelpbed, who was Glue’s right hand man, and Brian Fast, at least in the beginning until he screwed everyone over. And then there was Bucky and Big Tom and Leif Irish and Troy. There were others, too. I only did speed back then. That’s all any of us did. We were all rock ’n’ rollers. Glue was a great storyteller. Because of all the speed he took, his short-term memory was kind of fucked. So whenever he told a story he’d forget that he’d told it many times before. Each time he told a story, he did so very enthusiastically. My favorite was The Prison Story. In it, Gluehead is in San Bruno Prison. One day he gets out of the shower to discover a bunch of big and nasty brothers have taken all his cigarettes. Now, if that’s me in the story, I don’t do a goddamn thing; I let them have my cigarettes. But Glue said that if you do that sort of thing in prison it makes you a little bitch, and if you’re not sold for a deck of playing cards by the end of the night, you can at least count on never eating dessert again. What Glue does, he pops the razor blade out of his shaver, and he walks over to those brothers, who are standing there, smoking his cigarettes, and he slices his own hand down to the bone. Gluehead holds up his bloody hand. He says, “Those are my cigarettes and I want them back. I’m real sick. You don’t want my blood on you.” Gluehead gets his cigarettes back. v A piano prodigy-turned-skateboarding-

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punk-turned-speed freak, Gluehead lived in a 19 x 8 shack in the Lower Haight on the back edge of some property belonging to his ex-girlfriend, who was a much bigger dealer. She dealt to the big boys; Gluehead dealt with people like us. Gluehead still played piano. He was really good at one time, I heard. He was really good when I knew him, too. But it was different because of the drugs and brain damage. There was electricity in the shack via a generator but no toilet or shower, no refrigerator, no stove. Tweakers don’t sleep much, so Glue didn’t need a bedroom but he had a mattress anyway and a coffin that he sometimes crashed in. The place was overrun with crap. There were toppled shelving units and jagged light bulb bases and spent lighters, paint thinner, books, broken furniture piled high next to spreadout clusters of dismantled radios and tape decks, milk crates and mountains of unwashed, picked-from-the-street clothes. Instruments in various states of decay lay scattered throughout the place—half a guitar here, a keyboard missing keys there, a snare drum, a horn. There were giant cord balls everywhere, instrument cables that had become so intertwined they looked like snakes writhing

STORIES FROM THE STREETS: PART ONE – JOE CLIFFORD in heat. The shack was basically a storage shed whose construction had been halted. It certainly wasn’t up to code for human occupancy. You could see the exposed beams and 2 x 4s, the anchors and joists and clipped electrical wiring, the mangy pinkishbrown insulation, which was waterlogged and smelled like old tuna fish. It got very cold in the shack at night and the roof leaked in the rain. It was one of the best homes I ever knew. A student at UC Berkeley who’d call Gluehead to score from time to time, Haley came from upper crust in Edina, Minnesota. I can’t say whether she had schizophrenia back then. I know she drank a lot. I think the signs of her sickness were there, had I known what I was looking for. Haley’s cousin, Juliette, had flown in from Minneapolis, and the two of them had stopped by the shack looking for speed before hitting the downtown nightclubs.

center of attention. Not even close. I’d later learn that without the alcohol Haley was cripplingly shy, and further withdrawn into herself than anyone I’ve ever met. I had to work in the morning, but I let Haley drag me out with her. The nightclub was awful and my not being high made that thumping techno music excruciating. I’ve always hated crowds, everyone dancing and hopping like a fool. I didn’t have the energy to be charming and I just wanted to go to sleep. I had a loft where I was squatting—a nice loft, as far as squats go—and a job at the airport. I was one of the few guys who even had a job in those days. While most of the Gluehead Army just hung around the shack waiting for Glue to kick down free drugs, I was actually responsible, earning money to buy mine by delivering important documents from cargo planes. (I’d be fired two weeks later when they’d find speed in my delivery van.)

“You didn’t see girls like Haley at the shack often. Beautiful, yes, but there was something otherworldly about her, too.”

There wasn’t any, though. Hadn’t been for a while. The Feds had popped a major Mexican cartel a few weeks earlier, clogging the pipeline, the whole city dry. We were all hurting. You didn’t see girls like Haley at the shack often. Beautiful, yes, but there was something otherworldly about her, too. Long, straight black hair with a face as white as porcelain, she reminded me of a doll. She wore a short magenta dress that night, and was so drunk at one point that when she tried sitting on Glue’s lap she fell over and her legs spread apart. As she lay on the floor laughing, I saw her panties. They were royal blue. It would be one of the few times I’d ever hear her laugh. I couldn’t have known that then. The way she carried on, Haley came across as vivacious, the life of a party, a girl most comfortable at the

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I was surprised when Haley said she wanted to see me again. I don’t think she could’ve known how hopeless I was. It wasn’t until she was gone for the night that I started to fall in love with her. Before our second date, I went to Kerrie’s house. Kerrie was a stripper and older than I was. I’d once told her that life is over after thirty. I was twenty-five. She was thirtyfour. I needed to shower and borrow some clothes. My squat didn’t have a shower, and Kerrie always had nice men’s clothes lying around. Her marriage to John Wayne Newton had dissolved by then, and we’d sometimes fuck. John Wayne was one of the Boys of Belvedere, the first friends I made in San Francisco, before the drugs made things like friendship expendable. Kerrie was in love with me, and I was sort of in love with her. She was a

knockout—a blonde haired, big-titted, blue eyed girly-girl, the sort that knocks anyone out. I’d once suggested while she was still married that we run away together to Arizona, leave this city behind. Even then I could see where my life was headed if I stayed in San Francisco. I was half joking. When she said, “Let’s go,” she wasn’t kidding. Kerrie scared the hell out of me. After I showered and got dressed, I asked to borrow money so I could buy flowers for my date. Haley and I had made plans to meet at Glue’s shack. But she never showed. I sat there, with my stupid hair combed and clean clothes ironed, holding those damned flowers, for hours. v Around 1:30 a.m., Gluehead said we should go to a bar. It was cold, the fog rolling in. San Francisco, where sometimes it got so dark and gloomy you felt like a ghost walking on the moors. I was depressed. If I liked Haley before she stood me up, I was definitely in love with her now. Glue put his arm around me. “Why are you always so nice to me?” I asked him. “I’ve always been a sucker for a sensitive boy,” he said. That was Glue, a sensitive thug. One minute he’d be fending off convicted murderers, like the time Indian Paul, a maniac fresh out of San Quentin, was pounding on Gluehead’s ex’s door and Glue stared him down, and the next he’d be saying something like that. Coming over Buchanan Street, this little hill with a church at the top, a Buddhist temple I think, the streets were dead, soundless, not even traffic coming off the 101, whose off ramp was Fell Street, which became a straight shot to Golden Gate Park, which usually meant traffic, no matter what time of day or night. From out of the shadows, this black kid on a bicycle came flying over the hill, from the direction of the Webster Street projects a few blocks away. His front wheel slammed down and he flipped over the bars, face scraping along the asphalt. Jumping to his feet, frantically reaching for his bike, one foot on the pedal, spinning a wild 360˚ in the oily mist, the kid hauled ass out of there. Right behind him came the police,

“In the middle of the road lay fifty, maybe a hundred tiny baggies, each one packed with crack cocaine.” two squad cars, lights whirling, sirens slicing through the murkiness, taking air like the Streets of San Francisco. They blew past us like we weren’t even there. Glue was staring at the spot where the kid crashed. “You see that?” “Kid’s going to jail. So?” “No, that!” Glue said, pointing. In the middle of the road lay fifty, maybe a hundred tiny baggies, each one packed with crack cocaine. For the next few weeks, people would stop by the shack, hoping the meth drought was over. Glue would break the bad news. “But there’s some crack,” he’d say. The speed freaks would sigh, hang their heads. In a corner a pipe was all set up with Brillo pads and a blowtorch. Glue wouldn’t ask for money. The speed freaks would mutter how it was better than nothing, and then begrudgingly smoke some rock, spitting out fumes, angry at the government. They’d leave ten minutes later. They wouldn’t even say thank you. And Gluehead wouldn’t have expected them to. It was funny. Just over that hill, there were people in those projects fighting, stabbing, shooting each other—people who’d sell their own mother out—for a crumb of the stuff, and here we were, a bunch of tweakers, acting like we’d been forced to suffer handjobs from the pretty girl’s significantly less attractive best friend.

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MODEL: HA

MAH WHITE

r By Ben Turne

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PASSING OUT//PASSING BY: BEN TURNER

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PASSING OUT//PASSING BY: BEN TURNER

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PASSING OUT//PASSING BY: BEN TURNER

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PASSING OUT//PASSING BY: BEN TURNER

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PASSING OUT//PASSING BY: BEN TURNER

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PHOTO CREDIT: 1000 WORDS / SHUTTERSTOCK.COM

STREETS AT WAR: EMMA SEYMOUR A group of protesters set off a smoke bomb in central London during the anti-cuts rally on March 26, 2011.

MOBILE REVOLUTION By Emma Seymour

The last

year has been one of protest and demonstration. People across the country have been reclaiming the streets in defence of pensions, against government cuts, in support of the Arab spring, and everything in between. The biggest strike of a generation saw 1.2 million public sector workers from across the country walk out in November. Whether you agree or disagree with the cause – or just want everyone shot like Jeremy Clarkson – only those living in a cave would have failed to miss it. In today’s world of smart phone

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tweeting it’s pretty easy to get your voice heard too, even if you don’t fancy tramping the streets clutching a banner.

So what did the Twitterati have to say about it? @sadkate Is on strike tomorrow. Paying 3% more for 15% cut in eventual pension and working ‘til 68 goes beyond taking our share of the cuts.#Nov30 Comedian Stephen Grant Shall we have a Twitter strike as well? Just harnessing the momentum? “What do we want?” “More than 140 characters” “When do we want it?”

Protests of 2011 The November 30 march may have been the biggest in the UK for years but there was plenty else to shout about in 2011. Here are just five more protests from the last 12 months: n Egypt, January 25: The country’s first coordinated demos kick-off in Cairo as the people call for democracy and the former President Hosni Mubarak to step down. The country’s first free ballot in 80 years took place in November. n L ondon, March 26: The march against Government cuts is the UK’s biggest since the anti-Iraq war protest in 2003. Some 250,000 people took to the streets.

Bert Smith It’s cool when the elected chancellor says “you can strike and protest all you want, it won’t make a difference” GEE THANKS GIDEON @krisdeeds Just to be clear everyone; camping outside church and day off work for Royal wedding = Good. Doing same in economic protest = Bad. #strike @richeyrevol The tourists around Trafalgar Square have never had so many people to ask for directions. @shitlondon In a show of solidarity with all strikers, today I promise to contribute nothing useful to society in protest against pension reforms #Strike

@craigphilbrick How can it be fair that the public sector has been forced to pay the cost of the banking crisis? Resist the #cuts. #strike #N30 @rachelhawley I saw teachers laughing & relaxing in the pub this morning. If you’re going to strike, commit yourself to it. Picket, protest, rally, march. @josiensor Cars tooting their support for Unison anti-cuts protesters outside Royal London Hospital. #Strike @Activismtips When you’re sad cheer yourself up by going to a protest, a strike or a rally.

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n L ondon, August 6: A small protest following the police shooting of Mark Duggan in Tottenham erupts into days of riots across the capital. While the Government argued the violence was the work of a ‘feral’ underclass after a new pair of trainers, a study by the LSE and The Guardian argued rioters were fighting against social injustice and poverty. n U S, September 17: The Occupy Movement begins its first act of defiance by occupying Wall Street. The movement, which spread across the world including to London’s very own St Paul’s, fought against corporate wealth and greed. n M oscow, December 25: Tens of thousands of people marched against Vladimir Putin amid widespread accusations of fraud in the Presidential elections.

MY CHILDHOOD STREET: SGT. PILKO

N S: S G TR ATIO ILLUS

The newsagents at the bottom of the hill was a grand old place, the object of some racist desires where one could take a small mind, buy something and then later negatively refer to it in a joke with ones friends. Not me though, why bite the gracious hand that should give me comics and sweets. Lemon Bon-Bons in particular. Old ladies would sometimes appear and feature on this street, one in particular, who wanted to chat about the appearance of a football in her garden, had a bright green bogey on her coat that had fallen out of her nose. It made me feel sick and still does whenever I think of it. Ice would form on the inside of the window during winter, but that’s to be expected when you only have one wall and sleep in the garden. My mother would tire of this and call me into the house, “you’ll catch your death out there, idiot” she would bellow. My father would follow me in shortly after, having given up on his dream of becoming a lewd mountain man. Much to the relief of the neighbours. After seeing the shadow of a man shuffle past my window* one morning I was convinced it was evidence of God, it was in fact the next door neighbour escaping from his wife. I peeped through the curtains to discover that he had no trousers on and he had discovered that my wire bird feeder (made by me) would not meet product safety regulations. He became horribly entangled in the nether regions. In winter the Street was treacherous in the way it treated the inhabitants’ cars. When icy, the camber of the road would work in an evil manner against any cars who had dared to move. Even those on foot had to be wary of the malevolent icy intentions. My house was Orange, I developed a life-long dread of hairdressers, it brings a foul taste to my mouth whenever I see a comb.

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*If God was ever to be seen carrying a suitcase, an armful of clothes, a paint roller, wrapped in nothing but a towel then you can share my divine image.

With this reminisce in my mind I have dug out all my old maps, to enable me to traverse the streets of my youth. In my own head I can see it all… In fact it reminds me that I never finished my compass rose in the corner… Most likely to be the Northern end of the street, where the camber in the road was less like a buried leg, there was sited, a non-haunted/haunted/slightly spooky so most likely haunted, house. At least that’s how I saw it, the sounds of spectres drinking from cans that turned out to be squatters drinking from cans is my idea of romance. Now the man walking the street with the right outlook and a pouch full of gold will see it not as a haunted house but as a solid investment opportunity. Not me though, I prefer to look at it as a Haunted House. I grew up in a tall house on a wonky part of the street which had suitable ambient lighting at night, which attracted dog walkers of all varieties. Just then twenty years ago my dear old Grandma burned her sleeve while cooking milk. The culinary world revolves around tomatoes and milk so she would say. Her shriek caused her voice to bleed and hence I never heard her call for dinner. I would later carry on my search for the smugglers inside the sandstone cliff. It was a Tuesday. The Police would come and say ‘hi’ from time to time to some of the neighbours, it was always the same with them, they couldn’t wait to get in – I’d heard they made good fairy cakes and judging by the way old bobby would charge in without waiting for the door to open I assumed it to be true. Like most streets there was one time warp field that allowed a man to keep his MK1 escort (in brown) to remain in immaculate condition and he never had to see to the woodwork on the front of his house. He aged in the usual fashion however, suggesting that time warp fields of this kind only affect building materials and not flesh and bone.

T. PILK O

I was raised by wolves. The football team… No not really that one was from my cream cracker… Now to business!

QUOTE SPACE: BEN TURNER

THE SMITHS

ON THE STREETS OF LONDON

POETRY: JADE LEAF WILLETTS

Trailer trash: who didnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t understand the endearment, the mock insult Trailer trash: who walks with no shoes through glass and beer and blood never cutting her feet perfect feet dark dark, pale but darkened by the street the street a sanctuary a home Trailer trash: trashing traditional beauty with sandals, with bare feet with too much gold and not enough clothes with slang, with beautiful vulgar language with cheap wine with cigarettes and green

Trailer trash: who brought tears enough to melt the skin from your bones igniting something in your soul that cannot be extinguished who the moon broke down for crying tears of amber, lighting your way your way that saw me stop dead in my tracks to lay down and die in the heavy rain of my broken head and heart who caused me to write words in blood that were washed away to nothing

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Trailer trash: carved of stone and dirt still playing cards with the door open and the light on Trailer trash: who gave me water on the steps when I was thirsty a few summers ago who remains there smiling in my mind.

behaving well I move into town drink at a faster pace, In a hole of a place race to the next bar and pick up pace mix the grape and the grain I chat up cheap women, people I am not interested in I sound nothing like myself In fact I sound like them I carry on mindless like a fool dancing to music I despise because the girls like it and right now that is all that matters as I dance to some soulless noise inside I can hear Miss Holiday and I think about art and death and the sparrow I saw earlier In the day I spend money that should see me right for days I waste it like spilled beer

I get covered in bruises from fights that I could never start or finish I am in a room full of bad memories and girls with sad stories my phone gets broken In an altercation along with a bone in my hand I make a dozen or so calls to my ex-wife (from the payphone) there are girls hanging around like shadows masquerading as angels I try to erase the past from my memory as she deletes my message from her answer phone I take another drink (for the road) we leave when they tell us it is time and line up at meat counters we pay for fake meat lashed with sauce and I walk in the direction of a temporary home alone for hours in the rain and the part that really kills me Is that I know I will do it all again.

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PHOTO CREDIT: BEN TURNER

I open a bottle of wine at 6, the sun has gone down I need no more justification I am quiet, reflective, I have good intentions

Scratching the surface The streets of Tel Aviv by Daniel D. Moses

The streets of Tel Aviv are a bustling hub of activity reflecting the cultural, political, historical and cosmopolitan diversity of the city. At one end stands the ancient port city of ‘Yaffo’ (Jaffa), whilst at the other ‘Rabin Square’ housing city hall, named in memory of the former Prime Minster Yitzhak Rabin, assassinated in the square in 1995 campaigning for peace. Those inclined can relax on the beach, as shoppers browse the ‘Shuk Ha’Carmel’ market for literally anything they can think of; musicians and entertainers showcase their talents on the streets with intricate wall art presented as a part of the landscape. Only scratching the surface of Tel Aviv and old town Yaffo, these photos are part of my rediscovery of the city after a number of years away.

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