The Last Interview
by Joan Eyles Johnson
When Henry Miller wrote that stuff about earning a living by his paintings whereas his writing never paid him a cent he was acting the traitor’s part, don’t you think Jagway sat comfortably in a low slung chair His guest perched on the edge of its twin Words flapped windily above their heads dropping in front of the moderator who swept them away with a wave of his manicured fingers suspended for the interminable second of a Russian dancer performing a grand jette Henry Miller had a right to say anything about anything at all This was a case of the frozen in mid-air retort Anti-gravity at work Your daughter is a painter in Paris Jagway felt the keen thrust of his sharpened knowledge delighted in his voice The show was going well My daughter Who the hell cares Why don’t you ask her to come here if you are so interested give her a ring and invite her to his hell of lights Don’t expect me to work for you Jagway allowed a smirk to crack the well polished face Still your book about Giordano Bruno That was a clumsy segue Giordano’s been dead for a century Talk about here and now Bowing to your enormous talent I felt perhaps viewers want to hear the author speak about his latest work When Giordano Bruno was alive Shakespeare had just entered London and the city had already spread considerably outside of the confines of the great wall From the guest Hello Dolly Well Hello Dolly whaddyaknow Dolly Half sung half whispered Then much eye rolling as he fell back into his chair the way a diver releases his body to the sky Jagway leaning in Why do you always use an answering machine whenever I mean why would someone agile with words full of the old jeu d’esprit have need of a mechanical device for communication God was the solid gold Rolex on his elegant wrist the platinum credit cards in his pockets worth this job When you asked me here you said it would be literary conversation Why have you been going on and on about my daughter Giordano Bruno and my answering machine if I may get down to the real matter suicide is a very secret thing because it is so damned embarrassing to everyone Except of course the deceased How to deal with it Does one send flowers Jagway sat up straight Someday I may stroll off a bridge just after a good meal fall among the pleasure boats face down in a wave with a private smile Why tell us this now Jagway caught the cut signal from the floor director I don’t know To save you perhaps When you are next in the supermarket among apples and cantaloupes pinching bread waiting in line with a full cart you might hear a bell ring in your head you answer it and life falls from under you Why I am a very happy person Why would I do such a thing Perhaps to save something that needs saving Sometimes my hands fall off the typewriter when I think of things like that Let’s see You were a Rhodes Scholar were you not The producer in the control room now gesturing to cut but Jagway fighting People who walk around in a depressed state are embarrassing in their helplessness don’t you think Parry and thrust Did you know that right now in mental hospitals over the world there are people who have to be watched around the clock All they want is one split second alone really alone They will take any damned thing as an instrument of death a bathrobe belt some old Christmas gift a broken water glass Jagway raised his voice to change direction We have heard about psycho Softly interrupted Don’t tell me Jagway that suicide is a means of getting attention Don’t tell me suicides are pleading for help wanting to be saved no they are in love In love with death the same way nuns are in love with Christ Stifled cough May we go to a lighter subject before oh no our time is running out A fake surprise No it can’t be so soon ended Again, the flying words It is an act so complete that sex cannot compare Sex is never truly complete is it Jagway Such nonsense compared to dying Suicides are not wise men not apt judges of anything really don’t know any more than you do They just have more love in them that the world allows Jagway standing Well this has all been very enlightening though morbid and mostly disturbing but anything you have to say is always interesting to our audience and now we have run out of time may I hold up your book One morning I will wake up with the birds and whistle a stupid tune at my window or play the happy fool down by the river with my pockets full of marbles He stands with difficulty Or take a train get excited jump into a hobo nest of knives I may lie down on a night when stars are angry fists recite a litany to a bowl of pills Yes well, for those of you who are a bit squeamish about this conversation may I suggest a look at his newest historical holding up the book grown sticky with sweat from his bejeweled fingers The guest leans forward into the camera Cherish what you have in this world We are masters of the darkening light Each of us is in control of something very real Fade to black
Joan Eyles Johnson is a playwright, award-winning poet, and author of short stories. She won the Ernest Hemingway Prize for Short Fiction in 2016 for her story "The Night Packet" published in South East Review, judged by David Galef. Her stories have appeared in "Foliate Oak, Diabolique, Confluence, The Raven's Perch," and more. Two stories and a poem are anthologized in the book "Scream when you Burn" (Rothco PRess) a collection of LA underground writers in the 90s. She lives a mile above Los Angeles in the San Bernardino National Forest where she owns a writers retreat, a small getaway for 6 writers at a time. You can find her on Facebook and her retreat website: www.scribeaway.org.