Dante's Inferno (9 page)

Silent, apart, and without escort

We went on, the one before, the other

After, as haiku writers on a long journey.

I was trying to explain to Ted how the whole thing

Reminded me of a fable of Aesop’s,

The one where a frog offers to take a mouse

Over a river, but ends up drowning it,

Finally getting eaten itself, by a

Passing kite – the more I talked the less

Convinced he looked – when, one thought leading to

Another, as sometimes happens,

The whole thing suddenly came clear to me:

‘It’s not like what we just saw, it’s like
us
:

You’re the frog, I’m the mouse, the Kitchen Devils

Are the hawk: to put it bluntly,

We’re in danger, because after what we

Made them do, and everything that happened,

They’re going to be pretty pissed off with us!’

I was so frightened I kept glancing back

Over my shoulder; but now Berrigan

Looked more convinced: ‘I get your drift,’ he said,

‘We’d better split.’ Berrigan had scarcely finished

Outlining his plan when I heard them coming,

Wings spread, intent on catching us.

He grabbed me by the arm instinctively,

Like a mother waking to the sound of a smoke alarm

Who pulls her son close to her and runs

Without even a thought of getting dressed,

And we dashed out through the café, leaving behind us

A trail of upturned tables and spilt cappuccinos.

No sooner were we outside than Berrigan

Turned to me, saying: ‘Hold on!’

Then we both leapt down the scree

We had descended once before,

This time sliding down on our backsides

Like kids on a hill walk when the snow comes down.

We landed with a bump in the underground

Car park, next to a door marked
CAST ONLY
.

As we looked back up the slope we could see

The Kitchen Devils waving their prongs,

But they didn’t dare follow us,

We were out of their jurisdiction.

Within we found a painted crowd, who walked

Round at a snail’s pace on a raised stage,

Weeping, their look worn-out.

They wore huge cloaks which, on the outside, shone like

Gold, like something you might see on a catwalk,

But inside they were of lead, so heavy

That by comparison a suit of armour

Would have seemed as flimsy as a shellsuit.

At first I thought we had interrupted

The rehearsals for some Beckett play,

And I turned to Berrigan and said:

‘Is it some new interpretation of
Quad
?’

But Berrigan, my guide, motioned with his head,

As though to say ‘If only…’, then added:

‘See if there’s anyone you recognise.’

I looked up at them from where I stood in

The pit as they trudged slowly by,

Then one of their number, who saw me gazing,

Called out: ‘You, who seem to move so freely

In the dark air, perhaps you have come

To be fitted with a cloak?’

Berrigan told me to stay still, and as I

Continued to gaze on the gilded shades

I saw two who showed by their look

Great eagerness to be with me,

But their heavy load held them back.

When at last they drew up alongside us

They looked at me for a long time

Without uttering a word, then they turned to

One another and said between them:

‘By the way he moves his throat, I’d say

This one was alive; and if they are dead

By what right do they go without the heavy stole?’

Then they said to me: ‘Breather, for that is

What you seem to be, welcome to the Hedge School

Of the hypocrites. Tell us who you are?’

And I to them: ‘On the slimy banks of

The Lagan I was born and grew up in that

Strife-torn city, and I am in the body

That I always had. But tell me, who are you

Who distil such sorrow as I see running

Down your cheeks? And what punishment is it

That shines so brightly on your backs?’

And one of them replied to me: ‘Our gilded cloaks

Are lined with lead so thick that it makes us

Creak as we walk. We are from the ranks of

Hypocritical academics, who did not practise

What we preached: my name was Jeremy,

I was a well-known Marxist historian

Who sent my son to a fee-paying school

To give him a head start; my friend here was

Once a famous theorist, a translator

Of Derrida, espousing radical politics,

Who treated all she met with scorn.’

‘I know your type…’ I began, but said no more,

For now my eyes fell on one crucified

On the stage with three stakes driven into the ground,

And when he caught sight of me he writhed all over,

Blowing into his beard with sighs,

And Jeremy, who witnessed this, said:

‘That impaled figure you see stretched out

In pain is the man who advised the VC

To raise the fees to £9,000 a year.

Naked, he lies stretched out across our path,

As you can see, and as we pass over him,

He must feel the weight of our heavy cloaks.’

I saw Berrigan staring contemptuously

At this forlorn figure, stretched out on the stage,

The one who had raised fees now unable to raise a hand.

Afterwards, Berrigan addressed the

Historian: ‘Tell me, buddy,’ he said,

‘Is there any way out of this place

That doesn’t go through the café?

We had a bit of a disagreement

With some of the catering students.’

‘I can show you out through the green room,

If you like,’ the Marxist replied,

‘From there you should be able to scramble

Up to Square 5, from where it’s a short walk

To the next pit. It would be impossible

Wearing these heavy cloaks, but you two,

Who are light on your feet, should make it.’

At the thought of the climb Berrigan looked

Peeved, and let out an exaggerated sigh.

We left the Hedge School behind with heavy footsteps.

In that part of the youthful year, when the

Hoarfrost copies his white sister’s imprint

On soil, image that soon fades,

The farmer, down on hay, looks out over his

Fields, and curses; but after a power shower,

When he looks out again, he sees the grass is green

And with a spring in his step he heads to the 4x4;

Just so, Berrigan made me lose heart

When I heard him sighing, but just as quick

He whipped out the plaster to heal my wound;

For when we reached the foot of the mountain

Of rubble he smiled and threw me a rope.

With this I clipped myself to him, then we

Began the ascent, moving carefully from

One slab to the next, Berrigan in front,

Me behind; pulling me towards the top

Of a great splinter of concrete, he said:

‘Now grab hold of this ridge, but test it first

To see if it will take your weight.’

This was no road for gilded cloaks,

For though I had Berrigan to guide me,

And he had the weight of a shade,

We struggled to mount from crag to crag

Without crampons or hexes.

When we came to the point where the last stone

Breaks off, I was so sweaty and puffed out

That I couldn’t take a step more.

Yet no sooner had I sat down

Than Berrigan began to take the piss:

‘Get up off your backside, academic,’ he said.

‘I’m a fifty-year-old man,’ I replied,

‘What you going to do about it?’

‘Nobody,’ he said, ‘ever won fame that way.’

And at that he gave me his hand and yanked

Me to my feet; I stretched and puffed my chest out,

Trying to look as if I was up for it,

Then we took off with heavy steps towards

A large building that shone brightly in the

Darkness, traversing a narrow bridge.

As we went I made an effort to speak

So as not to seem faint, whereat a voice

Rose up from the pit beneath the bridge,

Though what it said I couldn’t make out,

It was like the voice of a man running at speed.

I peered over the side of the bridge

But saw nothing in the gloom, so I said:

‘Master, why don’t we slip round the end there,

where the grass is worn away, and look into the pit?’

‘Nice idea,’ he said, ‘lead on.’

From the centre of the bridge, we came to

The point where it ends and joins a steep bank,

And from this vantage point the pit opened up

To me: down there I saw a terrifying confusion

Of literary agents, all wearing name tags,

Double-barrelled, triple-barrelled, quadruple-

Barrelled, all of such a monstrous girth

Even now the thought of them makes my blood run cold.

Let the Libyan desert boast no more, for

Though it engenders chelydri and jaculi,

Phareans, cenchres and double-headed amphisbenes,

It never spawned so great a plague of venom,

Not even if you added the whole of Egypt

And all the lands of the Arab spring.

Amidst this cruel power-dressing swarm

Were authors running, naked and shit-scared,

Without hope of
pied-à-terre
or invisibility cloak.

They had their hands tied behind their backs with contracts,

And their loins were all disfigured and bloated

With the size of their advances.

Just then, an author ran straight past us –

An agent shot out and clamped her teeth there

Where the neck is bound upon the shoulders.

No Mills and Boon was ever written so

Quickly as he took fire, burned up,

And collapsed into a heap of ashes,

Which fell like leaves onto a carpet of

Unsolicited manuscripts, where some of the

Best work of its time lay rotting and neglected.

After he had been incinerated like this,

The ash particles reunited themselves

And he resumed his former shape

(Just so, as J.K. Rowling informs us,

The phoenix dies and then is born again

When it approaches its five-hundredth year).

As a man suffering a stroke or a heart

Attack will fall, and knows not why

(Perhaps high blood pressure, stress, cigarettes,

Or a failed marriage, drags him down, or some

Impure line of coke chokes his vital spirits),

Then, scrambling to his feet, will look around

All bewildered by the great anguish he

Has undergone, such was this author when he rose.

Berrigan asked who he was and he answered:

‘It’s not that long ago, though God it seems it,

That I rained down from Hull into this fierce gullet.

I loved the bachelor pad more than human

Intercourse, preferred to stay at home with

A packet of fags and a bottle of whisky

Than spend an evening down the pub

Exchanging polite chat, preferred a

Magazine to a real woman –

Less trouble at the end of the day.’

I said to Berrigan: ‘Tell him not to budge,

My mother once worked with him in the

Library at Queen’s, ask him what he’s doing here.’

But the poet heard very well what I said,

And didn’t try to hide it; he turned towards me,

Coughed, and with a look of guilt, said:

‘That you have caught me by surprise in this

Wretched pit pains me more than the day

I kicked the bucket, for that’s something you can’t help.

But I’ll answer what you ask: I’m stuck in this

Hell-hole for stealing a library book when I

Was at Oxford – largely so Amis couldn’t

Get his hands on it. There – not even Motion

Knows about that. Some might say I’m here

Because I narrowed the scope of poetry,

But that’s poppycock. I don’t want you to

Rejoice over the fact you bumped into me

In this pit if you ever get out of here

Alive, so prick up your ears and drink in

My prophecy:
The Arts Council will strip

Poetry publishers of all their miserable

Grants, and the one who publishes your books

Will be the first to go under. After that

There’ll be no room in the market for

Anything more elevated than Pam Ayres!’

When he had finished delivering his speech,

Larkin stuck his two fingers up at us,

Shouting: ‘This be the prophecy!’

And now the agents became my friends, for one

Of them, a blonde, coiled herself round his neck

And started tonguing him, which shut him up for good,

While another, a brunette, coming from the front,

Entwined him in her arms so that

He could barely move a muscle.

Coventry, you crappest of crap towns,

Wasn’t it enough to give us Philip Larkin?

Did you really have to follow that star turn

With Paul Connew and Hazel O’Connor,

King, Dennis Spicer and Pete Waterman?

Will you not be content till you have ruined

Every art form? Losing his balance under

The attention of the agents, Larkin collapsed.

‘Berrigan,’ I said, ‘tell me something about

The shades in this pit, what brings them together?’

‘This pit,’ explained Berrigan, ‘contains thieves,

As Larkin said – but the worst crimes you’ll see

Punished here are crimes against literature,

That’s why the agents are here, as well as

Larkin, and some other Movement poets.

Just as literary agents, in their pursuit

Of an ever-wider readership, and ever

Increasing sales, reduce all writing to a

Commodity, and a formula, so Movement

Writers reduce all poetry to the

Formulaic: journey, minor epiphany, return.

So it’s fitting the two groups come together here:

The writers have their identities robbed by agents,

But the agents are made to suffer in their turn,

As these Movement poets are the ones who never move.’

Just then a cleaner darted past, shouting:

‘Where’s he gone to, that bald librarian?

I found some more mags in his room, hidden

Under the Auden.’ Not even the Hôtel de Nesle

Had as many cockroaches as she had on her back,

There was a giant one crouched on her shoulders,

Just behind the neck, with its wings outstretched,

That seemed poised to take a bite out of her.

Berrigan said to me: ‘That one’s Dolores,

She’s down here rather than with her mates

Because of all the stuff she stole from the

Store cupboard, mostly wine and Rancheros.’

As he was talking the cleaner passed out of sight,

Then right under our noses three shades appeared

Which neither of us would have noticed,

If they hadn’t cried out: ‘Who are
you
?’

I couldn’t recognise any of them,

But it happened, as it sometimes does by chance,

That one of them addressed another:

‘Where did your friend go, Thwaity?’

And then, to stop Berrigan from opening

His mouth, I put my finger to my lips,

Hoping they might say more.

Reader, if you’re reluctant to believe

What I’m about to tell you, that’s no surprise:

I hardly credit it myself, and I was there.

I was still looking at them when a black

Triple-barrelled agent, a New Yorker with a

Six-figure contract, darted up in front of

One of them and fastened herself upon him.

With the middle finger of one hand she teased

The author’s locks, with the other she grabbed

His neck and kissed him on both cheeks.

She then spread her legs and rubbed herself

Against the author’s thighs, stuffing the

Contract between his legs. Ivy was never

Rooted to a tree as round the author’s limbs

The agent entwined her own;

Then they stuck together, as if they had been

Heat-bonded, mingling their colours,

So that neither seemed what they had been at first,

Just as a brown tint, ahead of the flame,

Will advance across the white pages

Of a pile of burning manuscripts.

The other two looked on and each cried:

‘Oh dear, Andrew! If you could only see how you’re

Changing, you don’t look yourself!’

The two heads, already large, merged into

One gigantic one, and the features of each

Face combined together till neither was recognisable,

Rather they looked like a face made in a potato.

The four arms grew together to make two,

Then the thighs, bellies, chests and feet

Mixed together to sprout such members as were

Never seen before in hospital or freak show

Or photographs by Diane Arbus.

The former shape was all extinct in them:

Both and neither the perverse image seemed,

And such it limped away with slow step.

Just then, at the speed of a darting lizard,

Another agent, she was short with fiery hair

And a fuck-off belt, came charging towards

The two remaining authors. She shot up

And sank her teeth into one of them,

Right on middle stump, then fell down,

Stretched out before him, only to jump up at once,

Offering him a Balkan Sobranie.

They both began to smoke languidly,

Staring at each other, the author seemingly

Lost for words, blowing smoke into each

Other’s faces, their feet motionless.

Let Marie Darrieussecq from now on be silent

With her stories about changing into a pig,

And Ovid too can shut up about Cadmus

And Arethusa – he may have changed one

Into a snake and the other into a fountain,

But does my face look bothered?

He never transformed two creatures standing

Face to face so that each took on the features

Of the other: a change of perfect symmetry.

The agent split her tongue into a fork,

While the author drew his legs together,

As if he were standing to attention to receive

The Presidential Medal of Freedom;

His legs and thighs along with them so stuck

To each other that the join became invisible,

While the cloven tongue swelled out growing feet

Which hardened at their extremities to form toes.

Now the legs drew back into the body softening

And growing furry, as they took on the features

The agent had shed, while her pubis

Thrust out to make the member old men piss through.

The smoke from each was now swirling round the

Other, exchanging shape and complexion,

Hair growing on one who had none before,

The other balding before my very eyes,

The one’s pale flat chest filling out with young breasts,

The other’s youth collapsing into withered age.

The one rose up, the other sank, but neither

Let up staring right back at the other,

Fixed eye to eye as they swapped faces.

When the smoke had cleared I saw the one transformed

Into the body of the author shuffle off

As if in a pair of slippers, muttering:

‘Let Conquest now creep about at

Literary lunches on all fours

                                        as I had to do.’

Just so I saw the cargo of the pit of thieves

Change and exchange form, and if my pen lets me down,

May the strangeness of it all excuse me.

But though my eyes could scarcely believe what they saw,

And my mind was sore perplexed,

I could still see clearly enough to notice

The one of the three who stood there alone

And was not changed, and if I am not

Mistaken, now I think on it, it bore a

Striking resemblance to Blake Morrison.