Spit On Your Face
He spoke to me with no spit
for the first time in about 10 years.
Each time we’d spoken in the past
he’d showered me with saliva,
passionately making his point
with arse-tight logic and Pythonesque humour.
I never minded. I enjoyed getting washed
with the back and forth of a robust argument.
but apparently he didn’t.
He regretted wetting the world
with his conversation and felt humiliated.
Sometimes when he spoke to me during lunch
there’d be bits of nuts or meat or vegetables in the spit
he’d cover my face with by accident.
Like peculiar acne.
Turns out he took tablets to dry himself out on the inside.
They worked a treat. He didn’t spit any more.
Or talk much for that matter.
I told him to stop taking the tablets.
That I liked the acne in brine
he gave to me and the world
when he spoke.
He said no.
…
Camillus John was bored and braised in Dublin. He has had work published in The Stinging Fly, RTÉ Ten, The Lonely Crowd and other such organs. He would also like to mention that Pats won the FAI cup in 2014 after 62 miserable years of not winning it.
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