Free Dante's Inferno by Philip Terry

legs up to the knee,
    And these were twitching frenziedly, as if
    Dancing to electropop, like a robot

    From
1984
, while on the soles of
    The feet a flame too danced, as
    Lit brandy on a Christmas pudding.
    ‘I know what you’re thinking,’ said Berrigan,
    ‘But this is no surrealist montage,
    The feet you see sticking out of the wall
    Belong to the vice-chancellors
    Of the university, the rest of their bodies
    Are stuffed inside.’
    ‘Who’s that one,’ I asked, ‘the one
    Who’s really going for it
                                             up ahead?’
    ‘If you really want to know, why don’t
    You ask him yourself?’ said Berrigan.
    ‘
He
can talk.’ When we reached the eighth
    Or the ninth step, where the stairs begin to turn
    To the left, we came up close to the cleft.
    ‘Hello,’ I stuttered, ‘I can only see your feet,
    But if you can hear me, and still have a voice, speak.’
    I stood like a holy man confessing some
    Hardened assassin on Death Row,
    Who, strapped in his chair, calls him back
    To delay the moment of death:
    The feet stilled, then a voice came out,
    Muffled, but audible: ‘Is that you on the stair,
    Riordan? Here already? The statutes
    Were out by several years on your account.
    Are you so soon sated with that wealth for which
    You made no bones about seizing the university
    By deceit, only then to make havoc with her?’
    I stood as one in negative equity,
    Unsure how to understand what I heard
    And uncertain how to reply.

    Then Berrigan nudged me, saying:
    ‘Tell him you’re not the one he takes you for.’
    At which I stepped right up to the hole
    And did as he instructed. At this
    The shade knotted his feet together,
    Sighing in a laboured fashion,
    Then in a voice which was half whining,
    He said: ‘Then what do you want of me?
    If you’ve trudged up these stairs, rather than
    Take the paternoster, to know who I am,
    Learn that I was once clothed in the great mantle,
    But beneath the finery
    I was greed incarnate, so eager
    To advance my own ends, that up above
    I stuffed my pockets, and here am stuffed in one.
    I was the one who lobbied for top-up fees,
    I shut down any subject area that wasn’t
    Making a killing, and encouraged those that would
    Bring in cash – the EBS was my brainchild, to the arts
    I was no friend. Under my head are stuffed all the
    Others who came before me, moneygrubbers to a man,
    Cowering within the fissures of the rock.
    I too will go down there when the one I
    Mistook you for retires.
    But already I’ve stood toasting in this
    Undignified posture longer than he will,
    For after him, from the north, will come
    A ruthless shepherd who will liquidate
    All of the humanities, a man who will
    Put our deeds in the shade.
    He’ll be another John Brooks:
    If he doesn’t shut you down, he’ll either
    Pension you off or make you work longer hours.’

    He rambled on and on, like one who enjoyed
    The sound of his own voice and was used
    To his audience hanging on every word.
    Perhaps I spoke out of turn, but I answered
    Him with what was upmost in my mind:
    ‘While your salaries can be counted in
    Hundreds of thousands,
                                         have you any
                          idea how much we pay our TAs?
    And do you know how much the cleaners earn,
    Who even have to pay to park at work?
    Do you know what we pay poets?
    Stay stuck where you are, for you’ve got exactly
    What you deserve; your avarice grieves the world,
    And your vision of a chrestomathic university
    Chained to markets and so-called creative industries
    Leaves no room for thought, and cares nothing for
    The rubbished margins of your success story.
    It’s you and your like who have put the “vice”
    In “vice-chancellor”, you should be ashamed.’
    And as I ranted on at him like this,
    Like I do when I’m completely pissed,
    Whether it was through rage,
    Or because he