Coe vs Poe
Throughout my career, my enemies have sought to discredit my work and opinions by means of childishly sly defamations. At various times I've been referred to as a pervert, a schizophrenic and a fantasist. Christians have threatened me with forcible baptism while Satanists have attached hexes to my door. My own brother has threatened to kill me on numerous occasions while my successes have earned me the undying hostility of celebrity driven psychics who vainly consider themselves my 'rivals'. "Mars circled Neptune at the instant of your birth!" observed sham astrologer Maurice Gibson when presented with evidence of his actual (non) credentials. He might have added that the creatures of nemesis have howled at my heels ever since! In nearly four decades, however, my resolve has rarely faltered. The entire creed of Coe is based on good humour and perseverence: at times of adversity a smile has proved my most effective shield. This month's gloom, unfortunately, compounded by flu, has all but overwhelmed me.
The extent to which despondency has prevailed can be gauged by the regular appearance of Edgar Allen Poe in my dreams. Since my earlest childhood, before I even knew who he was, Poe's saturnine presence has anticipated periods of trauma and illness in the House of Coe. "Mr Grumpy was here," I'd explain to my mother as she remonstrated with me on account of a sodden sheet. "There is no Mr Grumpy," she'd retort, but there most assuredly was! When I was nine years old, I finally identified him while browsing through one of my Grandfather Sneddon's encyclopaedias. That night Poe pranced triumphantly around my room like the great 'I Am', spouting reams of his morbid drivel, pausing occasionally to brag, "I wrote that!" As the diseased content of his imagination unravelled, I wondered what sort of person would proudly claim responsibility for less wholesome thoughts than those scratched into the walls of public toilets.
A so-called creative person is invariably driven by exactly the same motives that might compel someone else to break a window. It's unfashionable to advocate the destruction of art-works, but nothing produced in a malevolent spirit can do anything other than replicate that ill-feeling in others. Poe's entire ouevre was written in such a foul humour that nobody reading him can fail to be effected. Spencer, became infatuated with his work while in his early teens and was subsequently prone to bad skin, moodiness and solitary pleasures. I vividly remember the embarrassing circumstance of being trapped under his bed while he unsuccessfully attempted to seduce Tara Gibb. Looking up, I was startled by the appearance of Poe's scowling face pressed against the window-pane, forefinger pointed toward me. Unable to restrain myself, I cried out and suffered the indignity of being dragged from my hiding place by the ears. To this day, Spencer remains afflicted by Poe's baleful influence. Billy Ure's life has been similarly blighted.
Last night, Poe loomed at the foot of my bed, his face distorted by a cruel smirk as his parrot flapped frenetically overhead. (I'm aware, incidentally, that Poe is primarily associated with cats and ravens, but for as long as I can remember, his presence has been accompanied by that of a large yellow parrot.) How, I'm often asked, should one confront an apparition? In exactly the same manner, I reply, as you would any other intruder. Whether the intrusion is psychic or physical, an uncompromising response is required for pests and interlopers. A stern rebuke would normally be sufficient to see off the arch-skulker of Baltimore. Like most bullies, he has no real stomach for confrontation. On this occasion, however, he lingered, singing to me in the harshly monotonous tones of a drunkard. This was the first time Poe had actually serenaded me and, while I wouldn't have imagined it to be an agreeable experience, it was more unnerving than I could have possibly anticipated. Suspended helplessly in the limbo between sleep and wakefulness, I ordered him to stop singing, but to no avail. "Because you're mine," he droned, "I walk the line." As I gradually came to my senses, I realised that the song was, in fact, emanating through the wall from Spencer's room. My momentary relief was almost instantaneousy dispelled as I identified a second voice coming from the furthest corner of my own room. As the music gradually faded to silence in Spencer's room, the solitary voice in mine continued, accompanied only by the electric hiss of menace I needn't describe to any fellow psychic.
I defy anyone to successfully negotiate the trials of a day preceded by dreams of Poe and his infernal parrot. There are few things I deplore more than rudeness, but today I presented a snarling response to the slightest of provocations. Gayle, my housekeeper, particularly irked me by dipping into my diminishing stock of imported Italian coffee. I'm not so mean spirited, of course, that I wouldn't share my coffee, but Gayle has more than once insisted that she actually prefers Nescafe, an unopened jar of which was in an adjacent shelf. As I remonstrated with her I was aware that my response was intemperate to what was, after all, a minor irritation. Part of me concurred with her muttered retort that I was being a "pompous idiot". Had Spencer not appeared, I might have been able to back down and negotiate a reconciliation, but he took Gayle's part so enthusiastically that I ended up banning either of them from using my coffee or my biscuits. Before leaving I snapped, "I hope you're both still this friendly the next time Spencer clogs the shower with his seminal discharge," an admittedly below the belt reference to last year's contention which resulted in Gayle demanding a pay rise and Spencer her dismissal.
Normally, a spin on the Picador would have enabled me to gather my thoughts. Today, I lacked the energy to cycle for more than ten minutes. My mood wasn't improved when, for the third successive week, neither Connor Sumner nor the Lang twins attended my Cung Coe class. My only student, in fact, was Penny Findlay who, after attending sporadically for nearly a year, has still to recite Rudyard Kipling's "If..." from memory, a pre-requisite before being introduced to any of Cung Coe's offensive (as opposed to defensive) techniques. For forty five minutes, she struggled to replicate my demonstrations of the Beetle Defence, at one stage giggling in such an asinine manner that I snapped, "If you're not prepared to take this seriously then I can think of about a thousand other things I could be doing." To my mortification, she promptly burst into tears and I spent the rest of the evening trying to mollify her.
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