That Bloody Couple In Corfu

These past two years I have relived everything (we once met a couple
in Corfu, I think it was, the ‘we’ being me and my first girlfriend.
God, I was cruel to her. This couple had worked at Clarks shoes, living together
in the low-cost housing on site. They dumped so much on us on that holiday.
They were reliving everything too), and it is so innocuous what comes back,
though it has been a thorough, thorough bombardment of memories, at times,
and I have felt quite guilty at times (and annoyed! They simply would not
be quiet, and they were on that terrace every blood evening! I just wanted
to speak to my girlfriend, but I couldn’t). (And now, an hour or so later,
at least two other holidays have come back to me, along with other pettiness
and cruelty, but I’m still only dumping my days in the sun here, reliving them
cowardly as I write, peeling away more and more vacant memories
to only bring back others.)

—

It’s the Sunday afternoon of the Jubilee weekend

I’m behind the bar polishing the same glass.
The Dalai Lama walks in holding a gun to his head.
He stops in the middle of the bar.
The celebrations go past on the TV.
He nods at it and walks to the bar. Sits down.
“Usual, please, barman.”
He doesn’t remove the gun from his head.
Sylvia looks up from the corner to check.
“No, not yet,” he says.
She bends back down to the oven. Waits.
He sits nursing his bottle.
A gambler comes in and stretches next to him.
They make eye contact. They consider each other.
“Why not,” Dalai says.
The gambler runs outside. Sets himself on fire.
A new girl is piling up old empties in the back.
“Another,” I shout to her.
I didn’t sign up for this.
The next two years are quiet. Only Sylvia checking.
I polish the same glass.
A professor from the Doctorised Collective of Everything Knowable® walks in with 17 suits on.
His eyes are narrow. Has sick on every layer.
Everyone ignores him.
He points at me. “I don’t get you: that’s clean!”
“Finally!” says Dalai. “You can take a seat now, Doc.”
Still holding his gun.
Still polishing the same glass.
That took him a while, from the back.
“Can I take one of your jackets for you?” from me.

Ashley Dunn has written lots of words and is starting to get organised (artistically). He hosts a poetry night. He has been published in Roi Fainéant Press and Grey Thoughts. He is based in Bristol, UK. He can be found on Instagram and Twitter with @ashleydwriting. He loves you.