One night I dreamt there were two of me

I didn’t like it one bit

I walked into my living room

And there he was, the git

Sitting in the old armchair

Where I’m supposed to sit.

 

We looked the same, we dressed the same

I didn’t like the guy

I told him he should sling his hook

We looked us in the eye

And said in perfect synchrony

One of us must die

 

I punched his old familiar face

He fell against a table

He kicked me in the private parts

As hard as he was able

And so the battle raged until

We both became unstable

 

We brawled, we swore, we spat and scratched

It wasn’t any use

We were of course an even match

In terms of self-abuse

Pretty soon we’d had enough

And called a fragile truce

 

Next night in the pub I told my wife

Of the dream, to her dismay.

‘Two? of you?’ she said, aghast

‘You’d make my hair turn grey.

Does this make me a bigamist?

Will you use the pronoun they?’

 

She Googled on her mobile phone

To diagnose my plight.

She deemed split personality;

In the head I wasn’t right

My left side and my right side

Were in a mortal fight

 

She quoted Sigmund Freud at me –

The ego and the id.

She said, ‘you hate what you’ve become

And everything you did.

You have an abnormality

Of which you can’t be rid.

 

‘You probably want to kill your dad,

And take your mum to bed.

I see you in a different light

You’re funny in the head.

You should have told me all of this

Before the day we wed.’

 

I said, ‘is it so serious?

Should I see a shrink?’

‘No,’ she sighed, ‘you will survive;

Let’s have another drink.

And now that there are three of us

it’s your round again, I think.’

 

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