iii
A BOOK OF IDEALS
An evangelist of the ring of death in the theatre of pain. The
spectators came from far and wide to hear his ranting
pontifications and see him cast one more horn-sharpened beast
into the Catholic abyss. He came to be known as the Gentleman,
the Pontiff, the Scoundrel. He was every true Ezbahhan lady’s
late-lie-in wet fingered fantasy and he fucking knew it.
He wasn’t a villain in the true sense, he was something far
more insidious. He was an uber-villain in that he lived above all
natural laws, a perfectly tamed hunter killer. Perfect social
camouflage. To his supporters he was the Pontiff, to his enemies,
he was the Butcher of Brasillica.
In a place called Herod, tarmac sticks to your feet. Big cars and
loose women stalk the streets. Steam therapy for idiots. A black
tie only event. A birthday celebration at the restaurant takes
centre stage. Our hero toys with a cigarillo, turning it this way
and that, the leaf crackling against his brown edged teeth.
Constant droning of a bull’s broken heart. Life as a mummy.
Shady deals done in rooms that were permanently vacant. Tortures
and gameplans. The fat wife of tears.
In a restaurant called Madheda, the stink of bull offal exposed
to the sun, skulking gangbang fanny stage gaslit by need. The
smell of methane in the air, the rasping suffocation of a sex
show laid on by his fat wife. The grating rattle of her hideous
gargling laugh, his fat wife flirts with the hordes of gore
groupies at his pulpit of slaughter.
A carnival of cunts like rotten lemons baking on a summer veranda.
The smell of potted plants in need of watering., the parched
leaves and sad petals. Puss coming forever. A terror light of
vomited up porridge. Trilabial neon grind shot.
Blisters and Bubble Bath, that was the name of the show his wife
had laid on for him. Half a face buried into a rotting pillow old
as mildew. The wrought iron door to dancehall hell where Marilyn
Munroe lived. Her red knickers ever aflame. Moist unctions of
baby glue and red wine stains. Kettle screams of some hybrid
afterbirth professor child, the living turd of mammary flesh like
white pudding on super drugs.
The nasty pink poodle fed to the guard dogs.
Littering one corner of the restaurant, broken babies and other
aborted attempts at pro-creation with the fat whelp. Those still
living made horrible soft noises; pitiful to hear them beg for
sustenance in their clucking way. Mama’s old bed passed down
through the centuries reeking of piss.
She caught his arm as he was leaving, the long lost love. Stood
there soaked to the skin in his ring of sorrows. Their eyes
formed a physical bridge across the years of separation. Electric
ran all over their bodies like a chill.