David Hadley's Blog, page 90

Over By The Tree

‘Look!’

‘What? Where?’

‘Oh… hang on. No…. It doesn’t matter.’

‘What doesn’t matter?’

‘No, it’s gone now… forget about it.’

‘How can I forget about it now? When I don’t know what it is I’m supposed to be forgetting?’

‘I said it didn’t matter.’

‘It’s too late for that now. Now, it does matter, because until I know what it is, I’m going to be wondering about it. Trying to find out what it is and why it was so important for a moment and then – arbitrarily, as far as I know – it suddenly wasn’t.’

‘Oh, shut up.’

‘What?’

‘Why must you always make such a fuss about everything? There was a… something over there, but it has gone now.’

‘I don’t make a fuss abou….’

‘Yes, you do.’

‘There….’

‘What?’

‘That’s something you do. You start something off like this stuff about this whatever it was you thought you saw, and when I try to find what you are on about, you blame me.’

‘Well, I was just….’

‘What?’

‘Ssshhh.’

‘No, I won’t shush…. Hang on, what are you staring at…?’

‘It’s back…. Look, over there… under that tree.’

‘Which tree? We are in the bloody woods, if you hadn’t realised. One thing about this place is…. Oh, shit…. What is that… that… thing?’

‘I dunno…. But what is that thing that… thing is pointing at us?’

‘It’s an alien… got to be…. Come on, let’s get out of here! That thing in its hand looks like a gu….’

‘Geoff? Geoff! Oh, shi…! Geoff! Oh, god, it’s pointing that thing at me, n….’

 

Territorial Integrity

Of course, we had warned them that any more unauthorised incursions into our airspace would result in action to protect the integrity of our borders.

We did point out to them that the are are UN treaties about the use of chemical warfare devices. However our neighbours insist that the deployment of a barbecue was not listed in the schedule of outlawed delivery devices. Anyway, they added, the smoke from a barbecue hardly constitutes chemical warfare.

The wife did point out though – somewhat forcefully – that if a whole house smelling of barbecue smoke was not some form of health hazard she didn’t know what was. Luckily, I managed to restrain her before she resorted to a territorial incursion of her own. But it took a while to get her to climb down from the fence and to make her let go of the garden shovel she had been waving at next-door’s wife, while yelling about how all our washing would have to be redone to get rid of the smell of burnt burgers from it.

Anyway, during the last period of peace, after the Late-Night Party Limitation Treaty had been signed by us and the neighbours from both sides, next door invited us to a barbecue. So, I’ve tasted his cooking and certainly I do now think the UN ought to add his burgers to the list of banned and outlawed biological and chemical weaponry. Judging by the people we spoke to in the days following that barbecue, who all came down with various degrees of dodgy stomach problems, then there is a very strong argument that his barbecues should be classed as weapons of mass destruction.

The wife reckons we ought to get that Tony Blair round to one of next door’s barbecues. Get him to see if he can come up with a dossier for us. After all, these days he does seem to be at somewhat of a loose end, what with only being a Middle-East Peace envoy. Which doesn’t seem to take up that much of his time. But I doubt we could afford his fees, maintenance of a grin like that probably doesn’t come cheap.

Anyway, all this may become a bit moot. When I was out walking the dog this morning on a reconnaissance mission around the neighbourhood I notice number 28 is up for sale again. So we may be forced into another uneasy alliance with next door anyway, at least until we repel the new invaders.

 

It Was Then

It was not how it began that mattered that much. After all, beginnings are fairly arbitrary. Who really knows where anything begins? You may say it was when you first met that it all started, but that ignores all the other events that led to that meeting.

After all, would you have met her, there, on that street corner if you were not already late and rushing? What if you’d been early, or even – for once – on time? Maybe then, you would have been watching where you were going and you would have seen her. Just another of those beautiful women you pass by on every street on every other day that get a glance and a little daydream of what might be until the next face or body or something catches your eye.

It didn’t begin as though it was going to be a special day either. There were no signs or portents, no omens of good or bad luck. Nor was there any suggestion that the physical forces that control the universe would fall into line to construct this chain of events. Of course, we know too there are no gods or other supernatural agencies working out the fates of humans either, whether playing dice or not. There are no fates or destinies either. We also know that the various forms of divination of the future have only ever been successful at separating the gullible from their money.

So, nothing was fated, or inevitable, and any other simple action by either one of you would have led to you passing each other by that morning.

But you didn’t….

You walked into her and her papers for her morning meeting scattered in the wind. Those papers wrapping themselves around the feet of others passing you both by as you knelt on the pavement, apologising and not daring to look up at her.

But, when you did look up and into her face, it was then everything changed.

 

Frogs?

‘Out there?’

The Captain nodded.

Glerk peeked around the heavy curtain again. ‘Are you sure?’

The Captain nodded, grasping the hilt of his sword meaningfully as he stared at Glerk.

‘On my own?’

The Captain nodded.

‘You don’t say much do you?’ Glerk attempted a smile that faltered and failed part-way across his lips. He swallowed.

The Captain eased his sword in its scabbard.

Glerk took a breath and stood up straighter, aiming for a confidence he did not feel.

The sword came out of the scabbard a thumb’s width.

‘Are you threatening me?’ Glerk touched his pointy hat, resting precariously on his head. It wobbled. ‘I am a wizard, you know.’ He took a step closer to the Captain. ‘I could turn you into a frog.’

‘I’ve had worse.’ The sword came out to a thumb’s length.

‘Worse?’ Glerk stared. ‘Worse than a wizard’s spell?’

The Captain nodded again. He looked down at his sword. ‘It is very sharp,’ he said reflectively. ‘And I’m very fast.’

‘Ah.’ Glerk had a few fast spells, but they were mainly to do with lighting fires, making cups of tea, fiddling tax returns and moving a woman’s clothes a stride to her left. Which, Glerk supposed, showed where a wizard’s priorities usually lay. He also remembered his Training Master’s wise words. Don’t get involved in battles, especially those you can’t win.

‘Go out there, now, wizard.’ The Captain now held his naked sword in his hand. ‘Before they get in here and kill us, go out there and kill them all.’

Glerk looked down at the sword, gulped and stepped through the curtain.

There was silence.

There was more silence.

The air crackled as the Captain saw the sky turn purple for an instant.

There was silence

There was more silence.

A frog croaked.

Then another.

And another.

Then, a hundred or more frogs croaked.

The Captain sheathed his sword and stepped through the curtain into the hallway where, only moments before, over a hundred of the enemy’s troops had cornered them.

Glerk turned to face the Captain, smiling apologetically as scores of very annoyed frogs hopped around him. ‘Er…,’ he said. ‘It was the best I could do.’ A frog jumped up angrily croaking and splatted into his face. He batted it away, spitting out the taste of frog.

The other, very angry, frogs gathered around the two men, pressing closer and closer.

‘Come on!’ The Captain yelled over the increasingly noisy croaking. ‘Let’s go. Or do you want to be known throughout the rest of time as the wizard who was smothered to death by his own plague of frogs?’

They jumped, as well as they could, over the press of frogs. Glerk felt something squelch under his boot as he landed. He shuddered.

Then the two men, glancing at the waves of frogs tumbling after them, turned and ran for the exit.

Here Is Nothing

Here Is Nothing

If this could be your moment

would you make use of it?

Could you see all there is to see?

Could you call out names and describe?

Could you hold it and call it precious?

Would it call out in your dreams

and worm its way inside

all your deepest darkest desires?

Would you soar over these forests

and cold mountains following the twists

of my deepest blue river

before touching the sun

with your wingtip and falling down

and down to land soft on your bed

where I will always wait there for you.

Arms open wide and ready

to hold you tight inside

the safety of this world of yours

where nothing else is there. Except

a chance to go beyond this and give

a small token of my thanks

for those times together

we spent dancing through the dark hours

and flying through our open skies

to a world beyond this small bedroom.

Perhaps Once Upon A Time

Once, even – perhaps – once upon a time, there was a captive princess living in the tower that once stood here. You can see the ruins about us. The heaps of rubble and tumbled dressed stone that once stood so high above this hillside.

Back then, in the times of our father’s grandfathers these, were different lands living in different times.

These days, of course, we have no princesses, no kings even. These days we have the committees of grey men who go about the business of government for the benefit of us all… or so they claim.

Life, though, doesn’t ever seem to change for the better. We here, out far from where those grey committees make their deliberations, are still hungry and cold in the winter. Then, in the spring and summer, our best young men are taken into the armies and rarely, if ever, seen again. That is, except for those that come struggling home no longer whole and, sometimes, barely even human.

The committees of grey men tell us we are better off these days. Of course, I can see by that look in your eyes we had all best believe what they say is so. Unless we want to go to the same place our kings, princesses and lords disappeared to in that time when the grey men rose to power over us. All proclaiming it was the end of the era of unaccountable distant men ruling over us for their own ends and ignoring us ordinary folk.

Yes, sir, this tower belonged to a time of long ago. A time of tales and legends that are best forgotten about now, especially if we know what is good for us.

 

The Golden Days Of Autumn

Our summer is waning now as the year grows older and what was once green is now fading. The autumn has its golds, reds, and oranges, giving it a sense of something still possible, even though the days themselves fade into grey. The night spreads, growing stronger, longer. Our mornings are lost in mists and the narrowing of all our horizons. We can no longer see as far as we once did and our days are no longer long enough.

Each night brings with it the harsh promise of the cold winter. Each day brings a wind, which blows down from the cold mountains around us.

Once, we had a spring where our days could only grow longer, brighter and warmer. Then we had a summer we thought would last forever. Now, though, looking back it seems our summer was never that long and all it promised now fades into memory and dies.

All we have left to us, before our final winter, are these few brief golden days of our autumn. We cling to them knowing we will not see another one. Our winter is coming and we have almost spent all our year. Our future fades into less than a season of cold and dark. All we have is what we look back upon and regret for what we will lose when that final winter storm closes all our days down forever.

 

Gallery

Gallery

These are all the lives we now remember,

this is all of it, and spread around us

down the gallery of days long over,

pausing to recall those times that mattered.

These are galleries of years together.

Do you still remember this? Our lives here

all arranged in place as we recall them,

making sense from this random happenstance.

For Personal Use Only

Obviously it doesn’t always work as it should, but then what can you expect at that sort of price? Especially when the so-called optional attachments appear to be essential to the operation of the unit. The thing itself without those ‘optional attachments’ then turns into little more than a conversation piece. Although, considering that the item itself is widely-known as a sexual aid, some of those conversations, especially with elderly relatives and members of the clergy can be somewhat… unusual. Especially so when those aforesaid members of the clergy demonstrated a familiarity with the item that surpasses even the intricate knowledge demonstrated by those elderly relatives.

Well, I suppose when you think of it, having a job where you only have to annoy the god of your choice one day a week does leave you with time on your hands… as it were. The same, of course, applies to retirement. A time of life where there are only so many games of bingo in the old folks home that one can tolerate. Also, when the vicar comes around to the home for his weekly pastoral visit and cup of tea, both of you will be too worn out and satiated for anything but the most desultory of conversations.

Anyway, there she was thinking that she had got the latest in such gadgets, but she was somewhat at a loss as to what to use it for. Although, one of the optional attachments, the egg whisk, was given away free with the device in the special offer she purchased. However, the instructions do explicitly warn against using the egg whisk attachment in intimate situations. The instructions insist that the aforesaid attachment be used only in the domestic kitchen, mainly for whisking eggs and other such foodstuffs. Otherwise there is a real danger of voiding the warranty and the manufacturers take no responsibility for injury through misuse of the device and whisk attachment if used for anything other than food preparation.

Of course, although the offer did not make it explicitly clear when she bought it, she assumed that the egg whisk attachment nomenclature was some sort of euphemism. Probably for an attachment offering a more intimate personal service. So, as you can probably imagine, she was more than a little disconcerted to discover the egg whisk attachment was – in fact – meant to whisk eggs and not offer any form of intimate sensual experience and satiation. That is – of course – unless one is sexually satisfied by the sensual frenzy of whisking eggs – but enough about me.

Anyway, there was on the website this week another special offer where five of the attachments are available for the price of three. So she has sent off for them. Although, personally, I see little use for the integrated DVD player. However, she did – at the same time – order complete box sets of the films of George Clooney, Bradd Pitt and Daniel Craig. So I think she may have thought of a use for it.

Anyway, we will see.

Of All The Brothels In All The World

Of all the brothels in all the world, she had to be working in this one. I’d hoped I’d forget Asila. I’d certainly tried to drink enough to forget her and I’d travelled so far to get away from her. I’d become a legionnaire in the Kantish Empire’s foreign legion and marched of to wars so far from anything I’d ever known. I’d fought strange harsh desert tribes deep in the heart of the hottest country on the planet, I’d seen things that made me ever only want to forget, but still I could not forget Asila.

Now, here we both were, thousands of leagues from the village where we’d grown up, and a lifetime away from the hayloft in the barn that still filled my memories and my dreams.

Eventually, after I’d hung around the bar for long enough, turning down all the other girls, Asila came down the stairs. A drunk stumbled down after her.

Asila shook her long black hair free and ran a hand through the thick curls as she searched the brothel’s bar for the next likely mark.

Our eyes met and I saw the recognition. She turned, looked around then pulled herself up straighter and forced a smile on to her face.

‘Jenk,’ she said. ‘Truly it is a small world.’

‘Asila.’ I kissed the hand she held out to me in the tradition of this country.

‘You do remember me.’ She smiled, a genuine one this time.

‘I’ve never forgotten you.’

She looked into my eyes. Then nodded, taking a small step backwards.

‘Then why did you leave me, you bastard!’

Pain exploded in my balls as her knee drove home. I grabbed the bar to stop myself collapsing to the floor. My eyes squeezed tight as I bit my lip to stop the sound of the pain escaping.

Of course, when I – at last – opened my eyes, Asila was gone… again.