1980

The table -

Between the table and the bar -

Bob Craven -

His head blown off -

Head off, face gone, beard gone -

Blood across the wall -

Across the shadows -

Across the swastikas and across the sixes -

Six six sixes -

(The shadows talking).

Beside the portable tape recorder, the tape still turning:

Pause, hiss -

HISS -

Piano -

Drums -

Bass -

‘How can this be love, if it makes us cry?’

STOP .

HISS -

Cries -

Whispers -

Hell:

‘How can the world be as sad as it seems?’

STOP .

HISS -

Cries -

Whispers -

More hell:

‘How much do you love me?’

STOP .

HISS -

Cries -

Cries -

Cries:

‘Spirits will kill Hunter!’

STOP

Silence -

Tape over.

Silence -

Between these walls, silence -

Walls tattooed with shadows silent, silent pain -

Maps, charts, photographs of pain -

The silent pain of the photographs -

Grace Morrison, Billy Bell, Paul Booker, and Derek Box -

Across the maps, the charts, and the photographs -

Swastikas and sixes -

Shadows, swastikas and sixes -

Six six sixes -

(Silent shadows, silent sixes).

Sat among the silence, sat upon the table -

The smashed and splintered, stained and shattered table -

Sat upon the low table in the centre of the room -

Wings, huge and rotting things -

Big black things that weigh me down, heavy -

Stop me standing -

Sitting on the table, his shotgun on my knees -

Staring at the sixes -

Silent sixes, waiting -

Six six sixes.

Across the sixes -

Across the swastikas, across the shadows -

Across them all -

The blood across the wall -

Head off, face gone, beard gone -

His head blown off -

Bob Craven -

Between the table and the bar -

Bob Craven, silent -

Tape off.

Silence -

Silence until -

Until outside I hear car tires on the car park -

The rotten, uneven car park -

Puddles of rain water and motor oil under wheels -

Car lights illuminating a door -

A door to an upstairs room -

A door banging in the wind, in the rain -

The car lights stop before the door -

The door to an upstairs room -

The door banging in the wind, in the rain -

More doors banging, slamming -

Car doors slamming -

Boots across the car park -

The rotten, uneven car park -

Puddles of rain water and motor oil underfoot -

Boots upon the dark stone stairs;