Exactly how long will this rain continue? No, I know you can’t tell me but, you see, I journeyed long and hard to escape the Devon rain only to discover that it is much the same in London. And I only have a couple of days here before I have to head back to Devon. You can see him looking out at the rain – it’s true that there is something mesmerising about the rain. As though it is an impossible phenomenon; it doesn’t belong with the proper world but something imposed from without, from a region of of fear and spite. Perhaps he’s remembering rains of yesteryear. When he was a lad running down through the woods to the stream only to discover rain lashing at the leaves above his head, the wind tearing through the foliage. The spirits of wood and storm shaking the earth. He can feel the roots shrieking to be free. And he knows that longing. How old is he? Oh, eight I think. His skin sparkles with energy. There is enough force for him to let go and run with the wind or for the wind to run with him.
And now he is seventy eight, still sprightly, still with a longing for life. Let’s you and I get out there with our axes and start building the ark. Somebody has to do it. We cannot wait any longer. It is doubtful if there are any leaders who can lead us through this. Let us gold plate this ark. Surely there is enough gold in the Bank of England vaults to sustain us, to provide the wherewithal of our future. Let there be fleets of arks, gold and silver, skimming the seas, unsinkable, kept afloat by the breath and the hope of the multitude.
Of course it maybe that the illusion of wealth here is merely an elaborate illusion. Whereas, in fact, it has all been secreted away to safe places free from any democratic notions of solidarity and accountability. It follows that we are truly floating on a sea of illusion perpetuated by the combined efforts of the politicians and advertisers and various PR scumbags.
We won’t even have to turn the lights out before we leave – they are already flickering in the twilight as the gods bicker amongst themselves, pinching and punching each other as they struggle for the last few seats on the final starship out of here.
