SMOKING REMAINS



A loud noise at lunchtime wakes me and I wonder - what the fuck? WW11
UXB apparently someone stood on it by mistake is the news. Oh well time
I was up anyway so why worry about some poor slob even now meeting with
his maker of whom the less said etc may he rest in peace notwithstanding
nobody knows his name or number he just moved in the man not the maker
with his wife and dog.

I perform that dour deliberation so redolent of the gentleman and shine
my shoes of course a trick I picked up at school. Slipper to the kitchen
initiating proceedings there knocking over a mug of coffee I was about
to sip blast now I'll have to make another look at the bloody time I'm
nothing like ready to go can't seem to shrug off this hunch of sobriety
surely bending my back. I notice I'm not shaking today, nearly, vibrations
must have tuned in to my wavelength and smoothed it out so the scattered
man didn't die in vain. Only passing strange he should choose that very
moment to tread on a slug that exploded? Idly speculating, loading a sling
bag with books I borrowed in the porous hope of enlightenment leaving no
tome unlearned but what I want to know is - what has literature the fuck
to do with life? And how does one avoid it? Scrambled eggs is the answer
as is so often the case.

Where was I? Oh yes on my way out like a light fantastic tripping down
the road to the library not the pub where the world goes alas ah listen
I will hie me home sober and OD on Casablanca tonight. Sobriety becomes
me I do say broken liver aside on the whole not to be too peculiar about
it without prejudice yes I do say sobriety suits me rather well hell a
summer without gin who needs it - is that right? No not me not I no beer
either mind neither wine. Still. There's always walking in the rain. And cocaine.

Passing the place where the bang occurred I resist the urge to applaud.
Who knows your man might be there in spirit his flesh is flecking the
wall spirals of blue ascending his wife howling the dog cowering large
fluorescent men scooping up his smoking remains and I think yeah ain't
it the truth as I hurry by holding my nose there's always some fucker
worse off than yourself.

 

THE MURDER FLAT

They were a quiet couple, the Palmers. If you saw them in the car park or in the lobby, they’d nod and hurry along, Mrs Palmer meek behind her husband, shopping clinking. He was average. Everything about him was average. She was ordinary. Nothing about her attracted a second glance. Although, sometimes, as she padded meekly behind Mr Palmer, you might notice a tightening of the lips, a narrowing of the eyes, and if you let yourself look down you might see her neat fists curled rigid, unpainted nails digging into palms. 

One evening, waiting for the lift with them, pleasantries exchanged, when it came I ushered them in ahead of me, my floor below theirs. As I moved forward to exit I happened to look in the mirror on one side of the lift and I saw Mrs Palmer staring with intense hatred, no other word to describe it, at her husband's back.

I couldn't speak. I waved and gave them a nod and a smile, neighbourly. 'Bloody hell,' I thought, 'That was scary.' I'd never seen a mark on Mrs Palmer, nothing to suggest physical abuse, but now I began to think about the way they must be in private. I was up at three that night down a rabbithole when I heard a heavy crunching sound. Couple of hours later the ambulance left. He had died in a sweaty, stinking stupor on top of her, we learned. Took her an hour to free herself, she said, and to call the emergency services. They had found him with his face buried in her pillow. The jury took ten minutes to send her home.

ON A CLEAR DAY


You gotta love it, the story of Jesus. Born in a manger to Mary the
virgin and Joseph the cuckold. Apparently she didn't, like, do it? You
know? Sure, sure. believe it. Anyway, what happens, the family move

from Bethlehem to Nazareth, for the work, right? There's a big demand for
carpenters. Those Nazarenes, always decorating. Now it isn't long before
Jesus gets bored with building work and starts up a gang, the disciples,
with their own uniforms and everything. Thing is, he's really well connected: 

tribe of Judah, family of David, second king of Israel. You know what 

I'm saying? And there was his cousin, sure. Everyone knew John the
Baptist. John the Publicist, if you ask me. What a bigmouth. Anyway, Jesus
gets baptized, by guess who, and before you know it he's made two trips
through Galilee with his pals from Jerusalem, and hey, most of the time
they're, like, at it. You know? Eating and drinking, loaves, fishes, wine.
You name it. Thing about Jesus, your man knew how to party and he didn't
care who complained. The fly in the ointment was the religious right, of
course. When isn't it? And then there was Herod, or Governor Antipas as
he was formerly known, and boy, did Jesus get up his nose.

A week before Passover, Jesus decides to split and he goes back to
Jerusalem, and to his surprise the people greet him as the Messiah! Really,
the Messiah, yet. Can you believe it? Now Jesus isn't exactly backward
at coming forward as we know, and when one of his gang, Judas the cheap-
skate, squeals on him, well, he puts his hand up, and the Sanhedrin, this
bunch of superior bastards with nothing better to do, have him arrested,
give him a quick trial - and condemn him to death! The Roman procurator,
Pontius Pilate, fell for the Sanhedrin's line about Jesus being a threat
to his total authority. Yeah right, like a hippy with attitude is going
to fuck up Imperial Rome all on his own. Well, the sad part is that by
now Jesus is beginning to believe his own publicity, and to cut a long
story short, he puts on quite a show and to cries of Here Come The Cross
the whole town turns out for the crucifixion, a kind of open air enter-
tainment popular at the time. So now Jesus is hanging up there with the
rest of the cast feeling pretty sorry for himself, despite the groupies
licking their lips down below, and he notices this soldier eyeing him
up. You know? And he says to him, 'Oy, pal, see these nails?' Nods to
his hands, 'You couldn't like pull them out for me could you?' Well, the
soldier has taken a shine to him and he agrees, reaches up with a claw
hammer he happens to have on him, and yanks the nails. 'Oh the relief,'
Jesus says, rubbing his hands together, as he begins to sway forwards.
'Oh my god,' he shouts, 'Quick, quick, fer chrisakes, ya dumb fuckin
eejit, THE FEET THE FEET.' Well, I don't need to tell you what happens
next. The whole thing is blown up out of all proportion a few hundred
years later and in the present day the story of Jesus is big business.
Ironically, run from Rome by a few shysters, and all over the world,
variations on the theme are set up and called Churches, pushing the
concept of a godhead, and the belief that Jesus died for the sins of
the people. Oh yeah. He did, didn't he? He died because he was a ham
and he couldn't resist the applause, is what he did. His fans were so
pissed off when he kicked it they made up all kinds of shit about how
he came back from the dead and ascended into heaven where his old man,
God Almighty, welcomed him back with big hugs and kisses, yada, yada,
yada. Back in the real world a billion or more suckers Love Him Love
Him, like you do with a divinity, and they love their neighbours as
themselves too, sure, except when their neighbours have other ideas,
when they hate the fuck out of them, and start shooting. And so it
goes, the story of Jesus. You gotta love it.

 BICYCLES

I find myself a completely different person today. It is as though
yesterday I was the same as the day before and the day before and the
day before. My life was like Tordenskjold's famous parade. It was as
though I was the same soldier on the parade of my life. I would march
past the reviewing stand of career, marriage, sex with strangers, sex
without strangers, Porsches, bicycles, the cat Dennis and my dead dog
Bastard, who I remember still with a deep affection. The cat I don't
care for. He is her cat. The fact is he hates me. Because I love her.
Even when I put on a different uniform and march past the stand again,
the cat knows. It was I who took Dennis to the veterinarians and had a
stranger cut off his balls. I represent the incalculable forces of the
garrison. And I am sleeping with his mistress. No. Life was always an
endless Kierkegaard. Like Tordenskjold and his famous parade. Soldier
after soldier. I was the same soldier that I was and thus the parade
continued. Stages On Life's Way. Kierkegaard. How did he know? What
is the point? Pointless to ask. I make a leap of faith and I land on
the same spot. Run and I go faster. Still no answer. What would Hegel
have said? Fuck him. Kierkegaard often argued with himself. How many
Kierkegaards does it take to change a lightbulb? One to postulate.
The whole thing is absurd. I know. I know. The individual exists in
a state of absurdity; how else would he know about the others? It
doesn't bear thinking about. Unless you were Kierkegaard. And look
what happened to him. But now I am a different man. Rationalization
is the concrete failure to understand the point. Now at last it is
over. Last night it happened. The car was in the shop and I was in
a loan. They call these courtesy cars but they never apologise for
the terrible smell of smokers. It is as though they conceived that
consciousness and the external object formed a unity in which both
could not exist independently not Hegel. Fuck them too. Today life
is different because I drove home backed in to the drive and ran
over the cat. I don't blame Dennis. He was expecting the Porsche.
No. The endless parade is over. I am completely different. There
is an end to it. She has told me that Dennis will recover but she
knows I always hated him. Of course the opposite is true. How am
I to explain to her about the soldiers? The endless Kierkegaard?

LAYERS

'Your man's back,' I say to Seamus,
'the onion.'
'Wit the name?'
'Himself,' I say,
'and if you'll put down that spanner,
'I think it's time to eat,
'I'm buying.'
There's a walk we take,
along by the alleys
with creeper over the walls.
He says nothing,
Seamus, but it's like prayer,
he doesn't do that either,
only listens.
He lets a hand stray,
touching the vine,
long dead bloodless sinews,
begun in a glasshouse
and now forever never escaping.
We reach the street,
see Ollie Fanteen, black as black
in his white shirt.
'Ollie,' Seamus hollers, 'he's buying.'
The Italian is where we go,
I'm buying but I'm not paying
if you follow,
there's nothing like spaghetti
when you're buying.
A carafe of house red appears,
and I pour myself a glass
of water, iced, for the company.
Minestrone comes,
and Seamus complains, 'Potaters,'
he says, 'it needs big fockin potaters.'
He won't be told.
But he sucks up spaghetti alright,
him and Ollie both,
double my plateful, I'm buying,
and on a diet.
We're the last table
this lunchtime;
it's the timing, sure,
there's reason we do what we do.
You don't have to be an onion
to make strange soup
but it helps.
Ice cream and coffee is ordered,
and waiting, Seamus says,
thoughtful, 'Did one a youse say grace?'
I reach into my pocket,
'Shaddap,' I say, 'and listen to this.'

RACE MEETING


It's all over. The crowds have dispersed, leaving behind the empties,
the rubbish piled high, stinking toilets, one abandoned shoe and three
lines turned to ghostly slime on my favourite mirror. Worth a lick. I
see on the TV it's a sorry mess at Cheltenham too, only they clean up
after the Queen Mother, old bitch didn't choke to death, again. Shame.
I said to the second Clancy, this morning, 'Missed your chances there,
Pat'. He's not speaking, it's his voice, but he agreed.

You don't know until it happens to you. I don't drink, for my health,
so it's always me the spare hand at the wheel, short order cook, hard
currency negotiator and general dogsbody for the Limerick crowd, with
Seamus and his Uncle Ralph Don't Ask, in reserve. Mrs. Seamus allowed
the pair of them to go this year, on the Wednesday, the day my fockin
horse kissed the ground came up to meet him. It couldn't lose, if you
listen to some people. TV Woo catered the evening at my place - she's
a diamond, I tell you, but she threw the box of tricks in at the door
and fucked off sharpish. She's from London, too. We're a colony. They
never missed us till we were gone. Patel was on the phone asking when
he can expect a visit. I ask Herself to look him up if I'm tied to my
desk. She says he pines. It was a fucking fatwa last time, when Aaron
pulled his second cousin twice removed and seduced her on the bedroom
carpet, she wouldn't undress. I think Seamus has a plan.

I made them all breakfast this morning, the works. My reputation. My
phone warbled. It was the other Clancy, would I be sure to scorch his
bacon. I wouldn't mind but he was on the toilet. So, it's all over. A
celebration. Your man was a Welshman, but any excuse. Still, as I pan
the camera, making sure I get the sinister green Transit in the scene,
I can't help wondering, about the shipment.

POND LIFE

It was a miserable damp morning. The sun backlit sodden trees. Birds
driipped in the branches. A cat eyed the street through a window at
No. 52. At the top of the house Sheehy lay face down across his bed.
Beneath the window a dog with his legs in the air, sharp protrusion
pinkly pointing. Kids shouting woke him. He rolled over, staggered
over to the bed, nudged, until he heard a moan. Pointing, he came
closer. Sheehy opened one eye, 'Ah, Jesus, Charles,' he said,
closed the eye, moaned again, 'No,' he moaned, 'No.'

He got up, collected towels, glanced into the next room on his way to
the shower; there was a body on the sofa. When he came out of the shower
it was in his bedroom stealing his clothes. Sheehy said, 'Leave me a
clean shirt.' He went in to the sitting room, over to his desk, set just
so in the corner. Paper proliferated, plain, printed and palimpsest. A
humming PC lit up at his approach exposing a neat text, and he gazed at
it mystified. He reached up for a book, found a page, 'Yossarian,' he
whispered, 'Yossarian'. He sat down in despair. Just as he was about to
hold his head in his hands he felt a sinister presence behind him. A
sharp pain made him wince as he realized he hadn't fed the cat. Her
claws embedded in his shoulders, he went to the kitchen. Charles was 

already there, licking.

'Coffee's on,' Sheehy called.

The body appeared wearing his last ironed shirt. Sheehy carried in a
tray. Framed monochrome photographs of famous people from behind filled
the wall above the desk and in a glass fronted cabinet on one shelf a
collection of balls, miniature scoreboard fixed at 106 and 41, and several 

gouged out blocks of chalk. On another shelf a jam of model motors
led by a green Defender mounting a white gloved policeman lying down 

on the job. The bottom shelf was stacked with magazines.

Charles came in, farted. Sheehy slung him out on his arse. 'Animal,' he
said. His brother sat drinking coffee, watching the dog in the garden.

'Shouldn't you give her a bell?'

'I don't think so, she never wants to speak to me, ever again.'

A phone rang.

'Hello? Yes, it's me, do you want ... ?' He listened. Hung up.
'She never wants to speak to you ever again,' he said, 'she's coming
over to see me and have a word.'

'She loves me'. 

Sheehy went to the bedroom and dressed, returned, took Charles' 

lead off its hook and stepped out through the open French doors. 

A blue car drew up as they reached the gate. Sheehy gave the driver 

a kiss, 'You all right?'

'All right?' She said, 'All right? How can I be all right when that ...
that ... '

'Bastard?'

'Selfish bastard doesn't ... doesn't ... I'm going to kill him ... this
is the last time.'

'Well, don't break any mugs, and mind my furniture.'

They left her to it and walked down the Sunday street. Not raining now,
the sun almost shone. Drying puddles reflected the tall houses and in
every third driveway a booted man washed a car. Kids biked about in
packs, dogs exchanged smells, cats glared and round the corner came Mrs
Smallbone, back from mass, 'Risen from your sinful bed, Michael?' 'Good 

morning yourself, Mrs.' She rolled away, led by her Pomeranian, Bruce.

The park was crowded with suburbanites pursuing leisure. There was a
round pond in the middle of a neat coppice. Fashionable fisher folk sat
on stools deploying expensive rods, thewhile ducks plopped into the
water from their conveniently located island hideaway. A man in green
bent to instruct a beautiful goldie. Charles sloped over and tried it on  

with her, but no luck. The sun had burned off straggling clouds as they 

walked over to the tennis courts, where Larkin the piebald gazehound

tried pissing on the wire fence.

"Every time", Sheehy thought. 'How are you Stan?'

'I never knew a dog so stupid.'

The dogs fell down together to rest while the two men stood in silence
as players ran around smiting mightily at balls. A blonde girl wearing
immaculate kit was thoroughly ogled. Her partner became more and more
annoyed as she trounced him. He had no style, no class, and no chance
after this and he knew it. She chased down a ball, crashed into the
fence in front of the onlookers, spraying sweat. She licked her lips
at them.

'Christ,' Stan said, 'Oh Christ, her legs ... they're ... they're ... '

'Glinting in the sunlight, a fine sheen of moisture accentuating the
muscles within, taut and hot to the touch?'

'Oh fuck me yes,' Stan said. Larkin took another slash at the fence. 

 
'Later Stan,' Sheehy said.

When they got back to the house, the blue car was gone. There was 

a note on his desk. He spiked it, turned on the T.V. Brazil. Red Bull 

looked invincible, Vettel fastest, Alonso up his arse. Charles flopped, 

the cat reclined. Outside, daylight ebbed away, streetlamps yellowed 

and Mrs Smallbone ambled homeward, Bruce in her arms.