[The graphic sign / indicates the line is interrupted by the following one, and // the one after that, etc.]

(1) You shouldn’t ask me that.
(2) What?
(1) You really shouldn’t ask me that.
(2) Why?
(1) The agreement we made, if you remember, clearly stated that things of such should scarcely be allowed.
(2) When?
(1) Scarcely not to say never. I rather think it’s a very reasonable point and you are wilfully opting to ignore it.
(2) How?
(1) Well, by asking me what do I think about this poem you wrote, and Who?, well, whomever it was that you wrote it for instead of me.
(2) Stop that.
(1) There’s so much I can stand, and then there’s you writing stuff saying you love somebody else.
(2) Hmm (pause), yes if I remember the agreement we made, / it clearly stated
(1) And with your special knack for words, by all means.
(2) What is that supposed to mean?
(1) I’m not saying you write badly,
(2) Good.
(1) which you do.
(2)
(1) I never really understood it, but (pause) it seems words die in your hands. (pause) Like fish. (short pause) Jiggle about a bit and die. It’s quite a skill.
(2) Are you done?
(1) It’s like the touch of death, (pause) only worse, / I think.
(2) I really don’t think it’s that bad.
(1) I mean, what’s this?
(2) I’ve done worse than that.
(1) First line.
(2) I’ve done a lot worse / than that.
(1) First fucking line. May I quote you? May I quote you? I’m gonna quote you. (pause) In before I slept. (pause) First blasted line, In before I slept.
(2) It’s not a bad line.
(1) I’m not saying it is.
(2) But it is.
(1) If you say so. I’ve got nothing against this white trash syntax, by all means, but it just strikes me as (pause) wrong.
(2) I’m glad I asked you.
(1) Deeply, deeply wrong.
(2) I’m very glad.
(1) You know people who have rosaries on their cars?,
(2) Couldn’t be any more / thankful
(1) [like] hanging (short pause) from their rearviewmirrors?
(2) I mean, who better than Mr Wordsmith-himself, of all people, to (short pause) criticize / my poems
(1) I always felt there was something intrinsically evil about those / people,
(2) You know what you are?
(1) like they have the capacity of summoning hell (pause) at will.
(2) Seriously, do you know what you are?
(1) And they just don’t cos there’s (short pause, with contempt) THAT (pause), with the little Christ jiggling about and specifically telling them not to do so
(2) You’re a bad pond.
(1) or a tree will grow against their bonnets just (snaps fingers) like that.
(2) If I remember the agreement we made, / it clearly stated
(1) So sprinkle your dashboards with Holy Water of all drinks, for the Almighty is allseeing and the trees are allwood and then you’re alldead.
(2) It clearly stated that you were to be the good pond.
(1) That’s you with words.
(2) Which you are not.
(1) You take the word flower for example from a fucking meadow and it dies back into a bud in your very hands.
(2) So when I happened to say I was beautiful, you were to agree,
(1) And the same with birds if you care to fly or with (pause)
(2) reflexively,
(1) the sea if you want to dive (increasingly queezy) in a puddle of you own (pause) I give up.
(2) without thinking, without even pausing to properly listen.
(1)
(2) And if I were to say my poems were good, / you were to say it back in the same words.
(1) I was to say it back in the same words.
(2) (pause) Yes.
(1) Instead of saying that once they start they can’t help but going on and on and on, one line after another, one fucking beating after another, endless endless cemeteries of sentences, (pause) haunted things (pause) painful painful like a pourdown of knives, (pause) stabbing and stabbing and ripping whatever (short pause) remains (pause),
(2) Yes.
(1) (pause) whatever remained, whatever healed back. (pause, sniggers) If I remember the agreement we made (pause) it clearly stated you were not to say you loved anybody else in front of me.
(2) It didn’t.
(1) I know it didn’t. And when we agreed on that / it was very blatantly implied you were not to run your love letters through me (pause) like knives (pause) for me to very thoroughly examine the blade and if possible // suggest new ways in which it could hurt me more.
(2) We didn’t.
(2) If possible.
(1) Ache me with better words. (pause) Bruise me more beautifully.
(2) You told me you didn’t love me.
(1) I lied. (long pause) This is Cyrano all over again. (pause) What authority do you have to write like that the whole of love in one sentence alone?
(2) I almost never write.
(1) And when you do (pause), In before I slept.
(2) I agree it sounds bad.
(1) It does. (pause) It most beautifully does. (pause) In before I slept. (pause, sighs) In before I slept. RC