Chapter 38: A World of Poets
‘Surprise!’
A dozen of my friends were present in the ground-floor kitchen of the squat. With red and black and gold, a metre-wide roll of paper that was hung across the far wall stated: ‘WELCOME HOME CYN’. A comforting scent from a stack of glazed Cinnamon buns, fresh out of the oven, surrounded me and caressed me as gently as the eyes of my friends.
Pats, handshakes, murmurs of encouragement and appreciation.
‘You were so brave.’
‘I loved your speech; you were wonderful.’
‘I am proud of you.’ This last from Tony and it was a pleasure to see him in person. Navy jacket; pale blue shirt collar above a green jumper; tidy trousers and shoes. Both by his age and dress, my studio-mate stood out from my anarchist friends and perhaps there was a hint of a question in my expression as I greeted him, since Tony gestured to Daniel and explained that as a result of a visit by Daniel they had brought my easel and paints from the studio to my room the squat.
‘You were in my dream,’ I said, ‘I can’t remember all that much of it, but you were there and were a great comfort.’
‘I saw that. I was a tree in the forest at the time. You were speaking to my soul.’
‘We were all there,’ murmured Ciara.
Buns eaten (soft, sweet, warm, and delicious, despite Ciara’s apology that she was not that good of a baker) and teas drunk, I felt in the diminution of the conversation and from the shy smiles and frequent looks in my direction that something was expected from me. Some words.
Several white, plastic garden chairs had been brought in from the patio for this homecoming party and I stood up on one. Immediately, all conversation ceased. Yes, this is what was wanted.
‘It has been said that: “wherever I lay my hat, that’s my home”. For me, home is wherever I’m with my friends. I’m so glad to be home.’
Grins. Claps.
‘I tried to dream a dream for us all. A dream of utopia. I wanted to inspire the world to reset and start again in peace and harmony, in love even. I tried to end the era of Neo and Trump and Putin and the rest. My dream became a nightmare. I’m sorry about that. Celine and I weren’t strong enough to win, not even with all your help and the help of Amanda and her crowd.
‘I did my best and I lost. That’s enough public dreaming for me. All those trolls who turned up to harass me can find someone else to grief. I’m going to concentrate on my painting.’
I was about to get off the chair when Celine objected by sharing our memory of a puppy that Mum and I were house training. The little dog looked so sad as we gave out to him for his mess. I understood. Celine wanted us to conclude with a more positive statement. Straightening once more, I added, ‘Still, Neo didn’t get what he wanted. It turned out that killing Celine in a dream didn’t harm her. She’s still here and still the source of my best art. They can tamper with the narrative – in as much as there is one – of our dreams but they can’t destroy our id, our imagination, our libido.’
Now I got several claps and nods. My friends were in agreement with me and glad of the positive message. When he offered his hand to help me down from the chair, Tony spoke loudly enough for everyone to hear. ‘It doesn’t matter that Neo won the battle in your dream. What matters is millions of people are using the DreamAds hoods and our souls are able to meet each other in a new and more immediate way than ever before. Neo can try to put adverts in that space but they don’t prevent our souls coming together.’
‘Right!’ said Ciara. ‘And in our dreams, you are who you are without judgement. There’s so much love out there.’
‘A lot of sex too,’ said Daniel, to laughter.
‘And art.’
‘It’s not just the arts. It’s everything. Music too. I mean really good music.’
Voices in agreement.
‘Since using the hood, even my chemistry books got more interesting!’
‘I was looking at the stars last night and I felt something shift so that I was looking at myself: looking down on a small, beautiful planet. And I wasn’t even sure I existed. I’m still not entirely sure I do. My id is more real than I am. I’m like a set of clothes the id dresses in.’
And now the room was full of conversations whose tone was that of cheerful children when their teacher has stepped out of the classroom.
My hand was taken by Daniel’s and love flowed back and forth through the connection. ‘Come and see our room.’
With a wave to Tony – he probably missed it, he was talking so earnestly to Ciara – I went up the stairs, still holding hands with my poet primary.
As soon as I stepped into our bedroom I felt a delicious sense of coherence. Of a jigsaw piece finding its place. Of a satisfying click as a pen top snaps on properly. Of four black aces landing one after the other after the pull of a slot machine’s arm. Beside one of the two rectangular windows were my paints, brushes, easel and chair. Near the other was our bed. Both were natural springs, sources of creativity that poured forth joy. Placed beside each other, their currents swirled around the room melting me, inviting me, caressing me. The resultant mix from these two fountains whispered with smiles and gestures that I could be happy here. That here Celine could float in a sea of pleasure. That this was a space in which time dissolved and I could slough off the needs of Cyn Sweetwater to stand untarnished and exposed without fear of predators.
‘Thank you Daniel. It’s impossible to put in words how much I missed my paints.’
‘I’m changed. You’ve saved me. Brought back my self-awareness.’
I lay on the bed looking upward and Daniel straddled me, filling my view with his wide, bearded head, slowly allowing his considerable weight to settle on my pelvis and hips. Leaning forward, he kissed my lips and I felt the warmth of his love flow around me, like I was entering the corona of a star.
‘What was I thinking when I wrote for the likes? My words should come from the future, not from tweets. You tried to tell me and you did: Celine spoke to David in images that burned. Well, I found it Cyn. Or David did. The place that poetry comes from. I’ve found it again. It was right beside me the whole time.’
When Daniel spoke so rapidly and so urgently, it was usually because he’d just snorted a line of speed and, impassioned, was rushing in a variety of directions that were subjects selected more by chance than reason. Not this time, this was a stream of words from a lucid Daniel.
‘That was the effect of the DreamAds hood. Not me.’
‘Well, both. If I wasn’t sharing my life with you I’d have spun away into the darkness even while convinced I was becoming a better poet. There’s no shirking from your art, Cyn; self-deception is impossible in the viewer. And there’s no hiding from your judgement of people. To deserve your love I have to conduct lightning into your mind and body.’
I felt it: white-blue electricity from the fingertip that touched my forehead.
‘Trembling, I lay on an altar to my muse and though I knew what was to come, I did not flee. I thought of you. I thought of your paintings. I thought of myself and then came the pain. Screaming wind in my ears. Cruel lashes from a dozen whips. A stench that convulsed my body until blood poured from my mouth and nose. After all this suffering, were we were done? Not at all, my ego had a hundred disguises, each of which had to be torn away with merciless claws.
‘At last I returned to myself, a poet in truth. David knew all along. And I’m no longer lost.’
‘Come home to me, where you belong.’
More Celine and David than Cyn and Daniel, we rolled and touched and stripped until, my hands held above my head in his fist, Daniel inside me, we found the calm inside the hurricane.
‘Welcome home lover,’ I said, referring to my body, Daniel’s home within home.
My words made him twitch inside me and a pulse of energy flowed from his eyes to mine, along my spine, to my sex, where clenching tight, I drew a groan from him, although we had barely moved. Suspended in the blaze of the joy of the world, I was simultaneously the rhythm of my heart, the weight of my limbs, the erotic imagery of my mind and motionless, weightless and emptiness. And when at last an avalanche gave way and began to sweep irresistibly downward and Daniel was pure bull, and my body demanded to be all that existed, again and again and again, only then did I clasp him tight and repeatedly lift my hips to meet him.
Afterwards, when shadows of leafy branches swayed back and forth across the sunlit parallelograms on the roof, we listened to music from the radio. My chest on his chest, two stars engulfing each other in their radiance.
Only when our room was suddenly filled with angels did I really pay attention to the music. Their voices were even more pleasurable than the reunion with Daniel/David I’d just experienced. As they sang, shivers ran through my entire body. I felt like I’d been struck in the head by a spear of golden light that poured into me and flooded my mind.
When at last I came back to myself I said, ‘What just happened?’
As though she had heard my question, the presenter on the radio said, ‘and that’s Martina Nolan’s masterpiece, Fianchetto. You know what, it’s so good and your texts and messages are so enthusiastic about the piece, I’ll play it again.’
And once more I was in the thrall of music so intensely beautiful I was lost for its duration.
After the last note diminished to nothing, all I wanted from life was to hear that music again.
‘She was on the pilot,’ murmured Daniel from beneath me.
‘What?’
‘Martina Nolan. She was like you. One of the first to use the DreamAds hood.’
‘She knows how to listen to her inner self. You can tell she knows.’
‘It’s coming,’ Daniel turned his head to look at me, hazel eyes aglow. ‘A world of the imagination. Neo’s achieved the very opposite of what he wanted. A world of poets.’