David Peace - Occupied City

IN THE OCCUPIED CITY, you are a writer and you are running

In the wintertime, papers in your arms, through this January night, down these Tokyo streets, you are running from the scene of the crime; from the snow and from the mud, from the bank and from the bodies; running from the scene of the crime and from the words of the book; words that first enticed and entranced you, then deceived and defeated you, and now have left you in-snared and in-prisoned

Beneath a sky that threatens more than night, more than snow, now you huff and breath-puff, puff and breath-pant, pant and gasp

For in your ears, you hear them coming, step by step, whispering and muttering. In your ears, you hear them gaining, step by step-step, drooling and growling, step by step-step by step

A Night Parade of One Hundred Demons

In the night-stagger, your spectacles fall from your nose. In the snow-stumble, your papers fall from your hand. In the night and in the snow, you scramble for your spectacles and for your papers, you search for your sight and for your work. But the ghost-laden wind is here now, again the be-specter-ed air is upon you. It steals your papers and it shatters your spectacles, it makes a sheaf-blizzard of the loose-leafs, a shard-storm of the slivered-lenses, as you claw through the laden wind, as you thrash through the haunted air

But then the wind is dead and now the air is gone, the sheaves fall and the shards drop. You grab your spectacles, you grasp your papers, your manuscript; your manuscript of

the book-to-come;

this book that

will not

come

This unfinished book of unsolved crime. This book of Winter, this book of Murder, book of Plague.

The blank sheets in your hands, the empty frames on your nose, now you see the Black Gate up ahead, and so you start to run again, through the January night, huffing and breath-puffing, down the Tokyo streets, puffing and breath

Now you stop running.

Beneath the Black Gate, you seek shelter. In its damp shadows, you squat now. Under the eaves of the gate, here there is no one else, only the finger-night-tips, the foot-snow-steps. This gate once a treasure, this gate now a ruin, almost; but this gate still remains, this gate now a sanctuary, perhaps. No crows, no foxes, no thugs, no prostitutes tonight. Only night and only snow, their finger-cold-tips and their foot-dirty-steps. You breathe hard, your soaked-coat-through, you spit blood, your stained-papers-red. Your breath is bad and belly bloated, your eyes bloodshot and face swollen

But here, under this Black Gate, in these damp shadows, here you will hide. Here inside, inside here

Here you will hide

Hide! Hide!

From this city, out of breath, from this city, out of time. This cursed city; city of riot and city of earthquake, city of assassination and city of coups, city of bombs and city of fire, city of disease and city of hunger, this city of defeat, defeat and surrender

This damned city; city of robbery and

city of rape, city of murder,

of murder and plague

These things you have witnessed, these things you have documented, in the ink you have spilt, on the papers you have spoiled. Inside here, here

inside

a ghost-story-telling game popularized during the Edo period. By the mid-seventeenth century its form was established among samurai as a playful test of courage, but by the early nineteenth century it had become a widespread entertainment for commoners. The game begins with a group of people gathering at twilight in the pale-blue light of one hundred lit candles, each covered with a pale-blue paper shade. Each person in turn then tells a tale of supernatural horror and at the end of each tale one wick is extinguished. As the evening and the tales progress the room becomes dimmer and gloomier until, after the one hundredth tale has been told and the last candle blown out, the room is in complete darkness. At this moment it is believed that real ghouls or monsters will appear in the dark, conjured up by the terrifying tale-telling

The blood-blots, the tear-traces, the dead letters and the death sentences. You look up from your papers, you snatch sight of a stairway, a broad stairway to an upper storey, an upper storey away from the city. You rush to gather your papers, you run to climb the steps, finger-light-tips follow you up, foot-soft-steps echo your own

One step, two steps, three steps, four

Half-way up, you stop, stair-still,

stair-bent, you crouch,

breath-held

In the chamber of the upper storey, high on the under-hide of the roof, there is light above your head, here inside the Black Gate,

here you are not alone, here in-presence-d

You climb again, you stop again, and now you see

In the upstairs chamber, in an occult circle

Twelve candles and twelve shadows

In the Occupied City, beneath the Black Gate, in its upper chamber, in this occult circle of these twelve candles,

now you are on your knees.

Suddenly, the ceiling of the chamber is illuminated by a flash of lightning. You look, you listen. You hear a peal of thunder, the fall of rain hard upon the roof of the gate. You listen, you look

In the light of the candles, you see and now you hear a hand-bell being shaken in the air; hear and see a bell and a hand

The red bell and the white hand, the white arm and the red sleeve, the red robe and the white face of a woman

The woman, a medium, before you

In the centre of the circle of the candles,

in their gutter-ring, she stands

Her hair and her robes now flailing within a sudden tempest, for the laden wind has found you here again, again the haunted air,

as the medium rattles the bell again and again, and again

The bell, and now the sound of a drum beating slowly,

as the medium begins to dance, to spin and to turn

Madly, the bell clattering and the wind howling,

the drum beating, on and on, over and over

Feet moving through the splintered wood,

dancing, spinning and spinning, turning

Suddenly she stops, suddenly still now,

frozen, the bell slips from her hand

Abruptly, she faces you now, to say:

Let the story-telling game begin

Then she tears towards you,

in this Possessed City

The medium falls to the floor before you, now she sits upright, taut and still, and now her mouth begins to open, to speak. In a disembodied drone, it speaks. It speaks the words of the dead

We are here because of you, they whisper. Because of you, our dear sweet, sweet writer dear, because of you

Because of you. The city is a coffin. In the snow. In the back of a truck. Parked outside the bank. In the sleet. Under the heavy damp tarpaulin. Driven through the streets. In the rain. To the hospital. To the morgue. In the sleet. To the mortuary. To the temple. In the snow. To the crematorium. To the earth and to the sky

In our twelve cheap wooden coffins

In these twelve cheap wooden coffins, we lie. But we do not lie still. In these twelve cheap wooden coffins, we are struggling. Not in the dark, not in the light; in the grey, we are struggling; for here is only grey, here we are only struggling