Friday 18 January 2008

MYSPACE ARCHIVE: Necropolitan

We are pleased to anounce that Ifscapulet Publishing will be issuing a new quarterly magazine for men and women of all ages in this, the city of the dead. NECROPLITAN recognises that in this throwaway culture people appreciate products that are made to be valued and cherished more than ever- especially when manufactured from objects most people would just shove in the ground and forget! For this reason the volume is beautifully bound in the tanned hide of an unbaptised child. The title is embossed in the surface in a dramatic, Gothic-esque script (actually an entirely new typface- neogotha- devised especially for this publication) and illuminated with the molten silver teeth obtained from those who no longer require them. Each of the beautifully bound six hundred and sixty six pages is manufactured from our own, in-house paper. A composite of dead skin, moths' wings and the pages of bibles torn out in anger, each is 100% recycled, peace of mind indeed for today's environmentaly conscious reader. And every page is uniquely scented with a bespoke perfume created by our master perfumier, Moloch. A whiff of sulphur, a hint of opium, the slightest touch of burning tar- the very smell of our publication excites curiosity and exhilarates the senses. At the turning of every page, small insects escape, fluttering delicately about the reader's head. They bite. Not all are poisonous or pestilence-ridden.Some pages are written in a near illegible scrawl, others in beautiful copperplate calligraphy. Articles are in English, Amharic, French, Greek, Arabic, Latin, Hebrew and Aramaic. The illustrations are beautiful but it contains no photography. It is big enough to be enjoyed with both hands but small enough to slip discretely into most ladies' handbags. Articles cover most subjects- from shoes to scarves to starving Africans- though the magazine is mostly adverts.

Monday 14 January 2008

MYSPACE ARCHIVE: Youssef Ifscapulet

Youssef Ifscapulet

Grappled with demons etc. got some good moves down, ultimately lost but ran away. Youssef fled. I apologise. The music, the poetry, the man, the myth- lost to the mists of time. Weep, my children, weep, though your tears be in vain. You may cry an ocean before the Blessed Bastard returns to stage or screen. He haunts my nightmares, maybe your dreams... but I am strong.

When I am awake, I have freedom. In sleep I am a slave. But now, awake, I assert the right to me own identity. To my own name. Not quite that with which I was born, but one by which I am known to many. Josef Donovan.

Having written for so long, indeed existed for so long under the wretched pseudonym, lived alongside the cruel beautiful creature of my imaginings, it is a struggle to assert who I am, as above I have attempted. For many months in the shadows hidden, now emergent into this glorious world, this wonderful year, a moth free of the cocoon, his wings heavy with mucus, drying in the moonlight the he so desires to swallow. It is far, the moon, though it near. Do not be distracted by pretty lights. Especially candles.

Youssef was his name- a wretched child
born disfigured and half lame- his flesh defiled
once beset by guilt and shame- abandoned to the wild
claimed that one day he'd be tamed- god only smiled...

well, I was that wretched boy stayed hidden in the shadows
embittered, twisted and annoyed, humour of the gallows
until the city promised fame with a travelling show....
Youssef was my name...

now they call me Joe.

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