Nature

Mythras: Flash Fiction

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Mythras
Bistro 16

In the pearly morning light, before the sun had burned off the mists from woods and fields, Jim contemplated the breakfast potential of the mushrooms pushing their stubby skulls through the damp grass. Jim refrained from gathering any until he came across a mushroom as large as a stepping-stone. He lifted it up with great care and placed it in the canvas bag he carried. Then, casting his glance from side to side in search of the best of the crop, he continued to wander along the faint path that led downhill to the field below.

Dai Jones, the farmer, was plowing a neighboring field into earthen waves that disappeared in the morning mist. His sheepdogs, Floss and Jess, ran free between the furrows of fresh-turned earth.

“Watch out for that bull,” Dai called to Jim, as he turned the tractor by the dry stonewall. “He’s loose in that lower field. He’s in a bad mood this morning.”

The roar of the tractor accelerating out of the turn swallowed Dai Jones’s last words.
Jim bent to collect another mushroom. Downhill he walked, following the path as it led him through the mushroom patch and toward the lower field. He stopped at the gate and gazed towards the trees where the mist gathered its folds. Night still dwelt in that woodland temple and the field seemed empty. Jim opened the gate and walked through, closing it behind him.

Jim wasn’t afraid of Dai’s bull. He had met bulls before and had never had any problems with them. He had holidayed in Spain one year and at the village bullfight he had vaulted over the protective barrier with two of his drinking friends and found himself face to face with a fighting bull. It wasn’t really a fighting bull. It was a young bull, a novillo with padded horns, all the village could afford, but he well remembered how the animal sensed his presence, raised his horned head, pawed at the ground, and charged.

Jim recalled the elation of flying, of side stepping, of turning aside from the novillo‘s uncontrolled rush. The villagers, aficionados all, began by laughing at that teenager thrust into a sacrificial, prehistoric culture. But Jim stood his ground, unafraid, and allowed the novillo to come towards him, again and again, before dancing merrily away.

The novillo became furious. It charged with less and less control, and, as it tired, Jim’s two friends combined with the villagers who jumped the barrier to catch the novillo by its tail and drag it snuffling and snorting from the ring.

Later, after the bullfight, Jim met another bull. Its horns and head were fixed to a wooden frame crammed with fireworks and carried on the backs of six large men. When the village clock struck midnight, this carnival bull charged into the square where the villagers were dancing. The bull’s wicked glass eyes flashed, the fireworks exploded, and sprays of bright sparks spurted from the bull’s wooden back. The six men whooped and bellowed, and everybody, except Jim, pretended to be afraid and ran.

As he knelt to gather another large mushroom, Jim remembered the holes burned in his sweater by those bright sparks. He knelt there and the early light cast a luminous spell around him. It was as if he knelt at prayer, just like a bullfighter, en capilla, kneels and prays in the bullring chapel before his entrance into the ring. But Jim wasn’t afraid. He wasn’t affected by any mystery or myth, what he called ‘the bullshit of the bull’.

Within the mist, his bulk enlarged, his horns sharpened and curved, Dai’s black bull also knelt, snuffling gently, sensing Jim’s presence. Then the bull heaved his bulk slowly upwards until he reached a standing position. He couldn’t see Jim through the mist, but he sensed him, heard him breathe, and knew exactly where the young man was. The bull scraped his horns in the mud and pawed the ground.

Lost in his memories, Jim picked his last mushroom.

He looked up with astonishment when the black bull charged.

Jim’s world ended in a whimper as the bull’s sharp horn drove into the young man’s chest cavity, lifted him from the ground, severed the aorta, and pierced his heart.

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Building on Sand: Poetry

Building on Sand

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1
Everywhere the afternoon
gropes steadily to night.
Some people have lit fires;
others read by candlelight.

Geese litter the river bank,
drifts of snow their whiteness,
stained with freshet mud;
or is it the black
of midnight’s swift advance?

They walk on thin ice
at civilization’s edge.
Around them,
the universe’s clock
ticks slowly down.

2
Who forced that scream
through the needle’s eye?

Gathering night,
the moon on the sea bed
magnified by water.

Inverted,
the big dipper,
hanging its question
from the sky’s dark eye lid.

Ghosts of departed
constellations
walk the night.

Pale stars scythed
by moonlight
bob phosphorescent
flowers on the flood.

3
The flesh that bonds;
the bones that walk;
the shoulders and waist
on which I hang
my clothes.

Now they stand alone
beneath the moon
and listen at the water’s edge
to the whispering trees.

They have caught the words
of snowflakes
strung at midnight
between the stars.

Moonlight is a liquor
running raw within them.

4
There are striations
in my heart, so deep,
a lizard could lie there,
unseen, and wait
for tomorrow’s sun.

A knot of
sorrow in daylight’s throat;
the heart a great stone
cast in placid water,
each ripple
knitted to its mate.

Timeless,
the worm at the apple’s core
waiting for its world to end.

Seculae seculorum:
the centuries
rushing headlong.

5
Matins:
wide-eyed
this owl hooting
in the face of day.

Somewhere,
I remember
a table spread for two.
Breakfast.
An open door.
“Where are you going, dear?”

Something bright has fled the world.
The sun unfurls shadows.
The blood whirls stars
around the body.

“It has gone.” she said. “The magic.
I no longer tremble at your touch.”

6
You can drown now
in this liquid
silence.

Or you can rage against this slow snow
whitening the dark space
where yesterday
you placed your friend.

The silver birch wades
at dawn’s bright edge.

Somewhere,
sunshine will break
a delphinium
into blossom.

7
Tight lips.
A blaze of anger.
A challenge spat
in the wind’s face.

High-pitched
the rabbit’s grief
in its silver snare.
The midnight moon
deep in a trance.

If only I could kick away
this death’s head,
this sow’s bladder.

Full moon
drifting
high in a cloudless sky.

8
After heavy rain
the house shrinks.
Its mandibles close.

A crocodile peace
descends from the jaws of heaven.

I no longer fit my skin.
Iguana spots itch.
Walls encircle me,
hemming me in.

The I Ching sloughs my name:
each lottery ticket,
a bullet.

None with my number.

9
Late last night I thought
I had grasped the mystery:
but when I awoke
I clasped only shadows and sand.

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Lagartija: Fast Fiction

 

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Lagartija
(Bistro 13)

There are striations in my heart, so deep, a lizard could lie there, unseen, and wait for tomorrow’s sun. Timeless: this worm at the apple’s core waiting for its world to end. Seculae seculorum: the centuries rushing headlong. Matins: wide-eyed this owl hooting in the face of day. Somewhere, I remember a table spread for two. Breakfast: an open door, a window that overlooks a balcony and a garden.
“Where are you going, dear?”
Something bright has fled the world. The sun unfurls shadows. The blood whirls stars around the body.
“It has gone,” she said. “The magic. I no longer tremble at your touch.”
The silver birch wades at dawn’s bright edge. Somewhere: tight lips, a blaze of anger, a challenge spat in the wind’s taut face. High-pitched the rabbit’s grief as it struggles in its silver snare. The somnambulant moon tiptoes in a trance.
If only I could kick away this death’s head, this sow’s bladder, this full moon drifting high in a cloudless sky.

Who knows when the skeleton will take to the limelight, peel off her gloves, doff her hat, lay down her white cane, and use me as fuel for a different kind of fire. Grief lurks in the bracelet’s silver snare of aging hair. I kick my legs in the chorus line and my day fades into shadowy shapes that unfurl leathery wings.
Pebbles catch in my throat and the word-river once flowing smooth backs up to spill leaf-freckled foam over the tiniest barriers of branch and weed. I try to speak but a gypsy has stolen my tongue and sewn my lips together.
Leaves outside my window grow rusty with rain. A sharp-shinned hawk no bigger than the blue jay he stalks drives like a whirlwind at the feeder. Winter touches with his jack-frost fingers and Old Eight Hoots waits in the tree and calls my name.
Bright stars crackle the sky. Frost crisps leaves. A mist weaves webs scarce-seen. All around, as I walk to my lonely home, the cold ground creaks its wordless tongue-tied whispers.

Night shapes abound.

 

 

 

Obsidian’s Edge 22

10:00 PM
Alone at the Table
Memories of Home

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1

Salt on the sea wind sifts raucous gulls in packs,
breeze beneath wings, searching for something
to scavenge. Seaweed. The tidemark filled with
longing. A grey sea crests and rises. Staring eyes:
stark simplicity of that seal’s head filling the bay.
Next day, his body stretched dead on the beach.

The river runs rocky beneath the covered bridge.
Campers have created first nation’s rock people,
heaping stone upon stone. At low tide, on the dried
river bed, there is no easy way to say no. White foam

horses in the farrier’s forge stamp and surge. A cold
wind blows at Cape Enrage. Wolfe Point sees late
gales transform the beach: the sandbar carved:
a Thanksgiving turkey, stripped to bare rib bone.

Dead birds sacrificed, so I can lie here in comfort:
my eiderdown is stuffed with dull dry winter coats.

2

Gold and silver, the last breath going out of him,
this warrior destined to dance before a cruel sun.

His ultimate spoken threads, so delicate, so thin,
they run, blood and water, through his pierced side,
sorrowful beneath the spectator’s stare. Ice cold,
this water on which he no longer dares nor cares

to walk. Rich silk: this tapestry woven with another
man’s words. Ghosts shunt back and forth across ice.
Late autumn mists confuse the paths, leading nowhere.

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Obsidian’s Edge 20

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8:00 PM
Evensong

1

a skein of blood
reels its life out
vein by vein

he struggles
in vain
at the end of his crimson
lifeline

a weaver
unwinds him

then weaves him
into another pattern

2

left right left
he marches
onwards
along the edge

towards the brute
black knife

3

the key in his back
winds up
his pendulum legs

tick-tock
his heart

a time bomb
waiting to explode
its crimson flower

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4

An overflowing river of rouge,
a great red gong,
this plucked out heart
palpitating in the outstretched palm.

As orange as an orangutan,
its pendulum, once shivering
from rib to rib,
now spattering the worshiping crowd.

5

White birds gather piratical thoughts.

Etiolated crossbones,
bleached skulls,
avian blossoms,
they fly home to roost.

6

Deep-pooled river of unsought sunshine,
this leaf light flowing,
its tears torn from tresses
drift to the ground.

Wild surge of bells,
flourishing their flowery sounds,

blooming and booming on the church
tower’s rocky cliff.

7

The cricket
activates its trigger of song:
bright flashes sound sparks
from tree to tree.

Soft flares this evening air,
this kingdom come,
so soon to be upon us.

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8

Thick with an anonymous flame,
the tongue you parrot
ties itself
to a flesh and bone
cage.

Bistro 8 Flash Fiction

Fear of the Hawk

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The hawk glides in on silent wings. He sits on top of the hydro pole and surveys his empire watching for the slightest weakness. Bored, he takes a step into space and drops the weight of his body onto a gangplank of fragile air. He opens his wings and speeds the feathered arrow of his passing across Frank’s garden.

CBC reports another incident. This time, Frank’s son’s regiment is involved. The boy hasn’t e-mailed his father for seventy-two hours now and Frank’s worried about him. The father thinks of his son making all those patrols among today’s smiling friends. These friends may well turn out to be tomorrow’s scowling foes. Frank knows that every day something bad may be coming, but neither he nor his son knows how or when.

Outside in Frank’s garden, the morning sun carves charcoal lines of shadow. Light dances and reduces the snow to tiny islands of white that float in a rising sea of grass. What remains of winter is no longer smooth, but dimpled and wrinkled, glowing with a million tiny dots of color. From the cloudless sky, an occasional snowflake parachutes down, cross-wise, like a feather.

A military robin, nonchalant in the sunshine and bright in his scarlet uniform, steps his sentry duty across advancing grass.

The predator comes from nowhere, makes contact, talons first, lifts the robin, and slams him into the ground. A single prolonged shriek emerges from the robin’s beak. The sharp-shinned hawk tightens his grip. Claws clench, the robin’s movements weaken and his eyes glaze over. The hawk’s eyes throw a defiant light challenging the space before him. One final spasm, a last quick twitch, and the robin is gone, one wing dragging, borne skywards in triumphant claws.

Frank opens the door to the garden and walks to the killing field. A white tail feather and several bright beads of blood mark where the robin surrendered his life. Silence reigns around the place of execution.

A flutter of feathers beneath the silver birch catches Frank’s attention.  A red-tailed hawk lies there with the wind ruffling its plumage. Frank walks to the bird and turns its body over with his foot. He examines the gashes beneath the left wing where the crows’ marauding beaks have punched their way through to the white bones of the rib cage and into the heart. No wonder the crows were making so much noise earlier this morning, he thinks.

He walks to the garage, fetches a spade and places the blade beneath the corpse. Then he carries it to the back porch and sits down beside it on the step while he talks to the hawk. What shall I do with you? I can’t just throw your body into a plastic bag and leave it for the garbage men, or can I?  No, I’ll have to dig another grave and bury you in the garden.

Frank has buried so many bodies at the garden’s foot. When he lost his wife and daughter to a highway tractor that swerved into the vehicle they were driving, he scattered their ashes beneath those trees. He still prays there daily and tells them all the news. Burials: he’s done them before and he’ll do them again. He thinks of his son and the lack of emails. He hopes all is well, but he fears that any day now he may receive that fatal call.

The ground’s still hard, but he’ll be able to scratch a shallow grave, a scrape, if nothing more. It will be enough to keep the neighbor’s cat at a distance and to deter stray dogs. Never two without three, he thinks as he walks to the garden’s foot and starts to dig.

The digging done, he returns to the back porch and sits on the step. From there, he watches the sunlight playing touch and go with the early oven birds that scratch among the dead leaves.

Somewhere, high above, another hawk casts its shadow across the lawn.

Inside the house, the telephone shrieks like a dying robin.

 

Obsidian’s Edge 14

2:45 pm

Old Woman
@
Dainzú

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 1

Dusty paths
meander beneath
a drifting sun.

Shiftless ruins
cloak the land
in worn-out
shadow rags.

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Scrawny cattle
herded by an old man
and his sly-eyed dogs:

the old woman,
threatened,
stoops and picks up
a handful of stones.

Moving targets:
dust and shadows of dust.
So much stone and sand
sifted through the hand
and trodden underfoot.

3

In the distance,
a low mound
covered with grass and weeds:

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her family’s ancestral home,
its bountiful community
abandoned to the wilderness,
to the wild thorn
thrusting its spear
through her mortal heart.

Weed-filled walls,
empty houses, ruined fields.

4

Wise old woman
with her hands full of stones:

that first rock
freed from her fist
booms thunder
off the sheep
in a  wolf-skin’s
cowardly frame.

 

Obsidian’s Edge 12

1:15 pm
Water 2

Water seeks its final solution as it slips from cupped hands.
Does it remember when the earth was without form
and darkness was upon the face of the deep?

The waters under heaven were gathered into one place
and the firmament appeared.
Light was divided from darkness
and with the beginning of light came The Word,
and words, and the world …

… the world of water in which I was carried
until the waters broke
and the life sustaining substance drained away
throwing me from dark to light.

The valley’s parched throat longs for water,
born free, yet everywhere imprisoned:

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in chains, in bottles, in tins, in jars, in frozen cubes,
its captive essence staring out with grief filled eyes.

A young boy on a tricycle bears a dozen prison cells,
each with forty captives: forty fresh clean litres of water.
“¡Peragua!” he calls. “¡Super Agua!”

He holds out his hand for money
and invites me to pay a ransom,
to set these prisoners free.

Real water yearns to be released,
to be set free from its captivity,
to trickle out of the corner of your mouth,
to drip from your chin,
to seek sanctuary in the ground.

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Real water slips through your hair
and leaves you squeaky clean.
It is a mirage of palm trees upon burning sand.

It is the hot sun dragging its blood red tongue across the sky
and panting for water like a great big thirsty dog.

Water 1 (Obsidian’s Edge 11) was published in At the Edge of Obsidian (2005). Water 2 (Obsidian’s Edge 12) was re-written earlier this year for Obsidian’s Edge. Both attempts are interesting (for different reasons) and I am wondering whether to keep both versions. Obsidian’s Edge is the continuing rewrite of the earlier book. This re-write is part of the ongoing revision of The Oaxacan Trilogy.

 

Obsidian’s Edge 11

1:00 PM
Water 1

1

Cupped hands cannot embrace you.

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Do you remember when the earth
was without form, and darkness lay
on the face of the deep?

You yearned then to be released,
to flow from the darkness,
to flower in the sunlight.

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2

Images and symbols:
flags flying within my skull.
The shrunken head pond
ringed like a bath tub;
fields scorched and dry.

The land’s parched throat
longing for liquid:
water, born free,
yet everywhere in chains.

This mirage of palm trees,
green, against burning sand.
This hot sun dragging
its blood red tongue
across a powder blue sky.

Panting for water, I lick my lips
like a great big thirsty dog.

3

Words begin with the “Let be!” of light —
and it divides from darkness.

Then comes the world,
the inner waters in which male
and female forms are borne;
when the waters break,
the life sustaining substance drains away,
throwing us from dark to light.

The mid-day sun rides the sky
rolling its dark ball-turret cherry:
blood red wine over and under
this double-barreled thunder cloud.

 

Bistro 5 Flash Fiction

Clematis

The clematis unfolds bruised purple on the porch. Beneath the black and white hammers of ivory keys, old wounds crack open. A flight of feathered notes: this dead heart sacrificed on the lawn. I wash fresh stains from my fingers with the garden hose while the evening stretches out a shadow hand to squeeze my heart like an orange in its skin. Somewhere, the white throat sparrow trills its guillotine of vertical notes. I flap my hands in the air and they float like butterflies, amputated in sunlight’s net. The light fails fast. I hold up shorn stumps of flowers for the night wind to heal and a chickadee chants an afterlife built of spring branches.
Pressed between the pages of my dream: a lingering scent; the death of last year’s delphiniums; the tall tree toppled in the yard; a crab apple flower; a shard of grass as brittle as a bitter tongue at winter’s end. I know for sure that a dog fox hunts for my heart. Vicious as a vixen, the fox digs deep at midnight, unearthing the dried peas I shifted from bowl to bowl to measure time as I lay in bed. I sense a whimper at the window, the scratch of a paw. I watch a dead leaf settle down in a broken corner and it fills me with sudden silence.
Midnight stretches out a long, thin hand and clasps dream-treasures in its tight-clenched fist. The lone dove of my heart flaps in its trap of barren bone and my world is as small as a pea in a shrunken pod. Or is it a dried and blackened walnut in its wrinkled shell of overheating air? Sunset, last night, was a star-shell failing to fire. Swallows flew their evensong higher and higher, striving for that one last breath lapped from the dying lisp of day. Its last blush rode red on the clouds for no more than a second’s lustrous afterglow.
I lower the delphiniums, body after body, into their shallow graves. Night’s shadows weave illusions from earth’s old bones and rock becomes putty, malleable in the moonlight. Midnight readjusts her nocturnal robes and pulls bright stars from a top hat of darkness. Winged insects with human faces appear with the planets and clutter the owl’s path. Night swallows the swallows and creates more stars. The thin moon hones its cutting edge into an ice-cold blade.