Tale of a tapping

[smokingboot]

Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered weak and weary,
Over many a quaint and curious volume of forgotten lore,
While I nodded, nearly napping, suddenly there came a tapping,
As of some one gently rapping, rapping at my chamber door.
`'Tis some visitor,' I muttered, `tapping at my chamber door -
Only this, and nothing more.'

...

And the silken sad uncertain rustling of each purple curtain
Thrilled me - filled me with fantastic terrors never felt before;
So that now, to still the beating of my heart, I stood repeating
`'Tis some visitor entreating entrance at my chamber door -
Some late visitor entreating entrance at my chamber door; -
This it is, and nothing more,'

I will put the entirety of the poem up after this, just to keep Poe's ghost happy. The last thing I need is him tap-tapping at my chamber door tonight.

I now write down a trivial occurence which happened over the weekend and spooked me utterly. There are many possible explanations for it, and I make no claims about it. But it freaked me enough to write it now, in the early morning; poetry, velvet and flannel will make it seem more like a story, but the last thing I need is to write it at night-time, alone in the house. I refuse to give it more atmosphere. My intention is to make it less real.



The story begins some 15 years ago now, when I lived, very happily, in a blue attic room at the top of Brixton Hill. One night, I had the company of a friend camped on my floor, and she introduced me to a quaint belief of her anglo-irish ancestors. My friend was a child of wealthy Catholics, but quite where in Ireland she got her ideas from I never knew. That night, close to the moment of sleep for me, there came a knocking at the door of my room. I heard it, but reckoned it might be the pipes (how many ghost stories have been ruined by our sturdy belief in overactive pipes and creaky floorboards?). My friend however, had no such comforting faith.

'Did you hear that?' she hissed at me. I confirmed rather sleepily I did, and that I thought it was the pipes. The rapping came again. I looked at my friend blearily. 'That's no pipe, that's someone knocking!' She said, looking at me as if I should do something. Misinterpreting her gaze, I got out of bed and lumbered towards the door. She instantly sprang up and dragged me back.

'Don't open it!' she whispered. She looked genuinely scared, and she told me why. The tradition she was taught, was that if you hear a knocking at your door, in the depths of the night and you know there's no-one outside, what you are hearing is a soul getting ready to leave its body; someone connected to you is dying. The soul is knocking on the door, asking you to open it, but if you do, like a bird flying out of a window, it will leave the earth and go to its long home. Your job at this point, is to be very human and rather Dylan Thomas; you must stoutly refuse to open the door, however often you hear the rapping. It is your message to the soul to stay on and fight. The sad thing is that the person is probably dying anyway, certainly on the threshold of the great change. But your refusal to open the door buys them more time.

Nonsense of course - why would a soul seek permission to go? If it's going, it's going surely - and I laughed, and went to open the door. There had to be someone out there, even though I knew just as she did that there wasn't - but if there was a wraith around, I'd rather see it, if you know what I mean. My friend, with many panic stricken imprecations, insisted I didn't, and as we both needed to sleep and she was more determined than I, I left it, and went to sleep. My friend dourly informed me in the morning that her slumbers were distinctly unquiet.

Some weeks later, I heard that an old friend of mine had caught TB, and then had an allergic reaction to the treatment drugs. He died, aged 28, a swift and tragic death.*The timing was hazy, so to my mind, no immediate connection was made, and I forgot this incident.

Until this weekend, when, working on some story or other, long after Larians had gone to bed, I heard a distinct rapping on my door, and my blood went cold. I knew he was asleep, I knew no-one was on the landing, but I called out his name. The window was open, so in case the wind was somehow to blame, I closed it. The rapping came again. I leapt up and put the light on. But I didn't go near the door.

On monday, I learned that a good friend's partner is in hospital with cancer. He is not expected to come out.

Coincidence of course, and not even a particularly unusual one. Death is always riding by, and if one is seeking connections, they are not hard to find; someone is always on the point of leaving. Still, just in case, should you ever hear that sound, at the dead of night - not just the wind rattling the door jamb, but a clear, polite, distinct knock, where you know no-one can be - turn the lights on, and the telly if you have it, go do something ordinary, go to sleep, or get on with your stuff. Whatever you do, on no account open the door.

Make the bugger work.



So much for the story, made fantastical by words. But the experience, I assure you, is quite real.

And now, lest I forget that most morbid of poets, here we go Poe:

http://www.heise.de/ix/raven/Literature/Lore/TheRaven.html

*Love you always, Carlos.

Comments

[binidj.livejournal.com]

Is it Death who is knocking though, or a soul seeking a friend to send them on their way with love?

[smokingboot.livejournal.com]

That is a very beautiful idea.

Well, even if the threshold was a bit strange, daresay he's in the big love now.