another illustration: peasant women in the snow, identifying corpses. Nightmare: puppets taking flight across a stormy sky as if they’ve nowhere else to go but someone else’s tawdry paradise. The sodomite, the Jew, the black: need not apply. They bring a certain stench: self-pity, humbug, an obsession with the past. What might have been: oh, who can tell? Who cares? The gritted teeth, the clench of fists, the cocked revolver: why? The perfect landmine: why? In truth: humanity could turn its world into a trench and not regret the landscape. Beneficiaries: the fly, the cockroach and the astronaut. Ahead, beyond the dawn: the anti-climax. Questions: did the living have to die,

the dying linger? From High Wycombe to the Golden Horn: what would a human being not have done to skip the fate (they ask themselves) of having been conceived in haste and born to reap the consequence?… Cheer up, my little puddings: wait and see what gusset-wetting retail opportunities are being magicked up for you! In any case: the date has been determined when the poles will melt and tropics freeze; so seize the day and grab the bargains. Give, for this relief: much thanks. (These words were brought to you by: Aristophanes.)

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