Everly's Walk: Part Two

Blythe-by-the-Sea was a prosperous ocean town, built on seafood and surf. Made of white houses that dotted the shores like shells, it was a pretty enough place, a fond destination for families on holiday. Even the gulls dared not soil the pristine streets of Blythe, and the sun always shone there, making the water a clear blue-green.

Everly’s Walk was a preposterous ocean town up the shore from Blythe. Built on tug boats and trade, everything in Everly’s Walk was green or gray. The ocean, the glass, the seasick faces of the town’s people (who were notably averse to sea travel), sometimes even the skies, were a pale, unattractive sort of mint. Nothing grew in Everly, and so the ground was always charcoal stone. The houses were old, bent by wind and warped by storm, and, of course, gray. But it was outside of unfortunate Everly, not Blythe, that the once grand Carrigan House lived.

The Carrigans were the sole owners of Everly’s tug boat industry, and the town grew up from their money (which was also green). Though they still made far more than any townsperson in Everly, the Carrigan’s business had faded by the time Araby was born to the dusty glamor of things outraced. No one ever left Everly, and people rarely came. And the people who did come to Everly’s Walk were often the not-quite-right types. That was because the townspeople of Everly’s Walk did not deal in fish or fineries, trinkets or trifles. In Everly’s Walk they traded one thing and one thing only: tales. Not the lovely sort. Well, lovely in their way, but rather melancholy, nasty, stomach-roiling, even upsetting in their own right. 

And there were many tales to tell, most especially the tale of Everly Carrigan.

Comments, anyone? I'd love some feedback.

Everly's Walk: Part One

Part 1

Carrigan House was a crumbling old manor, perched on the edged of a cliff. Or it used to be. Rather, the cliff was perched under it. And then it wasn’t. Chunks of gray stone slipped from their precarious positions and plummeted to the green sea below, and parts of Carrigan House, that once stately mansion, went with them. Over time, the green sea collected enough souvenirs from Carrigan Cliff that a little island began to grow below, bathed in sea foam. 

The right wing of Carrigan House fell into the sea directly, when the first of the cliff began to go. Alice Carrigan, even then an old lady, had always said that the right wing was for those with no spine. That was probably because the right wing was the new wing, built on top of an old graveyard. To Alice Carrigan, the destruction of a graveyard was no fault, it was the cowardice of living on something so safe as hallowed ground that got to her. And all those modern conveniences as well.

The smallest dining room, remaining guest rooms, and half the ballroom fell away with the rest of the straggling cliff pieces. Alice Carrigan, who was fond of cliff diving, went with that batch as well. She left a message making it clear that she would be back when she recovered her home from the sea’s greedy, green fingers and not a moment sooner. Her granddaughter, Araby Carrigan, thought that her grandmother could simply not bear to watch her library tumble into the ocean with the rest of her life, and so she made it watch her leave instead.

They dragged the corpse of Alice Carrigan from the deep, mint pools of shallow water near the rocks that marked the edge of Carrigan Cliff. Araby could see it all from where she stood in the half-destroyed ballroom, wind wrecking her scarlet hair and howling along the jagged marble edges of the fallen-away floor. She refused to look as they removed the body, but still she caught glimpses of the limp, white-clad form, dripping and dead and covered in stony sand. She’d never seen Alice Carrigan look so frail or so free.

The beginning of my new short story, still under editing.

Standing in the Window at Day Change

fall away ashes
on the ground, in the light
pieces of sun and bone and broken
on my face, the skin of my arms
delving between the shallow shadows
between
it hurts harder than the depths
of drowning in the dark under my breath
consistent in the window
the world smiles through
the silhouettes that mark my vision
and my visage and my broken
wind under the lashes of my eyes
I weep dry tears
my face a dusty field
of ashes

Up North I Was

up north there were a thousand
lights
on a city of white
snow and snowing
in many different words
all crisp on the breaking ice
break even with the path and the odds
but here there are shadows of two
under the storm clouds reaching
dancing on the sea
and boats swim in the thorny waters
that kiss innocently the bows in the rain
running gray and white
foggy sun set still on two horizons
where up north there was a single
compass point
monochromatic symbols under a bridge
and licking the wakes
that walk deep in the water
with their stories of glories in the dangerous
white surf mountains
white is the color of fear on the water
but it is another hue of gray
on the alter
in the storm laughing
overhead the sky

The Jellowby Sound

sloughenly drip the jellowby sound
this is the ups and gargle growl pie plate
no sallow out mouthed drooling jaw
pinched bottle board breaking slobber
dog of a drunk on tilt toothed word vomit
yes, belch the ugly sober ego and
bruise brushed diaphragm
on bare beached faun eyes and gentle foes
these are the strings running up
toeing of far grown graces
the snarls slipping down
a chewed tie and snaggled bells
jumble traumatic beauty in the
momentary ire of bleach fanged snippy
nipping nil patty and tea bubbles
waves broken solid on muzzle fit doors
to form the yellow beast green
which downs the crier gullet and
drowns

THIS IS NOT A POEM

THIS IS NOT A REAL POEM

this is not

chasing the coattails of immature sentences

period and catching on

this is not

breaking the barrier of thinking

in rhythm

and only comprehension is away

this is not

feeling the gritty grime

crust through fingers to the page

and land in a pattern of ugly

that is beautiful

this is not

lying through sharpened teeth

to make a point

that you don’t believe

until it’s there

this is not

real

this is not

whole

this is not

that thing that it is said to be

what it looks like

what it tastes like

this is not

that poison

this is not

anything

that is not what

it feels like being

Ink

these wings are words that whisper wonderingly through me

wander thoughts of thoughtless beginnings and fabling fibs to tell a lie

rip right out my back in breaking painful price of giving up oneself to the sky

my bloodless body is a candy-colored corpse hanging thin and fumbling from textual lines left behind

swing me from the simple stars this celestial print projection and leaving me waning under the moon’s face

sending lacy ink like water to reach round my back and through to the heart

like blackened wilting webs they hold me as a marionette wobbling in the wind of marginal space

gossamer feathers spiky and soft with warmth

they slash the open page with loving feather fingers wash with cruel wanderings

cut the cords that carry me, these lines that want to string my things

and when the wished-for punctuation crashes to closing it works its wonder on my will

i drop, the warm longing of painful loving leaves me

without the want of need like water in the veins

i fall, alone without the agonized torment of driving destruction

without the wretched wrong of giving half and more to the hateful heavens

i collapse, without the strings of alphabet soup that flow from my fingers into those that pull me

without the rivers of ink that itch beneath skin until they are born free

i die

The Space Pirate

The exile star fields open up to him, a star-chain like hanging doorknobs in the voided sea. Through the undarkness, the pirate watches with cunning, moony eyes, wondering if his captain-prey knows the captain-law: stoic face and steer forward. Never look back or face the spiraling void.

Fire at whim, flip-turns in his mind as he gives chase. Run couple of stolen moments, he thinks.

His ship, a blackbird in space, lost to the eye. His crew, betwixt dark and bright.

And then, the breaching moment. From tale-ward comes the pirate-predator.

He smiles, knowing hope, in its endless fragility, is breakable as bones.

They plunder, there on the shadow-edge. One voyage, shipwrecked. It is the unmaking time. Fate intervenes in Destiny.

We are the spiraling void. And man in void, falls.

The point here was to use under 140 words.

One Word

There's a site called oneword.com where you have a set time limit to write about a set word. It's a brilliant exercise or working on flow and tone, for finding inspiration and destroying writer's block. I usually do two for each word. Here are some of my own one word creations:

Punishment

She fell from the branch to which she’d desperately clung, arms flailing in desperate bid for purchase. But no, her attempts were fragile and frail. That which was lost faded high away like dots in the distance. Faces of the leaving went quickly by and the below rose up with sharp fists to clutch at her broken body. She had not learned to run.

Punishment

It is a crash of rifting flesh like melting without the fragility. I break like breaking bones, unrepeatable. This is the rub of unending, just let me stop. Cease. It is never to end this pain.

Thread

Beneath the spool under a table in a small indentation in Ms. Jordan’s dingy home on the corner of Fifth and Crescent Street lived a family of five mice. The smallest slept always in the bundle of pooling thread that spilled over in turquoise blue masses. Their parents, small round mice with graying hair, made a sort of bed out of cotton balls but somehow always awoke with little thread fibers in their mouths. The oldest child slept on the next biggest mound of warm, soft thread. And the middle child slept on the hammock like sling beneath the two.

Thread

The piece that goes through the eye unwillingly, fraying until unusable and tossed aside. That which makes the needle tool rather than weapon. That which makes pictures of texture and color.

Avenue

Meaning to escape but forgetting the avenue even though twenty are open in the hedges. She streams forth blindly scrambling, nails scratch at latches and lost forever. Void. Fear. She knows his name. He leads her on and away and alone. Isolation.

Existence

He sat in the coil. Mortally wounded, his flesh fell out upon the earth, creating existence. His cells became persons who wandered and walked in their consciousness derived from his own membranous thoughts. They were one with him in his mortal wounds, his mortal peril, his broken, dying, immortality. They were his life force and they stole it away.

Existence

She existed between moments, breathing in the held breaths to try and capture attention. The glint of the eye, the flick of a wrist. She watched the things that make us human and longed to become as one. it is without permission that humanity begins unshakable and determined. Though that is a fabrication of human ego. She waited between moments with all the other corpses, the children, the infants, those who sat on eager edges for life to let them in.

As you can see, some are rough, but devoid of the words which inspired them, they take on entirely new meanings.

Mother's Foundling

Mother studied the still white figure. A child, no a teenage girl, lay bathed in the hues of night. Mother had not realized that the child was not a child. She wondered what made the child so innocent.
Honey hair spilled around her as she lay peaceful in the cold grass. Shadow things made lines across her pale, soft face. Relaxed as if asleep. But, no, the innocence lay in the whites.
Those orbs were like moons in the vague darkness, white parts glistening hazily. Staring. Her eyes reflected the sky, the mirror earth, the longing flight of ghostly stars. Staring.
One ivory palm faced up, as if in religious meditation. As if by benediction or rapture.Vulnerable to the chastising sky.
Mother thought with approval that perhaps she had given herself over to the clawing tears, sat cross-legged, back arched down with sobs that fell into open palms. Sacrificial pools offered to the stars.
The other hand faced down, claws digging into the earth to feel the pulse that beat there. Talons scratching deep in effort to hold still the spinning of physical time. A visible proof of life’s fated will.
Mother read in that hand, that coalition of muscle and thought, the sound of gasping for breath. Mother loved that hand.
Mother observed the way the child lay, exquisitely perched on the skewer of mortal earth. Body held taught yet quiet on invisible tight rope. Knees bent as if fallen backward from begging or prayer. Though Mother hardly knew the difference.
The tree shadows scraped wickedly at her edges, making them soft and transient. It was in mimicry of her current nature.
Mother knelt to touch the honey hair that spilt all around, combed with evening dew. Her eyes traveled the human length to the child’s feet. One pointed precisely as a ballerina’s. It’s tenseness in contrast to the body’s will.
The other clumsily upturned, almost grotesque.
This child had lived too gently in the in between until the reckoning moment.
And the poor child’s white dress was smeared with dirt and water, touched by earth’s sullying hands. She lay spoiled beneath the pure, pure sky.
Mother stepped away, dusting her hands of the sky’s child. Or what had once been.
And so Mother turned.
Mother did not need another body. She already held too many in her womb.
And so Mother walked.
Leaving the corpse behind.


http://www.fictionpress.com/s/2949839/1/Mothers_Foundling

With Your Permission

As the sun, a frugal being, stretched the shadow material until it frayed at the edges of the room and in the corners and the slow motions of such careful artistry caused time’s passage to slow into a muddling trap, Aberforth, abandoning good posture to lounge on the living room’s singular green ottoman, cared little for time’s tedious movement, being only a cat, and minded not whether the world continued on or ceased, for cats are notorious in their apathy, so the world could end quite suddenly in this twilight time and Aberforth would notice but not fret (cats always notice but do not as frequently deign to show their attention), as he was quite content in his half-slumber, not truly worrying after the fate of the world, simply lazing and thus giving time like permission (even the sun needs a cat’s permission to make its rounds in the sky).

*A single sentence story for a writing competition, inspired by my cat, Aberforth.*

A Short Story

This is a piece a already had written:

It’s actually not that hard to kill your best friend. It’s just death. Just murder. I’m walking away and I’m not sorry. That part of me was one of the victims. It’s the lead up that’s hard, the moments before the killer takes over. It’s when you have to pretend to be anything other than what you are, a cold-blooded assassin, that can break you. Especially when you’re lying to the person who knows you best. How could he not have known?

I’m reliving the end in my head. People always say that the eyes of the newly dead are staring, piercing. As I stood above him, his eyes were still open, but they were blank and empty. There was no judgment or fear because he was so unprepared to go, so unsuspecting.

My blood pumped with adrenaline, excitement and sorrow, anger and fear. I knew the second he was gone. It left a sort of sick thrill in my veins that was accompanied by a terrible weight of guilt. When the last breath left his lungs, leaving a curl of gray in the air, I stood up, ready to walk away, but that lasting curl of air swirled in front of me. It seemed alive, so much more alive than the corpse in front of me.

Before that, I watched the soul leave his eyes, and it was my fault. Blood was painted down his front. It oozed from the wound, hitting the pavement with a sickening noise. It slid between my fingers when I helped him to the ground, taking his weight as his strength abandoned him. And it felt like a lifetime, like eternity, that journey to the ground. My first kill.

I stabbed him with a knife. It was as brutal as it sounds.

It just took a moment, just a second of metal through flesh, a quick twist of the wrist. The knife felt so good in my hand, so stealthy and invisible. I felt invincible, so powerful. It’s like being God. But there was a weight of guilt, a premature repentance.

“Sorry,” I whispered. I didn’t look in his eyes. I still don’t know if I meant it. I just moved close to him and did it, slid the knife beneath his coat, metal to cloth, not even slicing off a button. He didn’t even notice, didn’t see it coming.

We had just been walking. Night had set just enough to obscure the eyes of any witnesses. It lent a sort of eerie perfection to the scene. He didn’t know. I wished that I didn’t. I would have felt better if I could have shared his surprise, but this was purely premeditated.

I felt sick because I was excited. My palms itched with the desire to hold the knife in my hand, to move it in that practiced movement. But the other part of me was acting, pretending nothing was different about this walk, this conversation. And the assassin crouched, waiting to carry out her mission.


The idea was to write a backwards story. It's a little different than the usual.

The Human Business

We raise foundation. Naturally unnatural ties. Mother. Father.
We grow, roots. Heart beast and blood, vines. Love.
We bloom and we blossom.
We break. We rebuild.
We trust. Again. Sheltering leaves. Fear.
We move along.
Our roots fill the cracks in the concrete.
We are destroyed. Fire.
We stand up again. Singed.
And we go about the human business of making worlds. Again.
Like birds and nests we live. Fragile.
This is the human way.

Pow, To The Moon

man in void
falls
recognize the destination
now prepared
stoic face and steer forward
into blazing infinite ignition
the cabin is not a ship
but always takes stowaways
when they are painful
unwise move, my foe
even in space
this voyager is invincible
fire at whim
and a missed opportunity
leaves pain in my hull
and we are spiraling void
it doesn’t hurt yet
just a remembrance of forewarning
now prepared
man in void
falls


Work in progress

Enlightened

ignite penultimate ramblings
this loquacious pen and feather
for endings are unbending
and rarely enjoyed

implode exaggerated meaning
that core and webby brain
for stars are often forgotten and rotten
and passed before they’re seen

An unfinished poem from the mind of a writer who is possibly rather wise. ;)

A Simple Love Connection

I thought with school coming up (or having already started for some of you), people would be in need of an easy read. I wrote this the other night. It needs editing and it's only part of a larger story, but I think it's cute.


Piper leaned back in her desk chair; one stiletto-booted foot perched on the edge of the vintage wood counter at Hamelin Books and the other designer boot crossed over the first. It was a Wicked Witch-like picture to be greeted with, the sight of only those two feet, but Piper really didn’t care. She loved her job, but she didn’t feel like a bookstore required such propriety. Cordelia, her boss, would not have agreed. But Cordelia wasn’t there.
The little bell above the door let Piper know that a customer had entered, but she didn’t look up from her book. At least, it was her intent to remain undistracted by the new arrival, until she heard footsteps approach the counter and then stop. She waited, refusing to look up for a few precious moments.
“That must be some book,” said a male voice. Piper’s insides curled at the sound which was Irish and smooth. She set aside her worn copy of Finnegans Wake to look at the newcomer. She wished she’d kept her eyes on the rather less attractive James Joyce because she wasn’t prepared for the guy that stood before her now. He wasn’t the usual sort---nerdy, arty, skinny, cute but not handsome. This guy was tall and lean but muscular. Her eyes lit on his light blonde hair that looked a lot like a lion’s mane, and then let her gaze travel down to his dancing green eyes.
“Can I help you find something?” She found her voice, and at the same time suppressed a self-satisfied smirk as the guy’s gaze turned appreciative.
“I was told that if I wanted to find Roethke I had to come here.” The guy grinned. “My name’s Ian, by the way.”
“You definitely came to the right place,” she said, ignoring his question. “We’re the only bookstore around that carries Roethke.”
“So you aren’t going to tell me your name?”
“Well, technically, you didn’t ask,” she said. “Roethke’s in the poetry section, up those stairs and to the—What are you doing?” he’d reached down to pluck an old name tag from the jar of pens on the counter.
“George,” he read. Then he met her eyes. “I’m guessing that’s not your name?”
“No,” she tried to sound cold, but she had a feeling he didn’t buy it. She sighed and gave in. “Strangers call me Melissa,” she began. “Family and acquaintances call me Mel. But my friends call me Piper.” He raised an eyebrow. “It’s my last name,” she explained.
“But I don’t want to be a stranger or an acquaintance or even a friend.” Her traitorous breath caught. “So I guess I’ll have to call you something else.” Now she raised an eyebrow. He stroked his chin in mock-thought. “Melissa…Izzy?” Warmth curled in her at the way he said the name. And he smirked because he could tell she liked it, but he didn’t say anything. He did, however, turn and walk to the stairs. Then he stopped.
“I’m not sure I can find it on my own, Iz.” She noticed he was trying to make a sad kind of face. It was actually pretty effective because she found herself rising and walking up the stairs with him.
She helped him find the Roethke book, standing on her toes to reach the top shelf. In a move as old as time, Ian stepped up behind her and grabbed it so that they were pressed close together in the isolating row of books. She turned, but he didn’t move. She could smell his scent, a combination of coffee and spice.
“What do you want that book for?” she said to break the thick silence. He stepped back.
“A class at the university,” he said. “But I’ve been meaning to read some of his poems for a while now.”
“You like poetry?” She couldn’t keep the surprise from her voice.
“Just because I’m a guy doesn’t mean I’m illiterate,” he said, pretending affront.
“In most cases it does,” she joked. Then she bit her lip which drew his heated gaze. She made a decision. “Follow me.”
She led him through the brightly lit rows of books into the back corner. Then she knelt down to a small section of shelf.
“This is where I keep the best books,” she admitted. Ian laughed.
“Hoarding them for yourself, Iz?”
“Something like that,” she laughed. “Actually, these are mine. I usually keep some of my favorite books around, just in case.” She half-smiled, wondering if he thought she was crazy. He was really thinking that she was fascinating and beautiful, but she couldn’t tell from his face.
She rose and handed him an old book. He set the Roethke aside to take it. It was an old copy of poems by Mandelstam.
“An old friend of mine translated them himself. They’re kind of amazing. You can borrow it, if you want.” He smiled at her.
“I want,” he grinned. She laughed a little. She felt isolated in their little space between the shelves. And she found herself liking this guy way too much.
“Come on, let’s get you checked out.” She slid past him toward check out, and he followed. She was acutely aware of his breathing and his footsteps. What was it about this guy? She’d met tons of cute, charming guys before. Her heels clicked on the wood stairs as she descended, jarring her back to reality. Then she heard him curse.
“What?” she asked.
“I left the Roethke back there,” he said. “I was distracted.” His eyes caught hers and held with an unspoken message that said it wasn’t any book that had distracted him. She looked away. “I’ll go get it and be right back.”
Piper went back to the counter, head spinning. She bit her lip before turning to ring up his purchase manually. Then, before she could stop herself, she had a pen in her hand and her fingers were scribbling ten digits and two hyphens on the back of his receipt. She shook her head at herself as she finished.
Ian appeared at the top of the stairs and a smile flitted over her face. She liked him, even she couldn’t deny it.
“Hey,” he said. “Here.” He handed her the book. She slid he receipt into the front cover and put both books into a bag. Ian watched her in silence.
“Take good care of my book,” she said.
“I will.” He smiled, and it did funny, unwanted things to her heart. “Well,” he said. “I’ve distracted you enough for one day.” She snorted. “I suppose you won’t give me your number then?” But he didn’t wait for an answer. And she didn’t have one for him anyway.
The door jingled, and then he was gone. And Piper felt oddly lost for a few moments after that, like she had to reacquaint herself with being Piper alone and not Piper with Ian. I was most unnerving.

Anyway, the idea is to start out the story with this little exchange that seems really really normal and then reveal the truth. I'm not sure what the truth is. By the way, the story's called Pied. I'm leaning towards making it take place after the world has pretty much been ravaged, but they're in one of the few rebuilt places. We shall see.

Wings Are Just Machines

Promptly questioning in the moment after

the antiphrasis lingering

what emotions make up omnipotent wonderings

and sit silently on the horizon in this second

perching to hit the faces of the youth

because they go unidentified

and are all the same

with their wings

Made Up Dictionary

I'd rather not feel the pressing pressure, gurgling forth and unable to spill out in agonizing bubbles. Oh, let me sit without this pain that is emptiness. No, loss. No, I cannot name it. It is a crane that I fold from paper. But not to be wished on. Is it nothing if it has no form of its own except this uncomfortable silence.
It is an inexplicable shock of hurt from a dream. God, why do I remember? Thank not the subconscious, for it is cruel. It is bitter and not sweet. And yet it does not hurt, only aches in my chest where my heart should be.
Let me not feel this. I am begging without conviction. As this is pain without form. Is it my nerves or my heart that feels this ghost in my heart-cavity?
But it is better than nothing. I think. It is tears that do not spill over, so it is not a threshold of pain. It is a threshold of aching, longing for what I do not want. But I do want it. I chose elsewhere instead.
The taste is like regret, but they are not the same. I would not go back for it if I had the choice.
Is this happiness? It shouldn't hurt this bad. My face in the steamed mirror is not agony. It is not acceptance either. When will I see forgiveness in the silver?
I can solve it, but that would be the coward's way out. It helps no one but myself. And yet I want that. And I fear it. Back to numbness? I think not. Yet I have never been numb.
I would not forget anyway. The mind holds onto pain more clearly. And an injury is stronger in retrospect. What choice is this to make? Not mine. And yet I made it.
Forgive me, soul. I knew not that I burdened you with this anxiety. I have left my outlet behind. No vacancy here for that imagining.
That is the pain. There is a lump where that thing should be, that thing I cast out. Is this love then?
I never understood destruction. This is love on the small scale. If there is such a thing.
But not love enough to stay. Love to leave is stronger.
Ah, but the aching, physical warmth of loss in my chest, that is where my heart should be. I will retrieve that from the tub's drain and be done. If I could. If I can.
There is a difference between what I can do and what I could have done. Closing off possibilities. That is where I cannot forgive. And yet I think I just did.
My chest does not feel lighter. But I can now see my eyes again. They are the same, if more unfulfilled.
And what is love anyway if I can refuse it? Maybe that is that love is. And the unrefused becomes obsession. Or maybe obsession fills the hole where love has lain. I do not know. I am learning. And it is painful, but without scarring.
Or maybe the soul is scarred. But the most scarred souls have lived. And I can write about that.
Accept I left that behind. My choice is now my hurt that I do not regret. A lock who's key I burned. Then it is ashes that start my heart now and they are heavier than they appear. But it is with them that I may be able to ink my pen.
And I will write a dedication to those left behind. If I have not given that choice away as well.

Can fluff be painful?

Instead of the witty awesome lyrical prose piece I wanted, I wrote a poem. But it's still rough yet.
Instead, enjoy a angsty romance oneshot I wrote a long time ago. Just recently posted it on FictionPress though.

http://www.fictionpress.com/secure/story/story_preview.php?storyid=2838395&chapter=1

10/6

Oh, a madman. Oh, a tired companion on a journey. How does he tailor so smoothly with crooked scissors and broken string? He who has been burned like the lace and buttons in his hair can no longer float above the ground. Waiting under a cloudless rain, his favorite tea time, there sits a masterpiece musician with needles and thread. Yet he wouldn’t know when tea time is because he no longer gets on well with history or future. Hoping has forsaken him and his pocket watch. He can only sit and search in his tea leaves for that which will appear on the horizon. His eyes are closing but his mouth runs rapid in another world for which he waits. Everything is clear in the uncrowded mind, but things cannot help pressing in to clutter the space most uncompromisingly. He who once knew all riddles is questioning. But the answer is found in a cocoon. Once he walked along and dreamt of clouds shaped like things, stringing letters along with his needle, embroidering them into rhyme. Dreams are no longer his companions and his companions are now only dreams and housecats, housecats who scratch and bite with their sarcastic smiles and covetous paws, as if they know more than he. They smile grins that stir up the dregs of the sad-faced madman’s latest cup. He who converses with cats and rabbits must also converse with hares, although they do not say much. He is tired of the silence. This poor forgotten reminiscence can’t wait to be remembered. Do you see the stitches in his heart? Everything is impossible for this honored jester. He is piecing together nonsense. Because shards of insanity rain more gently than pieces of perfect sense, and perfect sense in pieces makes no sense at all. In fact, it makes nonsense, and seems only like a few halfhearted tries at getting along ahead when the feet are stumbling behind in shoes three sizes too big. He does not know that his head is in the sky or that he is too tall for his shoes. Sometimes being taller or smaller is much preferred to normality. Maybe he only needs some cake. His favorite food is buttered bread, but he generally eats scones. He was once an artist but he is now only an appointed court official, hanging on the end of an unanswered question. If the butterfly could speak, he would end the fluttering query. Sometimes a headpiece is more like a hat. And sometimes a headpiece is simply a hat. There is no truth truer than that.