Sleepy, between an important writer (like Zadie) on my right and a young man on my left. She asked something. How does it feel to be the way I was in my story? I only ever see her hands. We’re at desks in school perhaps. I think carefully in my dream and then I say it’s not being one way, it’s constantly trying to think which way, trying to work out which way to be. I feel this has restored my dignity. I’m pleased but so sleepy, I lean my head on her hand, this way and that. I apologise but she doesn’t mind. She says she would like to come with me to the prizegiving in the hall. The little guy on the other side asks for a loan of a couple of bob to get some boot polish. He likes boots, he says. And he wants to shine his boots because he wants to come and sit beside me at the prizegiving as well. I am pleased and falling asleep in her hands.
Image: Saint Bearchán, Saint Brigid and St Fachtna from one of Harry Clarke’s masterpieces in stained glass for St. Barrahane’s church, Castletownshend, Cork.
Stephen Moran's Museum of Illusions 