DREAM TREE
The sorrows of the
trees? We hang the hammocks between them. Then we hang the sausages. Line up to hear the heart sing in its little sack of
blood. Let’s
go build a tree house, says Tatra. Yeah Tatra. Why not. All the children dream of tree houses cause it is a play house and
also close to trees since it is in the trees. Everyone falls in love with
trees. &
don’t
they give you the look. Cheeky. Leafy. They want to move out among the trees. This branch of my family split
from that branch but we’re still on the same tree with some branches full of
knots from failed branches. Also under the ground all the trees reach out and
touch each other. All the roots of trees underground tapping each other with
the dreams of trees.
Wolf Eyes
In the olden days they churned the butter for buttermilk biscuits. Just arrived in Cieplice. The oldest spa town in Poland from 1281.
They take the waters. 90 degrees celsius. Lotsa minerals. Good for decaying
teeth. Slow down the slippery slide to oblivion, maybe. It smells like the
devil’s armpit and tastes like it too. Suczka or sunia. That’s their dog. She
likes to lift her leg to pee. Pies is the male dog. If sunia meets pies it is
usually green light for circle sniffs. But two sunias spell trouble. Through
the city park they cross over into the wild park. It’s good to feel wild again.
They meet another sunia. Space space yells the saintly stick man with another
sunia. The other sunia crouches into prey position. Definitely trouble on the
horizon. Half wolf half German shepherd yells the wandering folkster with tiny
guitar slung over his back. Braided beard with beads twinkling in moonlight.
The half wolf half howls. So they skedaddle away.
Tight Squeeze
They visit The
Narrows to resurrect the life urge. It is a tight squeeze. Stuck/unstuck in
those narrow passages, they keep moving forward. Kato’s hand reaching out to
grab Tatra into daylight. This is a little like Plato’s cave. Sort of. But they
are only back to where they started. They have to keep moving out of
constricted corners. They lay down in the desert,
beside the abandoned shepherd shack. Ghost
sheep bleeding into mop buckets. They sit down
beside the speaking box. Tatra twists his finger
around the phone cord. Dials the numbers. Looped recording. Thank you for
contacting the abyss. You’re call is very important to us. The witch in the forest burns within them.
Dog Sticks
Kato lost her
phone in the wilderness. Old wooden inns. Thick
smoke creeping up the chimney. They turned on Find My
Phone. It didn’t give the exact location. Some place where the triangular field
intersects with the rectangle. They combed the prickly grass. Lots of dry dog
sticks. Someone else’s keys. Make it ding. There was no ding. There is a lot of
phone to make your life tick. Panting in the blaze of 40 degree heat wave. The
musky scent of the earth followed them. Hogging the air.
Hot Pockets
They gather the
samples and walk the forest to the lab. How
do we carry our vials? One hand behind our back in hushed reverence
and the other hugging the vial to the body. Or held out proudly in front of
you. Lighting the way in the wilderness. Maybe wrapped tightly in tin foil. Maybe in little baggies. When they arrive at the front of the line, the
hot crossed man crosses
their names off the list and makes a clicking sound. They aren’t
sure what to do with the clicking sound. Then the
frock coated captain points to one of the vials. The mouth of Kato’s vial is half open. Aghast, perhaps. Click. That’s
the sound of the mouth of the vial when it closes. There is a nervous buzz
in front of them.
So many colour coded paths. What colour do we take?
Black is the sharpest and if the rain falls heavily we will slip on the sharp
rocks. Red is also difficult, but you don’t need ropes for that one. Yellow is
full of sweet meadows and many rodents. Green is the city park with old word
trumpets. The vials glow red like shock waves. They tease their hair and place
it under hats. They creak the ancient floorboards & pass through the old gates. Bohemian milk foam. One quarter or a full tankard. They keep pulling the full tankard. They ride the Kozel horse into the little red room full of
velvet teardrops. They
stick out their tongues for the priest wafers encased in
dark tombs of chocolate. Then carnivorous cave fruit. Hot pockets of love surround them.
Wing Chair
They slide into
their pouches to burrow for winter. Time to toast the toast. Warm bread brings warm
feelings. The jam moves slowly around on the warm toast. Spreading its glob glory. It is a slow jam. Finally says, Kato.
Slowing down into new mood
rings. Blue heading into yellow. Cautiously mindful out the door into streets
full of Starfish. Here are seven interesting facts about Starfish. Starfish can
regenerate their own arms. They have no brain or blood. They wear tough, leathery
skin. They have eyes. They move with hundreds of feet. They can eat outside
their body. Not all starfish are star shaped. But most importantly starfish
move slowly. Six inches per minute. Some let the ocean breeze move them. The starfish is the star of the sea but how about the star inside you.
All caky crumbles. Put your ear to the worm. Praise for
the music of the dead and resurrected. Dear bellybutton, my lint is blue. Dear
bellybutton, thanks for ballooning my future into this present. Dear
bellybutton, I am full of hot air. Here in my wing chair. Dreaming of Polish
donuts and slug-happy forests.
Irish writer Marcus Silcock (who also writes under the name Marcus Slease) teaches English literature and creative writing at a high school in Barcelona. His poetry has been translated into Slovak, Turkish, Polish and Danish and has appeared in various magazines and anthologies in North America and Europe. He co-edits surreal-absurd for Mercurius magazine. His book of prose poems and microfictions, Dream Dust, is available from Broken Sleep Books. Find out more at Never Mind the Beasts (www.nevermindthebeasts.com).