I can hear your groan: this one, again? How many times? Yes, but its reappearance is testament to its brilliance. It’s a perfect piece. Jonathan Gibbs, of this parish, has written a precis which I cannot better, so all I’ll say is that the gutpunch I felt on first reading it, the knowing that, from now on, I’d have to undergo some harsh and hurtful self-examination, will forever be a component of my personal luggage.
First published in The Sunday Times, 2013, and collected in Madam Zero, Faber, 2017
A Personal Anthology 