An honorary doctorate when all I want is to lie here and drink tea on the sofa. A long time since I’ve headed west. Old stomping ground, old wilderness. No more stomping for me, I’m afraid. These fucking feet are fucked. But I get to thinking. West. The turnoff at Wickepin. The weird light. Spears of grass sticking in my bobby socks and braids. Golden dust in my hair. All those ghosts. Running through the wheat, all sweat and sex underneath my pinny. A beauty I was then. A wild creature. Any bloke I fancied. And I fancied them all. I was a mermaid. Look at me now. Prostrate on the couch, a harpooned dugong. Gregor Samsa, that’s me, reclining on the fucking commission-built leather catafalque. Look at those feet. Leper’s feet. Cut them off at the knees and stick umbrellas in them. Help me up, Merv, I gotta piss. * * * So they want to honour me. Make a big fuss. Want me to clamber up some wooden steps wearing a gown and mortarboard, prance across a rostrum, make a fucking speech.
