I am in between switching my focus from one Eliot (Thomas Stearns) to another (George). I need more time to ponder on why Middlemarch, her masterpiece, resonates so much more strongly with me than The Waste Land. Given that George Eliot is praised for the skill with which she conveys the consciousness within, it seems appropriate to republish this sequence which is a fictional attempt to project my inscape into words.
I’m in a queue to buy a cinema ticket, but I can’t remember the name of the film I want to watch. I’m next in line. A woman barges in front of me. I’m annoyed but I don’t protest. I need time to get out my phone and check the list of films showing at this cinema even though I’m not sure what cinema it is.
The usual problem with the screen occurs. It’s full of pretty pictures but none of the usual options such as Safari for Googling the cinema house. My mind has been primed for some time to realise that when this happens I’m dreaming. I give up on the cinema and walk off to enjoy the experience. Even though I’m strongly tempted, I decide not to do anything dramatic like flying, as that usually brings a lucid dream to a quick end. I just keep aware.
I go down a corridor full of people. At one point I see an old friend from my university days in the fenlands, looking a lot younger than he is now. I say ‘Hi,’ he nods, but we don’t stop to talk.
I’m enjoying the vividness of it all, so different from my daytime aphantasia where I can’t visualize anything at all, no matter how hard I try. I go outside down a path into an evening of broken cloud by the side of a river. I enjoy the shine of the water as it catches the dying light.
It feels a bit chilly so I go back under cover into a nearby arcade. I could do with a coffee. I spot a café, but something causes me to pause before I get too close. Outside Emma, Indie and Peat are handing out leaflets. Do I really want to confront them again? It was bad enough lastParliament of Selves (14/18): Wasting Time (b) time, and I’m not quite ready for another battle.
I notice there’s a side door into the café, which helps me avoid getting too close to their pitch.
I creep inside, breathing a sigh of relief, only to hear my name being shouted from the other side of the room. Oh God! It’s the rest of my parliament of selves, the silver sect, skulking in a far corner pretending they’re not with the lot outside.
I have lost my sense that I am dreaming, though it was good while it lasted. My dreaming mind has become very good at inducing me back into a dream state. I can’t fight against the feeling of being trapped in this situation whether I like it or not. I smile faintly, wave and walk to the bar to order a coffee.
I’m wondering whether it might even be best to go with the flow and make the best of this opportunity. Maybe we could have another go at reconciling our differences and reaching some kind of agreement about how to move forwards. It looks a long shot even so, with the rampant activists outside collaring unwilling listeners, and the aging introverts hiding away indoors.
It’s when I can’t access my coffee loyalty app on my iPhone that I realise I’m still dreaming. I take the coffee anyway and wander slowly back to the table with the trio of Chris, Fred and Bill waiting impatiently for me to join them.
I realise I don’t want to try and pull any tricks though I know I’m dreaming. I want to use my awareness to stay grounded in my waking mind, unphased by whatever bizarre things might happen in the next few minutes. I want to get the best possible outcome.
I sit down beside Bill, facing Chris and Fred. I need to be careful not to do or say anything that might trigger the other trio outside into thinking we’ve been plotting against them in here. I guess they’ll be joining us at some point.
‘What’s taken you so long?’ Fred Mires, the obsessive psychologist asks. ‘Even Chris, with all his meditative practice, has had steam coming out of his ears. The activists have been giving us a really hard time. It’s all right for you,’ he said, speaking as the expert in the subconscious process. ‘You have no idea what’s been going on underneath. It’s been pure hell down here, believe me.’
Chris Humfreeze is nodding as if his life depends on it. I don’t think I’ve ever seen him so disturbed.
‘Fred’s not exaggerating,’ he confirms. ‘We don’t get a moment’s peace, except when they’re out on a mission, like now. We don’t just get their propaganda campaign in stereo. There’s three of them at it day and night. You realise we never sleep, don’t you? Even when you’re awake, or not dreaming about us, we’re fully conscious. And the hammering goes on and on and on. I don’t think I’ve had more than five minutes to myself at any time to meditate and recharge my batteries. To be honest I just wish we’d left Indie and Peat where they were, then we’d only have Emmie to deal with. And she was bad enough on her own, always banging on about protesting and demonstrating.’
His voice tails off into silence.
William Wordless is strangely silent for a poet.
‘You don’t seem so upset about them, Bill’ I say, turning my head in his direction.
‘Well, no, probably not,’ he says quietly staring at the tabletop.
‘How come?’
‘I don’t know really. I’ve just had this feeling that there’s a way out of this mess. Poetry’s got something to do with it, but just can’t put my finger on it.’
Both Fred and Chris can’t suppress a snort. Bill looks up and sees the incredulous expressions on their faces.
‘I know that seems unlikely, but the idea just won’t go away.’
At exactly this point I begin to have the strangest experience. When Bill stops speaking I can still hear his voice in my head.
He is continuing his thread.
‘It’s to do with when Pete started reading about Elizabeth Jennings. I could feel a shift in my thinking. Before I’ve always jabbered about poets being the unacknowledged legislators, without really believing a word of it. I still don’t take that on board, but I am beginning to think they can take readers to a deeper level of understanding, but they have to do this accessibly enough to create a wide enough readership to shift a whole culture upwards, not just an educated elite within it.’
This feels really weird. It’s not just that I can hear his thoughts as loudly as his voice. It’s that he is thinking much the same as I’m thinking. This has never happened before.
Chris and Fred are looking at me with a worried expression on their faces.
‘What’s going on, Pete?’ Fred asks. ‘You’ve gone quite pale.’
‘I’m not sure,’ I mumble. I turn to Bill hoping for some clarification. If this wasn’t a dream, I’d say that he was dying, or at least fading slowly away.
‘What’s happening to Bill?’ I demand of Chris and Fred.
‘Oh God!’ Chris gasps. ‘It looks as though he’s started to disappear bit by bit into you.’
‘What!’ I snap back. ‘That’s not possible surely.’
Then I manage to remind myself that this is only a dream after all. Anything’s possible.
I look back at Bill. There’s almost nothing of him left, only a translucent shadow of his former self.
‘Bill!’ I shout. ‘Where are you? Come back!’
There is no answer, not even in my head.
‘You’ve blended with him or he with you,’ Fred explains. ‘He was a split off part of you, as we all are, and you have both reintegrated.’
‘Why now? What does that mean?’
‘I think it means that if we continue down this road, we will all end up the same way – fused back into your consciousness, no longer separate. This is the direction these encounters have been taking us,’ Chris clarified. ‘Perhaps the way that reading Elizabeth Jennings changed your way of thinking created a perfect moment for him to join with you again.’
‘Hold on a moment! I can understand what you’re saying, but even so, I would have thought a merging with Fred, as a psychologist, would’ve been more likely.’
I look towards Fred for some kind of validation.
‘I don’t think you get why we split in the first place,’ Fred replied. ‘You were always an applied psychologist. I always wanted to study it purely for its own sake. I am an academic not a practitioner. That’s why we all split off. We were frustrated by the way you did things. Isn’t that right, Chris?’
‘Definitely. Your way of dabbling in meditation wasn’t the way I wanted to do it. Just as Fred wanted to focus intensely on the study of some aspect of the mind, I wanted to devote far more time to learning how to meditate properly. Bill was the same with poetry. He wanted to spend all his time turning experience into lyrics. But you wouldn’t do that either. You’re a jack of too many trades, and you know what that means. We were all fed up with you in the end. Emma the same of course, though her activism didn’t suit any of us most of the time.’
‘But why would Bill think I’m going to be any different about poetry now than I was before? If I am mediocre and half-hearted in terms of his passion, why would he think now was a good time to get back on board?’
‘We’re not sure,’ Fred said. ‘Maybe he knows something none of the rest of us does. My guess is that it’s partly because, since you retired, you’ve been reading and writing more poetry than anytime since the eighties. He feels more at home within you than anytime since you were studying, and later teaching, literature. And he’s had writer’s block himself for ages. It’s not for nothing he’s named William Wordless. Of course, I’m bogged down as well, in my own way. That’s why I’m Frederick Mires by name. I’ll leave Chris to speak for himself.’
‘Christmas Humfreeze, my full name, speaks for itself as well. Frozen into hesitation. Couldn’t be worse really. We’re all wanting to find a way to get unstuck and become more creative each in our different way. Trouble is finding a way to do that which suits us all. Emma Pancake’s more than a bit flat herself, as I think she knows somewhere inside. We’re all in the same boat. Indira Pindance is spinning around in small circles getting nowhere fast, and Peat Humus is even more bogged down than Fred.’
‘Stop, for heaven’s sake! You’re depressing me.’ The words are out before I can stop myself. I know my full name means a rock and Hulme comes from an Anglo-Saxon word meaning an islet in a fen. Not the best names to suggest focused creativity, I’ve always thought.
But this recent unexpected event is making me wonder whether I might be missing the point. Why did I meet my old friend, from my time near the fens, at the beginning of the dream. Was this a hint of some kind? Should I look more kindly on the whole idea of bogs, fens, marshes, peat and the rest. I’ve been aware for a long time that peat is a pun on my name and that the sense of connection this gives me with the earth is important.
‘Look,’ I blurt out, ‘Pete, peat and poet are also close in sound. This might explain why Bill has stepped back inside. But where would the rest of you fit in, for heaven’s sake? Until we solve that somehow, I think we’re still stuck.’
I fix my attention once more on my companions only to discover a stranger sitting opposite me.
Everybody Means Something 
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