He knows all about my nosebleeds, W. says. He’s seen enough of them.

He remembers my Freiburg nosebleed. I appalled the Germans, W. says. I horrified them. He remembers my great American nosebleeds. I bled in Nashville, in a faux honky-tonk bar. And then I bled in Memphis in a faux blues bar. Bar tenders brought me tissues. Preppies looked away ... And haven’t I told him of my nosebleeds of my days as a temporary contractor in Bracknell? The shirts I have soiled ... The office desks ... How many times did they have to let me home early, in disgust? How many times did they ring up my agency to complain?

Blood running from my nose ... Blood pooling in my philtrum, and along the top of my lips, my great fat lips ... Blood colouring my teeth, until I look like a jackal ... Sometimes he sees it as a kind of martyrdom, W. says. I bleed to remember all the suffering in the world, just as Johnny Cash wore black to remember all the suffering in the world. I bleed because others bleed, in some kind of animal sympathy.

Sometimes it sees it as part of my Hinduism, as a part of the streaming of all things. As part of a great Hindu streaming, in which you can see all the gods, all the mortals, the beginning of the universe, and the end. My nosebleeds are cosmic, W. says.

Sometimes, he sees it as a Scandinavian phenomenon, a pagan phenomenon: as a kind of sympathy for Baldur, the bleeding God. It was said that Balder bled because the world had gone dark, and all promise had disappeared. It was said Balder’s wound wouldn’t heal until Ragnarok, at the end of times. And isn’t that the way with my nosebleed, too – that I bleed because our world has gone dark, and because our promise has disappeared. And won’t my nosebleed not stop until the final hour?