Grimm Justice

Y’all think ghost stories only happen in the dark. That’s jest yer ignorance.

Ruth had no bizness lettin’ her baby go pettin’ that mangy black dog. She knew it were a Keith-Tree dog.

I kin still see the blood a-drainin’ outta that Keith. Hanged men don’t bleed, Pa said, but I seen it. Said that man ‘tacked Dolly. Everbody knew she’d been steppin’ out with another feller. 

Keith sure loved dogs. They’s dogs at that tree, since.

Folks say he whispers to ‘em. Say they’s cursed. A-course that child sickened ‘n’ died. Poor thing, thrashing for air, bleedin’.

__

Submitted to round 2 of the NYC Microfiction Contest. Awarded an Honorable mention. (one edit made to this version).

Coventry

Coventry

The smell of dirt took her back. Touring her father’s field. Glances from the field hands.

The Count’s cold hand. Her breast grasped like a heifer’s udder. Her father’s face turning away. The Count continuing business directives.

The bells were ringing to call her to vespers. She grasped her tools, headed back to the monastery. 

Through the kitchen, pausing as was her custom at Sister Ignatius’ semi-hidden, heathenish “Warrior Mary” statuette. Prayers not for chapel.

Sister Ignatius grunts, “the Count was unhorsed. Prioress says he dies tonight.”

Genuflecting. Eyes down. “I will pray for him.”

Shrewd Sister Ignatius.  “Me too.”

___

Submitted to the NYC Microfiction 2020 competition, chosen in top 20 of category and moved on to semifinals.

Hyde, seek

These days I need a dire wolf
A shaggy protector from
Enemies and my own doubts.

Carry me mind-bound into a deep glade,
Lay me on the magic mound to have
Drained from me all the
Toxic civilization
Till I howl and
Run with her.

I need an uncanny familiar
Glass eyes reflecting away
Technology blue screen glare,
Nudging me to call forth the
Goddess with candle and cards,
Fire and magic, and salt and moon-washed grass

My totem animal has become some sort of
Golem, an animated LED screened monster,
That possesses my thoughts, shredding them
Into quarters, into 128s, into 1024s,
Until the bytes buzz like flies, and I am just a
Buzzing electric swarm.

Ridikulus. Expecto patronum.
Come forth, Isis, Athena, Kali.
This circuitry is a rational trap, and
my synapses are organic.
My belly makes life, and this is not life.
This out-of-balance world is not mine.

An Agnostic Defends Prayer

Those witch hunters,
Thirsting for enemy blood,
Crying to their heartless soulless gods of war and commerce,

They give it a bad name.

And thoughtsandprayers as a unit are a social bandaid
We solicitously apply to the wounds of strangers
As we cavort on with our lives.

When we feel spiritualimnotreallyreligious

We set intention
Mindfully meditate
Soulfully superior to the snake-dancers, tongue-speakers
Climate change deniers, gay-haters, finger-sandwiches-from-the-auxiliary eaters

But
prayer is a structure
for thought

prayer has us review our values,
tally them, bright beads on our
not-rosary

reflect on them
and then simplify what we are asking for
what resolution we seek
what help we need

having dressed the room for our best company,
we don't slouch on that sofa as we pray
we consider how our ask will look hanging on that wall facing the window

we judge our ask
weigh the solicitation we make
consider the bargains we will enter into

and then, satisfied, we throw it up, invite the universe in
sometimes we get an answer
sometimes we find it in the couch cushions
sometimes the tidy room is enough.

I went looking for Buddha (I thought)

I thought I went looking for Buddha
Settled into middle-class comfort now
A late midlife lull of mindfulness and peace
With my body
With my fortunes
With my soul's state
I was ready to meditate,
Align with my Western
Middle Class
Buddha-mind.

I thought I went looking for Buddha
But I found Shiva
Evil-destroyer
Transformer
Creator
Not one, but
One of --
Tripartite god
Batter my heart.

Shiva, who dances
Serpent-entwined,
Balances in
Dynamic power pose
Ascetic and
Demon-slayer

Shiva, holding counsel with
Vishnu and Brahma

Which aspect found me?
Parvati, some guidance?

Nataraja Shiva,
Parvati and Google tell me.
The dancer
The source of all movement
Creation and destruction
Release of the self

The restless energy within I had thought to quell
Whips and waves in a tidal dance
Demands release
Let go
Let come

Destroy the old to make way for the new
As cells do
As cities do

And as tarots do, my Shiva reveals an answer that was within me.
Let go
Let come
The fires of creation.

Of course.
Of course.

Red Room

In this red room I circle,
Wheedle the few
Words that break through,
Weave them, knead them, mold and massage them
Into meanings that might
Lift this leaden lumpen carapace.
Tracing the nautilus, thinking
Deeply, nerves pores senses open to
Quantum turbulence, to
Your intentions, to
My grace, essays, defeat.
In this red room
I wait.

Donald Trump's Favourite Ice Cream Flavour

Youtube told me,
Trump prefers vanilla.

The matrix is broken, I thought,
Thousands of us thought.
An elaborate joke that history will devote online chapters
To analysing.

What covfefe led us here.

As all things move relentlessly toward chaos,
This chaordic path is yours, America.
Race relations out of control
A schism through your soul
Poverty taking its toll
And as a president, you chose....
a troll.

Climate change is a hoax?
What people can he coax
That his tweets are not just
nonsense-soaked,
That he is smarter than the jokes.

The best words.

Ice caps melt, erratic weather,
A googleplex of variables beyond control,
Hate grows in the hearts of disenfranchised peoples
Fed by hate, fed by war, fed by poverty, by people not fed.
Beyond our ability to control
All the easy problems seem solved
Now we sadly circle a vexing tangle
Gordian knot
of explosive complexity

When everything else is impossible,
Perhaps only the sublimely absurb
Makes sense.