Tales from the Sanctuary - An anthology of readings from a QueenSpark Performance Evening

Introduction

October 27th 1994 marked the day of the first QueenSpark Performance Night for some time and what a wonderful night it was. QueenSpark performers old and new, some from writing groups, others not, gathered together at the Sanctuary Cafe to reveal the breadth of talent in QueenSpark. This anthology of all the readings celebrates the event, for those who were there, those who performed and also ‘outsiders’ who I am sure will be impressed by this wonderful collection.

This anthology reflects the diversity of QueenSpark members. There is prose and poetry, funny and sad writings, long and short contributions. For some people this was the first time they had read in public, not that you would have known. Everyone performed as though they had done this all their lives and the readings truly reflected the QueenSpark ethos that everyone is a writer.

I hope that this anthology will inspire more performance evenings and, I’m sure with everyone else who reads this wonderful collection, look forward to seeing more QueenSpark writers in print.

Lorraine Sitzia

JULIE EVERTON

Today I met three men and fell from the sky

There are rumours of a bomb in Oxford Street. In John Lewis the smell of Chanel whacks me in the face. I get a headrush as bad as if it were Bostick. I stand on the raised platform of the jewellery and engraved pen section where the engraver’s drill is placing BERYL on the Royal Blue stainless steel of the pen; I look for the entrance doors. The temperature rises. The cosmetics hall starts to bubble. I make my way as if through marmalade and head for the opening.

I wheeze. My asthma is bad again. Having recovered I look up. Something weird is happening. Something environmental.

The sky, clouds and all, has stopped only two feet above my head. The thin wind catches bits of newspaper and cellophane and within seconds the sky is an ugly collage of grey and black.

I notice an old man with his WHAT DO YOU THINK OF OUR LORD banner. He has been coughing for five minutes. He has been pushing against the sky with his banner. He coughs and splutters. We both sit down on a wall, wheezing and heaving. All the John Lewis shoppers head for their cars, Chanel bags swinging viciously as they quick march past. Someone swipes me one with a metal clasp handbag, and I look around for some more space to recover this fit. I decide on the tube. In retrospect a mistake, but at least it is separate. An air-raid shelter.

I take the old man to the subway entrance. As we enter the tunnel there is a rush of air as a tube train catapults out of the dark. We gasp in the air.

“What do you think of the Lord?” He asks. “Are you religious. Here let me give you a pamphlet. We are sinners, the lot of us. Armageddon. The sky has fallen, the Lord is upon us. End of the world.”

It does feel like the end of the world. I warm to him.

“Would you like to meet Jesus?”

“No thanks.”

“Meet him now. Embrace the Lord and you shall be saved. There is not much time.”

I scrawl my number on a piece of paper. “Give me a ring, I’ll give you a ring, I’ll come and arrange something next time I am in town.

However he has fixed on his purpose, with all the intent of a J-cloth salesman on a rainy day. MEET JESUS NOW! HE WILL NOT WAIT FOREVER, TIME IS SHORT. REPENT. REPENT. YOU HAVE SINNED? I feel my favourite skirt shorten. Is this what he means? I nearly didn’t wear it, it always gets looks, I am never quite sure, I feel embarrassed. He is such an old man. We have such different backgrounds. I wish he understood.

My breath starts to get short again. “Look, here,” I hand the old man my asthma inhaler, as an apology.

“I have to dash.” He takes it and I capitalise on his bewilderment to make a quick dash for the tube.

I jump into the train just as the doors shut, the last sardine to get into the tin. I hold my breath and imagine I am swimming underwater. It sometimes helps but today it does not. There is one bubble of air remaining and a big thick-breathed man in a grey wool coat smelling heavily of Kuros falls into it, knocking the bubble into oblivion.

The pressure inside my head is becoming more and more intense. Walls are going up. I feel like spiderwoman in a very tight spot.

The man turns round. Talk about gold, he is dripping in it. He breathes heavily onto me through his nostrils. He has eaten steak, medium rare, lots of mustard.

As the train careers round a corner I find myself thrust towards his chest, nose to nipple and without an inch to turn myself round. Enveloped in flesh. Smoke on his shirt. Testosterone. Sweet reek of underarm sweat. His or mine? Where am I? There is no room whatever for pleasantries. Intimate on a first encounter. I like men, don’t get me wrong, but I like the chance to discuss ideas, have pauses in conversation, air and lightness. A chance to expand. Today there is not a breath to divide us. He belches loudly. I take it in.

The train finally draws to a standstill at Covent Garden. As the doors peel back, the train’s innards tumble onto the platform and we peel apart. I stagger, I am so hot. My skin is drenched through my woollen dress, hot and wet. I feel sick, I feel I am going to faint. It is like the tower of Babel out here. I start to shout, but no one hears. Where can I go? I start to run for the lift as the narrow strip of light between the two doors is closing.

Suddenly, I glimpse a man sitting in a stairwell of light. He plays a Northumberland pipe, a song so reedy so full of spaces and echoes, that huge caves and caverns are opened up inside me where the wind of a Northumberland moor with herons flying blows through with abandon.

It is as if there is a direct line from the air in the man’s lungs down through vibrations in the floor and up through the soles of my own feet. I begin to gulp it in.

With every gulp one more person evaporates from the platform. The air cools. Finally there is an almighty rush of wind. The thousands of bits of rubbish are sucked off the ceiling of the sky in through the tunnel and into the mouths of the municipal bins.

Only the pipe player and myself are left. He continues to play until he takes away the pain of the rest of the day. The drone of the pipe is so persistent, I cannot help but breathe in its drone. I breathe, I breathe. I empty my mind, I close my eyes. I am alone. It is peaceful.

Upstairs it is still like Hong Kong. But above the man with the pipes, the sky is clear. For the first time today, I feel gathered together, and resolve not to buy any more presents. I want an introduction to the man on the stairs.

SAM ROYCE

Dental Talk

I really should never have spoken
As the Dentist adjusted the chair,
My mouth was opened quite widely
With a ‘chock’ allowing his stare.

“I see you have one that is going,
Does it hurt when I give it a jar?”
My reply was obviously limited
But I managed a stifled “Aha!”

He prodded and poked at the others
Asked questions like, “Have you come far?”
I gulped and looked at him awkward
Then nodded a stifled “Aha!”

The assistant was filling my chart out
When the dentist said, “Have you a car?”
I struggled to give him an answer
But obliged with a stifled “Aha!”

Then he drilled to clear up my trouble
Replying with “Better by far”
Inviting a response as I lay there
So I summoned a stifled “Aha!”

“That’ll do for today, take it easy
And rinse your mouth with the jar”
I responded the way he was used to
With a nod and a stifled “Aha!”

I’m returning tomorrow for treatment
To free all the nasty tartar,
We’ll finish that gripping conversation
With a much needed final “Aha!”

Warm Feelings

It was sunny and warm when I met her
In Brighton quite close to the sea,
She was smiling and giggling so freely
I was pleased she had stumbled on me

We clicked and adjourned for refreshment
Cold drinks and a snack were agreed,
We chatted and looked at each other
Our minds were set on a need

It seemed we were floating on air-waves
As we petted and moved on more,
Excited, we stayed on embracing
Aware what our bodies were for

A while we lay there exhausted
Our eyes telling stories to each,
Then we stirred and moved ever nearer
To the sandier part of the beach

The day raced on reaching midnight
As we parted great friends with a kiss;
Unfolded a dream I was having
Experiencing unwedded-bliss!!!

CYRIL DAUGY

Eternity

I am living now in the past of the future;
Any future; forever
I am living now forever in the past
My everlasting life.

JOHN CRANFIELD

Enter Tony

Give me an ‘f’
Give me a ‘u’
Give me a ‘c’
Give me a ‘k’
adding an ‘off’
Loud and clear
You know what to say
enough’s enough
Give Major the air
Here’s Tony Blair!

Now
individual aggression
and money’s all spent
Forward to government
serving society’s
update of the sixties

The Stock Exchange heaven’s
one hell of a place
Consuming our children
and ruining our race

So
give me a ‘g’
give me an ‘o’
give me a ‘g’
give me an ‘o’
give me a ‘g’
give me an ‘o’

Let the Tories know
that they must
Go!
Go!
Go!

Broad is Blair’s church
High his steeple
His is power
of the people

Yabba Dabba Doo
It’s up to you
To give this
Century a grand finale
Put the eighties
In the dustbin
Of histories

So
thrice give an ‘n’
give then an ‘o’
You, you give me
a double-u
What does it spell
No time allow
and yell, yell, yell
NOW, NOW, NOW and
GO, GO, GO and
If you’re stuck
Give me an `f’
As well as the rest
Then holding hands
Wish us all the best
Of British Luck!

Just Look Around

We used to back society,
Urge one for all, then maybe me;
While trades unions shaped the views
Of working folk who paid their dues.
But some there were whom bosses paid
for making sure strikes were delayed,
Back-stabbers who raised voices high
to ring out loud this gleeful cry:-
‘The working-class can kiss my arse,
I’ve got the foreman’s job at last!’

Insider-Judas was once named,
Now sleaze is commonly the game.
You only have to look at it
life everywhere is bums and shit.

Made in Britain was always best,
Now we are lost among the rest.
Lasting longer is a nuisance,
What counts most is short-lived nonsense
promising a maxi-profit
no matter what becomes of it.

Gone the day of serving others,
Now’s the time of selfish owners,
When national togetherness
is individual separateness
believing that what’s yours is mine.

Self service is the bottom line

And greater problems than our own
Are left alone if not disowned.

Now that we’re totally disgraced
by classless culture quite debased,
Working, middle, upper classes
Get up one another’s noses;
Sex-forbearance is now nonsense,
Stiff willies are without a conscience.

Since Thatcherism’s done its worst
and we await a bust or burst,
not slowing down or going back,
Let’s blame ourselves and face the facts.

Me arrogant, above the heap?
Not so, I’m just as much a creep!
Hear my theme-song borrowed from
A late-night telly singer’s song:-
`Just look around, what do you see,
the world is full of creeps like me.’

Now all together, loud and clear,
En core en core for all to hear.
One-two-three-four one-two-three-four-
‘Just look around, what do you see,
the world is full of creeps like me.’
‘Just look again, what do you see,
the world is full of creeps like me.’

SHIRLEY BECKETT

Beach Mermaid

I made a mermaid on the sand
A patch of beach where breakwaters
channelled all the pebbles out to sea.

With a stick I drew ten times life-size,
(But who knows what is mermaid size?)
my long steps carving out a rhythm
for swirling tail and curling hair.

From furling cirrus-cloudy sky
nothing about to look on her
but gulls and tern and turnstone.

Turn of tide; I hop along shingle,
skating the shallow, incoming waves
and wonder: will she be paddled on by old men and young girls;
or visited by fishes?

Will the grains of sand cohere
in mermaidshape to mermankind
-drawn elsewhere along the coast-
in watery embrace: Sandmix

Has my creation made her exist?
From under the waves I may have heard singing.

Mermaiday

She had drawn me on the sand
wondered when the tide washed me away
whether I’d exist
It took all night to find my tail,
snuggled by lobster pot way out,
sand piled to high tide; low tide: no longer to hide
but sweep along beach as sun strikes the shore.
Spider crabs emerge, smug at the damage they’d done;
And fishermen swear as they disentangle their nets,
only selecting the little silver darlings.
Cockle breakfast; I swim under the pier
and watch the bucket and spade brigade emerge,
padding tentatively at first; then some take the plunge,
not knowing how close to me they’d come,
only one bloke says:” Blimey! I think I need a beer…”
his kids clamoured: “Ice cream for me,”
and wifey wants winkles, saying: “Why Sam, you look as
though the scales have fallen from your eyes!”
The sun moves over the sea;
Tea and buns for beach people.
I have succulent shrimps
and swim out to where the trawlers haul
– minding my way – but too late!
A likely lad lifts me from the mesh –
“Well, we’m been ‘aving some queer fish lately
but this one’m Beautiful!
and kisses me on the lips
– making the scales on my tail quiver….
So I may pull him in with me
and we could swim so happily
in silent green and darkly deep
where moonbeams fracture mermansleep.

AL THOMSON

Growing up with the Anzac legend*

I had a military childhood. For the first twelve years of my life, from 1960 until 1972, my father was a senior infantry officer in the Australian army. With my two brothers, I grew up in army barracks in different parts of Australia and around the world. We were surrounded by soldiers and soldiering. My earliest memories are of starched khaki and green-clad men parading across asphalt squares, trooping and wheeling to echoed commands. When I was five, my father took his battalion to Borneo to fight the secret war of confrontation against the Indonesians. While the men were away, the army brats marched up and down in makeshift uniforms, childish imitations of our soldier fathers.

We also relished the warrior culture of Australian boyhood (girls were rarely included in our play). During the day we raced across school quadrangles between concrete trenches; when we came home we fought an hour of war before tea. We felt strong and proud with our wooden guns and tin hats, exhilarated by ambushes in the park and frontal assaults on unarmed hedges. Pocket money was spent on war comics and Airfix toy soldiers. I was especially proud of my collection of 2000 plastic soldiers, and would set them up in intricate battle formations and then pelt them with matchstick-firing guns. Death was count-to-ten and make-believe; war was an adventure …

…The Anzac tradition that I grew up with articulated a selective family history and generalised it as an influential version of the nation’s wartime past. But one of the lessons of growing up in a relatively powerful family and class is a recognition that its members do not simply, or conspiratorially, impose their views upon society. Their views are pervasive because of public power, but they are also sincerely believed and propagated. My father and grandfather Rogers believed their version of the Anzac legend – in which Australian soldiers and Australians in general are all good mates and equally able to achieve their full potential – because it made sense of their own experiences of military and social success and corroborated their personal and political beliefs. By emphasising the qualities of Australian soldiers rather than the nature and effects of war, it also helped them to keep painful personal memories at bay, and to compose a military past that they could live with in relative comfort. It is not surprising that my work on the Anzac legend, including this book, has caused pain and anger within my family. Personal identities are interwoven with national identities, individual memories intersect with public legends, and critical analysis of Anzac thus inevitably collides with powerful emotional investments in the past.

The process of subjective identification thus helps to explain the resonance of national myths. Take, for example, my own childhood fascination with war, or at least with what I imagined war to be. Even today, martial music and marching men make my spine shiver, and I can feel within myself some of the entranced enthusiasm that impels young men to war. Patriotic military ritual and rhetoric touches a sensitive human nerve. It fulfils our common need for a sense of purpose and a proud collective identity. One explanation for the success of the Anzac tradition among generations who have not known war is that we gain vicarious satisfaction from the saga of loyalty, courage and self-sacrifice. Many young Australian men would like to think that we, too, are Anzacs.

* this is an extract from Anzac Memories: Living with the Legend, by Alistair Thomson, published by Oxford University Press, 1994.

SONJA CTVRTECKA

Soldier – Gulf War

Quietly, he waited,
His heart-beat muffled
By the sound of his lungs
Trying to reach for oxygen
He waited
He tried to think of
Nothing
All he could feel was fear
His sweat dried as it reached
His Camouflage Exterior
So hot was all his gear

He had to go and use his Gun
This time he really
Might have to
kill some-one

Quietly he waited;
While back home,
Smiling, well-groomed,
Reporters, at neat desks
Told the ‘news’ to everyone.

Whisperings

Whisperings,
Calls from over the sea, “Hush hush”
Swishing with the waves
Messages brought onto this island beach,
From another land out of reach;
These whispers calling, calling gently, saying;

“Come back, leave with the morning; once again,
take the boat, and say good-bye to your own shores.”
“You will not cry, you didn’t before.” The voices
Call, “You came across here, to these little lost islands
In the sun, a few days’ sea journey, from your damp, cold,
Often too grey-covered land.” “You landed upon our shores.”

“You stayed, you smiled, you loved us then; you lived on one
of us; return again, Tenerife is calling, saying, remember
The morning, when you first set eyes on me, when you first
Set foot on me – come back – why did you go away
And where? How did my mountains fail you?”
“The pleasant sandstone buildings, volcanic shores, the black sand.”

“Everything you took in hand and into your soul!”
The voices call;
Whisperings,
Like the sound of fresh springs cascading from a
Scottish
or Welsh mountain.
Whisperings.

Like the sound of dead friends, and relatives,
Calling, making me dream they are alive again.
Whisperings,
Like the lost sounds of visions gone,
Regained now and then in memory.

A whisper across the winter trees,
As they make their springtime leaves. These are the things,
The thoughts, the happenings, the oceans, the springs, of my
Life calling
From sunset, into dawning, across daytime, and life-time
Whisperings.

JOHN TATUM

Conflict

Rastafari. Mi brother Tobias, is total Rastafari.
He want to go to Africa.
He mi half-brother an’ he got me talkin’ thee lingo.
Say it a shame for his friends
To hear me talkin’ with an English accent.

Tobias hang around thee corner smokin’ thee ganja
“Brother, when you goin’ to grow yr dreadlocks?” he say.
But I don’t know. I don’t know.
Mi father is English. Mi mother told me he was
Some sort of jazz-musician; a saxophone player.

He skipped off when I was three. Mi mother married again.
Mi step-father is a nice, kind man.
Workin’ all his life in thee undergroun’.
Charin’ Cross tube station.
He don’t know what to make of mi brother, Tobias.

“When you goin’ to do somethin’ ’bout yr brother?” he say.
“Get him to shave off his long hair?
You should have thee influence over him.
You three years older than him –
An’ he mi own flesh and blood!”

Thee kettle sing on thee hob. Thee clock tick.
Through thee lace curtains thee sunshine
Swell and fade across thee carpet
As thee clouds race across thee sky.
Mi mother’s parlour could be anywhere in Englan’.

An’ now thee children are shoutin’ in thee playground
An’ thee blackbird start a-singin’ on thee rooftop.
A number 11 bus is passing by thee window….
But on thee wall is a picture of Kingston, Jamaica.
An’ mi brother’s bass-guitar is standin’ in thee corner.

Sussex Stag Night

The moon goes reeling through the trees
And Jack’s atop the vicar’s garden wall.
The steeple leans against the scudding clouds
And Jack looks like about to fall.
And it’s hush hush, my Sussex bonny boys,
Go home quiet and make no noise!

Young Nancy’s shadow moves across the curtain.
We love her, lads, and that’s for true.
Climb up, young Jack, upon this branch.
And then you’ll get a better view!
And it’s, hush, hush, my Sussex bonny boys.
Go home quiet and make no noise!

Strike up on your harmonica, young Jack,
And we’ll do a proper Morris Dance.
Oh dear, he’s in the flower-bed now.
Get up, Jack, and let us see you prance.
And it’s, hush, hush, my Sussex bonny boys,
Go home quiet and make no noise!

It’s alright, Officer, we’ve only drunk a yard of ale;
Though I swear young Jack drank from a pail.
And it’s, hush, hush, my Sussex bonny boys,
Go home quiet and make no noise!
Hush, Hush, the clock’s tolled midnight now.
Go home, lads, and make no noise.

NICOLA SCHOUTEN

Masada

Masada my love, across the heat,
height, sun, plateau.
I reach.

Masada my love, the cool bath house,
mosaics, dripping water,
entwined.

Masada my love, the white dress I wore,
bare feet on the terrace.
wind in muslin.

Masada my love, I fetch water from the vault.
We eat ripe figs,
smile.

Masada my love, twilight, a sedan,
we lie together.
The sky burns.

Masada my love, place the knife here
push, be brave.
I feel you close.

DEB THOMAS

Martin Frobisher (ex-pirate) avoided the gallows
by offering to go on a wild goose chase
inspired by greed and the legend of the short cut
through a land in deep freeze

‘You five men – go ashore
and don’t come back ’till you’ve located
the whereabouts of the north west passage.
The ship will be anchored so we can explore
and see if there is any gold ore’.

The men started off with spirits high
not knowing they were doomed to die
The silence had a voice, it had a presence
It had a soul, it enveloped mortal people
So they came not to know how they stumbled on an
Eskimo tribe.

It’s hard to imagine a house made of ice
could support family life
but what can you do in a polar community
where basic materials are dead seal and pack ice.

We truly believed the snow-covered seas
extended to where the eye cannot see
They came with a number they said it was the date
and scratched in the ice it resembled
fifteen seventy eight

They came from beyond the horizon, their clothes
their skin, their hair, their tongue
We do not understand but remember and pass on
At least this is what my mother told me
embroidered from generation to generation
it’s a favourite in winter when we look at the sky
and remember the men who fell from the Moon.

ARTHUR THICKETT

….Arthur introduced – polite applause… “Sanc-tu-ary much…” screams and boos.

After going on about Portillo (Minister for Unemployment, distress and depression) and his new Job Seeker’s Allowance to replace unemployment benefit, I introduce the:

Song of the Job Seeker’s Allowance
(Baseball cap gestures essential to act & corn)

They seek it here, they seek it there, school-leavers …seek it everywhere; bloodywell find it or they’ll call you a Yob – that damned, elusive proper job…

(‘change gear’ with cap etc)

They seek it here, they seek it there,
post-graduates…seek it everywhere;
is it in Crawley? – or down on the Strand!?
that damned, elusive, twenty Grand..

(You thought I was gonna’ say thirty grand, didn’t you…? no way, no way… etc….)

JOHN SITZIA

As darkness falls on earth, creepy-crawly bug thingies worm from crack and cranny, shake sleep from their eyes, stretch their legs, begin to beat tiny wings and float up the warm moist sky to search for prey. Blood, good red blood from rat or dog or goat or best of all from the great gangling human lumps out strolling and sipping, unprotected, unaware. High on the white-washed Town Hall wall, around the floodlight for the clock the bugs assemble, those thin and hungry hanging round those fat and laughing stomachs bursting with good red blood, fat and laughing that a species so clever, so strong, so big and strong and wise and clever cannot stop the slivery spike slipping into a pore, cannot feel the needle sliding through its flesh, the pumping start to drain, the bug-eye rolling, fluttering in fever, in ecstasy, until too late, all gone, the bug fat and laughing buzzed away. Our ankles itchy, we are left to scratch and mutter and curse.

The two friends hung around the light for a while, savouring the scent of those already full, feeling the thrill begin to ripple their wings, their lips to quiver their mouths to water as they scan the flesh sitting sipping chewing at tables in the Town Hall square. Someone big, someone juicy, someone red and big and sweating in the heat, easy to distract, easy to annoy: and then they see him, big man, huge man, khaki suit with little shorts barely covering his chubby childish thighs, all pink and sweaty carving steak, wiping his brow with a piece of red silk, waving it around, a vast expanse of red calf on which to settle.

And so they fluttered down and followed the usual plan, one friend buzzing first in the left ear then wandering over to the right then circling in front of the host’s eyes, avoiding clumsy swats of hand and swishes of silk as the other sucked happily on his leg, unobtrusive, unobserved, until completely stuffed. When both had eaten, the bugs floated back to sit in the light, pick their teeth, watch the world go by.

LORNA JONES

The Sage

I left home at fourteen to follow my destiny.

It was the only sensible course of action open to me at the time.

My fellow teenagers were thoroughly incapable of meaningful communication, preferring chat about boyfriends and pop music to stimulating metaphysical debate, and my parents had ridiculously low expectations of me.

It struck me one day that most of those around me were never likely to realise all the startling truths that were dawning on me at the time. I had to do some-thing.

I toyed with the idea of jumping from the second floor window of the Maths room, or taking my denim skirt up another two inches: and then I saw the answer. I packed my notebooks, pens, Bible and other Holy Scriptures, and casting my shoes into the Hedgerow, I set off for the hills.

A secluded cave was surprisingly easy to find in the North Downs near Guildford, and I quickly mastered all the necessary skills of self sufficiency, finding ways to feed and clothe myself through instinct and ingenuity.

I soon found that seclusion from other humans led to a deep sense of contentment and calm. Now and then the odd rambler or a dog walker would stumble upon my abode, and then it seemed that my solitary lifestyle had fostered the development of an unworldly wisdom of spirit.

I must have acquired some sort of reputation in the outside world, as nowadays visitors are fairly frequent. They turn up on the doorstep of my cave, asking, “Are you The Sage?” and begging me for advice in matters of universal truth.
All in all, it’s a good life being a Sage. I’m glad I didn’t stay on at school for the sake of my ‘0’ Levels.

Pippa’s Body

Pippa took care of her body.
She cycled, swam and dressed
In peacock colours. She loved
To feel the sun caress

Her lean brown limbs – in Summer
She would live down on the beach.
The bright rays warmed her skin, lit
Up her smile, but could not reach

That part inside where something
Dark and heavy clawed and screeched.
Her pain would not lie still
it grew and slowly leached

Away
Her life.

Pippa took care of her body,
Prepared for it a box of gold
Lined with bright silks. And when
it came home, thin and cold,

The body was dressed warmly
in her favourite clothes,
And lay so quietly, candles
Burning and the curtains closed.

In her lovely lilac room
Wearing the cosy turquoise
Jumper Pippa knitted,
Her body rested, pale lips poised

As if to speak. But they would
Not, nor ever wear her radiant
Smile
Again.

Dear Dead Mother

Dear dead mother,
I think it’s time we had a chat,
Don’t you?
(Of course you don’t
And haven’t done for some time now.
How long?)

My son reminds me:
He is about the age that you’d
Remember me.
He asks about you.
He asks, like I did, why you died
And how.

It was a blow,
Your loss.
But then, everyone has some inheritance
of shit to shift.

Anyway, I survived,
And just in case you’d like to know,
I’d like to say –
You pissed me off
But didn’t fuck me up
Too much.

TIM SHELTON – JONES

Happy as Harry

Harry Hooper’s studious features traced the thin lines of drizzle journeying through the dirt on the railway carriage window. The trembling diagonal dance lured him from daydream into gentle daydream; while some-where beyond, brick and slate merged artlessly into the late September storm.

Harry was stock control manager at P&K’s retailers. Not because he wanted to be, but because a philosopher with a First from Durham was lucky to get a job at all. For a while, his philosophy had survived. Schopenhauer was smuggled in beneath his coat, and surreptitiously applied to purchasing. Descartes infiltrated the design of the new shelving system. In the evenings Harry read, when he could, or challenged friends to recherche discussions on existentialism; and this worked for a while. Then Lucy had become pregnant, P had merged with K, and his free time had rapidly frozen over. If there had been an age when work mingled easily with leisure, it was long gone. Now, it seemed, you had one or the other. Except that these days leisure meant poverty.

Harry commuted by rail, in carriages sixty years old that rattled along a rooftop route of boarded-up shopfronts and unemployed youngsters clustered in doorways. Well, perhaps they were happier. There was no joy in Harry at the prospect of a day’s work sufficient to occupy three people, and an arrival at home that evening too late and too tired to enjoy the company of his family. A weekend would be nice. But people had forgotten weekends. A change of government might help. But the opposition had long ago packed up their bags and gone home, demoralised by the mysterious ability of the ruling party to win every time against all the odds. Opposition now was just one of those picturesque rituals, like Black Rod.

So Harry had become a bit of a News addict. The TV gave him hope, because you never knew what to expect. And he knew that one day it would happen – if not in his lifetime, then in his children’s. He watched over breakfast, he watched in bed, willing the inexorable engine of evolution to roll forward just a little. He waited, year upon year, for his moment.

It came one morning in June, well into the new century; not suddenly, but with stealth, like the Aids epidemic, or middle age. A corner of New Zealand had blown up. Just a small corner. Well, it looked small on the globe, though seemingly it caused a lot of trouble Down Under – shock waves, tidal waves, dust and destruction. That sort of thing. Harry was glued. A thousand Krakatoas, the scientists said. A billion billion tons of dust, in a cloud a hundred miles high. That was at bang-plus-a-day-and-a-half. At bang-plusthree, they reminded us of the dinosaurs. At bangplus-five, the sun over London shone red at noon. Harry talked to his neighbours for the first time in three months. There was a holiday atmosphere in the office, and they all went down to the pub for a long lunch. Harry’s little girl was frightened. “Mary says we’re all going to die, Daddy!” “No, sweetie, it’s just going to be a bit dark and cold for a while.” The cartoonists in the papers saw everything in terms of black clouds. Fringe religions took to the mountains, and Harry actually shared a joke with his boss. At bang-plus-seven, parliament met to discuss reports of an impending ice-age – already Norway was under a foot of snow. It was going to be like the Second World War. The opposition made a call for a Government of National Unity, which drove the cartoonists into even heartier paroxysms. People talked as never before; the theatres, the churches, the pubs were full. It was a carnival. It was a madcap moon. It was the end of the world.

On June 15th – bang-plus-ten – Harry woke to near-darkness. And silence. In the corners of their bedroom lurked a deep gloom – no radio alarm, no lamplight from under the door. A little shadow stirred at the end of the bed, and whimpered, “Daddy, the sun’s dead!” Harry leapt from his sheets into the cold air, and tugged at a curtain. The sun was not dead, but sky and garden were muted, half-formed. Then Harry saw the snow. It must be feet thick, and falling so fast, he realised, that he couldn’t see the back fence. And his first thought was – no work! Tilting his watch to catch the light, he read: twenty-past-nine.

“Lucy!”

His wife snorted and turned. “What is it?”
“Morning. A new kind, I think. I can feel a snowman coming on.”

They all had breakfast together, by candlelight. Alexander, aged four, puffed out his chest. “I’m going to build the biggest snowman ever.”

“And I’m going to help you!” Harry declared.

Lucy looked worried. It’s too deep Harry, it’s too cold. What’s going to happen?” But Harry remembered, as if from another life, toboggans, snowball fights, hot cocoa afterwards. (No hot cocoa today, though. A shame they didn’t have a nice wood fire, at least.) Then the three of them stepped outside, and the silence was deep as a forest. A few houses loomed like tombstones through the snow-mist. Harry seized his children by the hand, and they leapt and lolloped through the yielding, knee-high powder.

“We’re going to build a monster, monster snowman,” they carolled into the echoing pall. They ran, they tumbled, they shovelled, built, perspired till they shone. Harry Hooper’s breath came in balloons of hot smoke as he set his hat at a rakish angle on the snow-man’s head. “Tantara!” he sang triumphantly. He was happy, happy, happy.

DANNY BIRCHALL

Art therapy?

Shaky cold junky boy and I
Set to sketching in chalk
On the living room walls —
The front bonnet and steering wheel
Of a red sportscar — speedo at a ton,
Road clear ahead, a single tree.
We step back to admire our mural,
Both dreaming
Of places we each want to go.

Junky boy Dom on the nod

The problem is this man
Uninspires the poetry in me:
A toot on the tinfoil flute
And he slumps forward uncomfortably;
Stupor certainly not slumber, I find him
In the livingroom each morning
Out cold, stained silver strip by his head.
As a drug experience in the watching
It’s unlyrical to say the least.

Y.

“It’s real,” he says,
Sits in the chair and marvels
At the tangibility of our world;
His shifts and moves like an emotional
Acid trip, picks up the pace
And comes down to sleep sweet heroin;
I hoard his jotted poems in the back covers
Of various books, hoping he’ll never remember
To request their return, a kind of rag-tag-bag
Of his past — “I ate Acid”— by turns
Also spliff-head, E-head, yes I guess
It’s his head that gets to me, brown-eyed
Bog-brush haired existential poet of abuse
and radioactive half-life murmurs of the half-awake
Hours of the never-ending single day of life.
And I should be like him;
If only I could stand the pace.

Poetry

Won’t fight battles for me / Doesn’t necessarily make me feel better / Only sometimes says what I mean / Isn’t the only way out / Isn’t a death-wish / Is a gem in my fingers / Is turd in my hands / Is physical torture / Or bliss / Loves indiscriminately / Hates with a passion / Likes the sound of its own voice / Isn’t at the service of anyone’s revolution….

Listens when it hears / Speaks in many voices / Cries out in the night / Doesn’t drive a car / Walks when it has to / Runs after its enemies / Is hardly cricket / Is a tiny bug in the undergrowth / Lusts wildly / Recants without grace / Whisper’s ” nevertheless, it moves….”

Is repulsed by the truly ugly / Feigns madness occasionally / Eats fish on Fridays, but meat never / Is an anglicised curry / Spits glass in the mayonnaise / Swears at the streets / Gets weepy in the country / Has no national boundaries / Swears no allegiance / Pledges support….

Peers slyly out of a cupboard / Eavesdrops shamelessly / Doesn’t read letters pages / Eats when it’s hungry / Takes fright but never flight / Stands its ground…

Doesn’t write politicians’ speeches for them / Sings to itself / Is shy and coy / Is bold as brass / Questions itself constantly / Sometimes finds answers / Takes heat from the fire / — There’s no smoke without it / Cuts its own throat / Doesn’t pay for the razor blades / Eats grass to survive / Borrows, but pays back….

Indulges in a kind of drug abuse / Respects itself / Lives in the neighbourhood / Isn’t the girl-next-door / Never watches soap operas / Lasts only a flash / Is there forever / Doesn’t write thankyou letters / Is on strike for a better deal / Takes in the neighbour’s kids / Does horrible things to them / Burns churches / Laughs at the powerful / Teaches its granny to suck eggs….

Isn’t faithful / Philanders / Returns to true love / Cries itself to sleep at night / Listens to music / Makes a cup of tea and thinks / Doesn’t want to go home / Stays up late / Is a dirty stop-out / Leers madly / Feels sorry for itself / Always recovers / Sneezes adolescent confidences / Is Black & White in Technicolour / Makes films about the poor / Hitches a lift somewhere / Reads in the dark / Gets up early for the dawn…

Contradicts itself / Is a two-timing, lying, double-crossing bastard / Rots your brain / Makes your willy shrink / Has a dry-weave top-layer lyric / Wears shiny, shiny boots of leather / Eats its young / Smells like last night’s dinner / Lives in a shotgun shack / Has a steel bucket on its head / Says “fuck you” / Has four shredded wheat for breakfast / Takes no bribes or back-handers / Is true to itself / Lies to no-one…

Kills fascists / Loves lefties / Is ultra-liberal with a bite / Has bile / Gnaws its own testicles off in frustration / Has big tits / Exercises daily / Sleeps in, dreaming / Wakes screaming from its nightmares / Feels dead funny sometimes / Concerns itself with the abused / Cuts and slices up / Folds in upon itself / Has heroes but no gods / Is at the cutting edge of the new / Eats dinner in the past / Waits for the stranger to visit / Despises the man from Porlock / Skins up / Lives at the top of a towerblock / Is white-noise static / Is the best thing since sliced bread.

Predictions

We talked for hours, night after night,
We made our political star-maps;
Charted the course of the next few years:
The fall of governments, and wars,
The tide of history, the trends,
Conflicts, new and old.
But nothing
Will ever prepare for the rain
Sweeping chill freezing down bloody hillsides
On the bodies of the dead.

The old man grows pigeons

One of those late August Sundays
In the Park — the sound of sweet funky jazz
Should permeate, instead the soft click
Of bowling balls launched by ladies in white
Provides the afternoon’s soundtrack.

Stooped, sweltering, in a grey suit,
He gives birth to pigeons from his skin;
They feed and flutter off as he bears more.
Feathered scavengers stream upwards
Towards the sun, grateful for the bread
Of his afternoon stroll.

Fixed-fluid, a statue to the unknown
Bird-nourisher, he feeds as they feed,
Gaining power in his ancient rusty limbs
With the ceaseless coming and going, and slowly
Pushes out his chest….

Strutting slightly at first,
He throws back his shoulders to twitch
Newfound feathers on unfamiliar wings — turns
A proud beak to watch the white bowlers.
No longer belonging to this stifling afternoon:
Grey as grey, he cocks an eye
And throws himself into the sky.

SIMON JENNER

Khemanandi

You were one syllable: Liz
It was so simple,
stripped down into a single knot of attention:
the card-end’s hieroglyph,
your ten-speed sudden arrival,
and the plain, hour-stacked silences.

Now you are four – and unfamiliar;
so that at last I can roll in my own mantra:
(Let it go; let it go; let it go)…

For Elaine

I imagine the fragility
of sunlight
in late January.

Your clear grey eyes
cloud over
darken at my chatter.

At last these words
can drift and feed
as slowly
and as quietly with breaks

as your silences
will want to read them.

Consulting the Oracle

Mornings angle into paper clips,
and slide their sheet hours together,
samples of planets that colonise
me, the astrologer,
to the alert enterprise of myth
the metaphor that’s synchronised
to unporpitious clients
or a hopeless event;

flipping spaces
with their stranger faces.

What comfort can I wheel or shadow them? –
– scribbling sunshine on a tressel ricketing,
collapsing it like an “I”,
flapping a weak indulgent corner (at 45 degrees),
pressing to extinguish each page
towards scrap identifies of noon and promise?

Today – desires in thick brown paper.
A poem? or unprofitably
reluctant horoscopes for lovers
I was half in love with, and their new lovers
I’ve half encouraged in muscular composites;
and mumble out a synastry of amused despair

that my planets or my hair or hair-line opinion’s
not angled at maturity
or the brittle ersatz of being twenty,
the tripping fuck or the grace of clear hard skin
that won’t fire rash, spurt with designer blades
angling metal at their universe
that stripes me only

as blood stars through foam,
white, pink, grey
with stubble – and as Italian male fashionwear
shaved into these colours, razor models
sharpened to a transparency, to a blood smear
on a chin, running as smooth as sphere-glass.

The Great Elegy for Brighton

This summer’s a dead heat for nostalgia.
But the place I made a quarter century in
had its teeth cut in Regency, hollowed and gone
lushing its cropped spite till it yellowed gently.
House gaps stared, dentistry was metal houghing at the years
like plaque, and finding them dead as nerves set alight.

Reeking its porcelain enlightenment, sparkling
a town of shells saltscoured like nightlife
so puffy in the aftertaste of coffee dawns,
and wicca women, so weird that they wanted me.
Our lusts were siliconed like years gone hard;
and lonely was an only tenderness, apart.

Young in a New Age, with its split ends of nostalgia
gazing into ragged amethyst
and materialist blown sapphires of Beetles, items
for the sleek amphetamines of Glastonbury.
The quartz is shaved into daylights.
For them the stone is worn down end to end.

Marrow is a food of anger, ebbing to
flutes or the sucked Tibetan pipes of the dead,
and firing out my roots with regrets
brittles me into whistling at noon.
This was a time of lovers into crystals
when all around salt sweated from the sea.

I can graunch at this shell that’s Brighton in me,
a little flesh at the edges in a delicate twist
that says we’re the sum of what our shelling wants.
Like the West Pier, that’s a tangle of branches gone rotten.
I’ve trodden very lightly when I’ve tripped on the condemned,
steeped – over branches in reflection – roots fluttered in blue soil.

Exposure

Our film lay rolled for months –
love lit tight on black. Now, prints,
so late our love’s faltered, unravelled in the light.

Two’s Flesh

Naked, maybe never again with you
I want to strip beyond my skin,
as if my body hesitated your coming.

The Dead

Only when your back’s turned
face down, can my tongue quiver you
from bereavement to your own voice.

NICK OSMOND

Driven

George was driving Roberta back from a country pub.

They had eaten steak-and-kidney pie with salad, had shared a portion of chips and tasted each other’s beer.

After the two Worthington White Shields there was a light fizz in his brain which passed down his arms to the vibrant feel of the steering-wheel. The curve of the seat supported his lower back, his head was high, commanding a good view of the road. He fitted his car.

Roberta was a good passenger. Not herself a driver, she liked to be driven fast, never tensed her body, gasped or gripped the seat. Her hands, loose at the wrist, gestured as she talked. A wrinkled brown fore-arm and a beringed hand, loose-wristed and expressive, gestured on the periphery of his vision. They were comfortable together. He glanced across for a quick recapitulation of the features he liked in her. Bleached grey hair, brown face set in comely lines, an optimistic forward-looking way of holding her head. His attention was on her warm, rather deep voice, with its Yorkshire edges.

She was telling him about Christopher, her youngest son. George had only met him once or twice. Tall, talented and tormented. A suffering Christ. Attractive to women, intimidating, you couldn’t relax with him. As Roberta spoke, the picture in George’s imagination took on more colour and detail, even as his driving mind computed the continually evolving traffic situation. On this stretch of the A27 you did fifty to sixty through the tree-lined bends, then into fifth and up to eighty-plus on the long straights where you could read the road for a couple of miles ahead. He loved this driving.

“He’s too clever for his own good,” said Roberta sharply, stringing out the words and evidently savouring the strength of this truism. “He’s driven, George, that’s how Jeremy used to be, in a different way. Both of them, driven. “Jeremy was her husband, another gaunt giant, now long dead.

Christopher. Inward-looking dark eyes. For years he had worked as a hotel night-porter, never eating a proper meal, spending all his money on books which he had devoured in the dimly-lit lobby. Always hungry for knowledge, but for what purpose? Intent as a preacher, his eyes glittering with intellectual excitement, always attended by an exotic female determined to save him and avid to expose herself to his cold flame.

George was closing on a white Orion, sedately driven. The road was empty for half a mile ahead and he sent the long grey car surging through an effortless over-take, checked in the mirror that the white car was slipping meekly away behind and flicked into fifth as the steadily rising needle passed eighty. Easy driving. He relaxed his shoulders and the toes of his left foot which were still curled from working the clutch.

The pleasure he took in this crisp control stayed where it belonged, on the edge of the conversation with Roberta. Overtaking the white car was a barely perceptible interruption of the flow, as if, talking at a cafe table, one of them had put a hand on the other’s arm and smilingly indicated they’d like another cup of tea. Both would watch as the pot was lifted, the tea poured, the conversation flowing on like a river running round a rock.

As he approached the Asham roundabout he slowed to sixty to tuck in behind half a dozen cars motoring in line astern at decent intervals. The Beddingham level crossing was closing and as the cars waited a London-bound train passed urgently to the west, a long, sleek row of brightly lit windows.

“I love trains passing in the night.” The words were in his mind but Roberta was graphically depicting the wild rages of Christopher’s ex-wife and he was content to leave them unspoken.

The change began as the line of cars were accelerating away from the crossing, up the hill. He knew exactly how to time his run so he would be out-accelerating the cars in front just as he reached the over-taking lane, so that he could surge past, fifty yards behind another overtaker who was also travelling fast and indeed pulling slightly away. As he entered the long left-hand curve alongside one of the drivers he was overtaking, a glance at the speedometer showed he was up to eighty-five and over. Too fast and too tight for comfort. He registered that the car he was passing was closing on the one in front so that George was boxing it in. He knew it would swing out close behind him to follow through.

It did. Its lights were glaring right behind, and as he went on accelerating, trying to shake it off, he knew he was caught. The glowing eyes stuck on his tail. There was still three hundred yards of overtaking lane before the road narrowed. Pull over, slow slightly to let him zoom past? George couldn’t. His auto-pilot had taken him over. Accelerating up to ninety-plus past the leading car, he stayed longer than necessary in the out-side lane and only moved over to the inside when the man behind no longer had the space to get past. He was still uncomfortably close, the bastard. George’s neck muscles were taut as he gripped the wheel.

Teach him a lesson, make him drop back, show him you know he’s there! A quick dab on the brake pedal so the rear lights give a warning flash. Slow, more abruptly than is needed, just as you enter the two-way stretch leading into the roundabout at the beginning of the Lewes bypass.

There. You’ve forced him back, now shake him off, show him up. Into third and down to fifty-five on the approach to the roundabout, eagle-eyed check that there’s nothing coming up from the right to give way to, take the straightest line through to the dual-carriageway and stamp hard on the accelerator. Seventy, eighty, keep her in fourth for maximum pull, eighty-five. He’s still there. He’s moved into the outside lane and is closing, gradually. Keep accelerating. Nearly ninety.

The other driver is still closing, deliberately. He’s got the legs of you. There are cars ahead, can’t pull out now, boxed in, let him past. Move into overdrive, relax the right foot.

A shadow is passing to the right with insolent slowness. Bastard. You bastard. George stares rigidly ahead. If he looked he might see the young men’s large pale faces vociferating and gesticulating, perhaps a soft, hefty pair of white buttocks flattened against the glass.

But George can’t look. Tight-lipped and dry-mouthed, he can’t hear what his old friend is telling him about the pain and anxiety her son is causing her. He’s aware, way below words, of the auto-pilot. He knows he has gone defensive because the other has been playing with him, has retaliated.

The other car floats into view, but instead of using its power to roar ahead past the other cars up front, it pulls into the inside lane in front of you and, insolently, slows to match your speed. A fast little red job. Can’t tell what it is, the silver insignia is indecipherable. Something like one of those Renault Clios that used to flick past you at a hundred plus on the racing roads of France.

And yes, there is a skinhead face at the rear window, turning to mouth and make some gesture. You don’t want to see. Ease your speed. Please, just let him go, get him away, let it finish. Eventually the gap widens and the other starts to overtake the slower vehicles.

The joust is over.

But the spell was still upon him. George continued to sit bolt upright like a man in a trance. He was aware of Roberta’s gestures, he could hear her voice. But now their conversation was the rock and it was the driving drama that dashed over it, obliterating his response and spattering hers into discordant fragments.

She was telling him things about Christopher’s work that he didn’t know, wanted to hear, ought to be able to remember later. Something he was organising. A conference? A book or article he was writing, what about, to do with a course? Wasn’t he doing a PhD? But he was teaching too. Quite important, quite high-up. Peace Studies. Bullshit but impressive. Ghosts of questions hovered in George’s mind, configured vaguely into the attitude of grudging respect, mingled with hostility and an envious and lightly prurient curiosity about what he did with the alluring ladies, which made up his habitual feelings about Christopher when sympathy and interest were missing.

He was still on auto-pilot, absent, another, an empty human shell inhabited by an extra-terrestrial. He struggled to dispel this other but knew he couldn’t, not yet. What a pain! And it was a pain: it took you over when you least expected it, came and went in its own good time.

At least Roberta hadn’t noticed anything. Or so he hoped.

George completed the journey quietly and dropped her off after a warm farewell. His mind was unthawing slowly. Driving with self-conscious sedateness up the hill towards his own street he plucked an imaginary thing from somewhere in the region of his heart, squeezed it in his fist and flung it away with a little exhalation: “Woof! Bye-bye little red car.”

But what was Christopher writing about?

SUE LONG

My first best friend was Rebecca Penaluna, we were at infants and junior school together. I liked Rebecca because she had an exotic surname, an older brother and was very good at back bends. We used to go to gymnastics together but I was an amateur compared to Rebecca. In the playground I would attempt a hand-stand without the safety of a wall to protect me but would always bottle it, never quite having the courage necessary to fling my legs high into the air. I would perform dismal diagonal, with legs just a little higher than my waist, then drop back down and try to look pleased with myself. That wasn’t bad I used to think, passable and then I would see Rebecca. Rebecca didn’t do handstands she did flying handsprings, taking running leaps onto her hands and before a moment passed had moved through a 360 degree revolution to be back on her feet again. Rebecca didn’t need a wall for handstands, she could stay on her hands, perfectly balanced for hours on end, not caring about her pants showing or the grit from the playground digging into her palms. Rebbeca could walk on her hands.

Her family lived in a big house on the corner of Ditchling Road and St. Andrews Road. I loved visiting, it was a big house and Rebbeca had her own room. The sitting room had big cushions on the floor, bean bags and I would roll, squeal, leap and hide within the bean bags, waiting to be told off by Mrs Penaluna, but it never happened, it seemed that rolling, squealing, leaping and hiding were quite acceptable occurrences
for bean bags.

There was only one time Rebecca and Mrs Penaluna let me down. Mrs Penaluna had a car, which was as much a novelty to me as bean bags, and one day she drove Rebecca and I to somewhere – the shops maybe. Prior to getting in the car, we had eaten large quantities of custard tarts and I was feeling rather full. We sat in the back seat of the car and started our journey. All was going well until we turned right into Ditchling Rise. Ditchling Rise is a rather steep hill and Mrs Penaluna braked as the car hit the incline. The sudden stopping made Rebecca laugh, so I laughed too, then Mrs Penaluna laughed and in a minute we were all laughing and stopping the car seemed like a very good game. So good a game that Mrs Penaluna decided to continue it all the way down Ditchling Rise. Rebecca kept laughing, Mrs Penaluna kept laughing, I started to feel very sick. I was in a complete panic, I didn’t know what to do or say, I felt I would be ruining the nice time that Rebecca and Mrs Penaluna were having if I said stop. I felt a terrible sense of helplessness. We continued to bump down the road, the sound of their laughter crashed in my ears and I became convinced they were doing it on purpose, how could they not have noticed I had stopped laughing, that when Mrs Penaluna said gaily, `are you having fun?’ I didn’t answer. I knew I was going to be sick, but some-thing in me, pride, anger held it back until the car stopped. I walked round to the back of the car and threw up. It seemed as if everything I had ever eaten in my entire life came flooding from my mouth. The relief was fantastic. Mrs Penaluna looked horrified, ‘I didn’t know you were feeling sick dear, why didn’t you say?’ I looked at her, said nothing and continued to gag and spit onto the kerb. The final end came for Rebbeca and I when we finished junior school. We had all sat the 11 plus with our suitability to attend Grammar or Secondary Modern school being decided by one exam.

I ran home with the brown envelope containing my destiny and gave it to my mum sitting in the garden. The contents of the envelope took us all by surprise, I’d got in the Grammar School, no one was more amazed than I. The next morning I met Rebbeca in the cloakroom and we agreed the best way to tell each other was by shouting out the name of the school at the same time. We counted ‘one, two, three’ and I screamed ‘Varndean’ and she screamed `Dorothy Stringer’. I was heart broken, I said `oh Rebecca, what are we going to do, we might not see each other.’ Rebecca was silent for a long time and then said ‘I don’t think that matters much really’ and walked away.

Looking back I think maybe she was upset that I got to go to Grammar School and she didn’t, it was a complete reversal of roles. Rebecca had always been prettier, cleverer, smaller, cuter, nicer, better than me or so I thought. That day I also discovered she was nastier. That was in 1974 and Rebecca and I didn’t speak again until 1987, she tracked me down and phoned me in the squat I was living in, in London. ‘Hello’ said a voice ‘it’s Rebecca, Rebecca Penaluna, do you remember me?’ ‘Yes’ I said ‘I do, how are you?’ ‘I’m fine’ she said ‘sitting in front of the fire, with my dog at my feet and I’m pregnant’.
‘Oh my god’ I said ‘what are you going to do?’
‘Have it’ she said ‘I’m married, we’ve been trying for a baby’.
‘Oh yes’ I said, ‘of course’.
‘What are you up to?’ she said.

Sitting on the bare floored stairs of the squat, having just recovered from a termination and the nasty end of a nasty relationship, I felt incapable of saying anything to Rebecca that would make sense. Nothing could compete with the picture of wedded bliss that Rebecca had painted for me. There was no doubt in my mind that she was happier than me. She asked me to visit her that coming Christmas or when I was next in Brighton, I said I would and ended the conversation without taking her address. I’m sorry for that now. Discovering she was pregnant must have brought memories of her own childhood flooding back, I think like me, she was trying to reclaim bits of her life back, trying to find people who could help with a piece of the jigsaw. At that time, I wasn’t much use.