18: Maundy

Tongue On A Tooth ----------------- tongue on a tooth both moving out in the water for the better singing gloriously through the choked streets heading out over the cross hatch plan to the home of our strained age. Goat Queue ---------- You’re in a long for General Martin’s. You can’t remember how long you’ve been queuing, but it’s been long enough to visit the tree goats at least three or four times. Each time you did, as you climbed up and gingerly pulled your face level with their platform in the treehouse, you were met with stern gazes from Mr & Mrs Honeycomb, the billy and the nanny of the tree; a look that read, “not now please; we’re discussing something”, and each time you’d bow your eyelids in polite apology and shuffle your way back down to ground level. The kid was at ground level, lying on his side at the base of the tree; clearly the object of their discussions. You’d run your fingers through the auburn patch of hair between his ears; such a soft, downy coat. The first couple of times, you were even tempted to lie down beside him, nestling your face between his shoulder blades and go to sleep. But you didn’t want to lose your place in the queue, did you? Don’t worry, I’m here’ saving your place. And we’ve been moving, slowly, but steadily, and you’re at the front now, and you can see a competition display by the entrance: four or five large panels; visual puzzles to entertain the queue. The first panel depicts, in grainy black and white photography, a soldier from the First World War running towards a giant tortoise. They’re both wearing shrapnel helmets. It’s a caption competition. And there’s a handy hint. ‘Handy hint’, says a speaking hand next to the image, ‘be sure to use the correct proportion of logic, humour and hermeneutics in your answer’. The second panel features a diagrammatic schema of St. Paul’s cup. Some text alongside explains how followers of St. Paul in first century Macedonia would revere a sacred cup hewn from a dysplastic lamb's pelvis, a kiss of which was said to bring a bountiful harvest and victory in debating tournaments. The cup has been lost since 51 AD, when it got left on a picnic table in the port of Corinth. But today, the text enthuses, and for everyday until Maundy Thursday, store manager Valery Nisbit will be hiding a replica of the cup somewhere in the Homeware section. If you can show yourself kissing the cup to one of our Aisle Angels, you can win a discount coupon on a Britta filter. The content of the panels gets a bit drier from here and to be honest your attention is dwindling… there’s something algebraic about the angle of a sword swallower's larynx, but you’re starting to get sleepy. You explain to the assistant you’ve been ill and need to get inside to purchase glucose tablets and some plastic sheeting, but she says you’d need a doctor’s note to jump the queue, and even then there’s no guarantee the security personnel would let you in without receipt of play. And so, you’re ‘strongly encouraged’ to enter the competition, Plus, you can win a jeep. A jeep, hey? A what colour jeep?, you ask. The assistant turns over one of the A4 answer cards revealing a badly printed image of the prize Jeep. Black I think, she says. The jeep is barely visible under the smeared inkjet bands that bleed to the edge of the page. You notice light, ostentatious coughing from behind you. It’s me. I’m coughing, as if to say, get a move on; just put your name down to win the jeep; do the caption; calculate the larynx and go inside to kiss the cup. We’ve all got shopping to do. And you notice the queue is now snaking around the entire perimeter of the car park, almost lapping itself. And then you glance over the assistant’s shoulder, into the store, and realise it’s virtually empty. All the Checkout Champions are doing the sudoku or the crossword or their nails. And the Aisle Angels are milling about the clothing aisles, joking around with the grey plastic security tags, because they look like ‘robo-nipples’, and they’re holding them up to their chests and doing a little sexy robot dance. “Please”, you say, “I have to get inside, to the pharmacy; I’m diabetic…” “You know, you’re not supposed to visit the goats”, says the assistant. “I’ll get in big trouble if they find out you’ve been visiting the goats on my shift. Now do you want to win that jeep or what?” One Ice-cream ------------- My father would sometimes take me out for ice cream and we'd walk along with it and I'd get excited about the ice cream and I would say "Oh dad this is peachy keen I, I really really like this flavour it's so nice thank you Dad" and he would look all ... frowny and he would turn to me and he would say "Hmm, son, can you stop it with those words, those words that mean nothing, the ones that come out of your mouth out of you face towards my ears and go down into my head all the time, I can not conobulate them anymore and I would sit down with my ice cream and I would turn it upside down on my knee and push the cone right into my knee 'til the ice cream would be all slopped down my leg and fragments of cone suchy like glass in my hand and I would turn to him and say I'm sorry dad they’re just words, I just said them cos I was happy he'd say, I know, but just don't it's annoying can I, can I get you another same flavour and he'd come back and we'd walk along with it and I'd get excited about the ice cream and I would say "Oh dad this is peachy keen I, I really really like this flavour it's so nice thank you Dad" and he would look all ... frowny again and he would turn to me and he would say "Hmm, son, can you stop it with those words, those words that mean nothing, the ones that come out of your mouth and out of you face towards my ears and go down into my head all the time, I can not conobulate them anymore By the time we got home it was night and mum was at the door and she'd see the whole of my legs, my whole lower body were coated in sickly, sticky, ice-creamy creams and she'd say “Did my boys have a good time?” and me and my dad would look at each other, smile and say, “sure did” “peachy keen” my dad would say and my mum would look all ... frowny and turn to dad and say "Hmm, can you stop it with those words, those words that mean nothing, the ones that come out of your mouth out of you face towards my ears and go down into my head all the time, I can not conobulate them anymore”