Interview with a demon
come in sit down no don’t sit down on second thoughts and third thoughts don’t sit down don’t even hover carefully in mid-air can I get you a glass of water something to drench no quench your parch have you travelled far of course you have I know you have you’ve travelled for years down a lifetime because you’re brushing the dust out of crevices that seemed so shameful back then when an innocent youth that hasn’t been opened since we were barely in our teens barely out of short trousers and shorter tempers and tantrums and fuses because I never wanted to reveal the truth not to men in moustaches and men who wore glasses and the men who claimed I should be ashamed men who lied and spied and squandered and pondered on my life do you remember do you just cast your mind back for me a moment please a mere indulgence for an old adversary once an even older friend i always thought that if I imagined you were gone it would work but it never did it never does it never will did does will because because because I spoke too soon I spoke to a woman who let me cry on her shoulder until dawn then sent me away to repair my broken fingers and torn nails in an unfamiliar waiting room in an unfamiliar hospital it didn’t smell of antiseptic it reeked of shit and piss and gin and fags and nightmares toasted tasted tested on thinly sliced barbecued barbed wire double-sided sticky taped over my freezing flesh and my broken fingers my soul collapsed it collapsed inwards later that evening after I had been waiting to be seen by a nurse a doctor and a passing calm interrogator she asked lots of questions wrote lots of notes turned and spoke in a huddle with more versions of herself but I asked her not to tell and she said she wouldn’t she said she wouldn’t so I wrote the secret on my chest with cheap moving stationery yes ballpoint pen disjointed words don’t look at me I said as I tried to tell her the details gruesome and details truesome don’t look at me so she didn’t but she wrote and wrote and wrote for hours and then told me to tell or she would tell she advised not told but telling all the same it’s telling I found it very telling so I upped and offed and caught the green polluting vehicle took my plastered and blastered fingers home to my favourite pear tree and listened to the mad neighbour screech at her brats but she loves them she really loves them she’s just got problems mental in the head apparently but you don’t want to hear this have you got all you need any questions thank you for coming we’ll let you know once we have interviewed the other candidates but if I’m honest which I can be with you because I am over you I’m so over you now you’re nothing you’ll only ever work in this life again this town I mean this town again if it’s over my rotting corpse arranged and splayed and broken in the shape of a fucking cross can you see yourself out the door is that way no that way and you are lying that way facing that way talking that way no I don’t know where it leads