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Look, sometimes we eat mice
Jun. 29th, 2024 08:13 pmMaybe maybe maybe? Signing up for ljidol because I can though you're mostly getting horrible poetry.
Kummerspeck
Mar. 2nd, 2022 09:57 pmGelfred often watched his neighbor through the wide window in his own kitchen. The boy was called Alfie, a name that sounded cute and harmless.
But Gelfred knew the boy’s secret.
Each night, the boy sat at his desk and opened a small wooden box. Inside the box was a large round object that Alfie would cut into.
The next day a country would disappear. Gelfred would ask his neighbors if they remembered Poland or Pluto.
No such place, they’d say.
Which meant that the boy was eating the world. One bite at a time. Planets too. Oceans and land and all the people in between.
Well Alfie had to be stopped didn’t he? Gelfred planned to act before Denmark or Saturn went as well. He quite liked the rings around the latter.
In the morning he put on his tweed suit and clipped on the red bowtie Millicent always said made him look official.
He hadn’t been next door physically in years. Not since Alfie’s parents and grandparents all died on an ill-advised trip to Disney World Scotland when they ate haggis on a stick that had spoiled.
Alfie had come back hollow eyed, his ribs protruding in a disturbing manner. Most in town had avoided the boy after, for fear whatever was haunting the boy would manifest in them.
Gelfred had thought the boy was getting better. For sure Alfie had gained pounds and pounds, filling out until he resembled a cooked dumpling.
Gelfred could still see the boy’s ribs, above the potbelly and waddling knees.
Alfie’s door looked different. Gelfred remembered a cheerful lion door knocker with a ring through its mouth. The lion now had the patina of old metal and snarled, making him hesitate to use it.
“You won’t give me a disease?” he asked the metal lion anxiously, wringing his hands.
He knocked once and waited. If no one came to answer he could at least say he tried saving the world.
Five minutes later the door opened a crack.
“No solicitors,” the voice croaked.
“Is that you Alfie?” Gelfred asked. “I came to speak with you but I’m not selling anything. Unless you’re interested in some very fine china I found at a yard sale last week. It’s got little blue octopuses painted on it. Quality work.”
The door opened and there Alfie stood. His shirt was stained in bruised purple and green stains that matched the patches of food on his chin.
Gelfred squinted. “You’ve been eating Finland haven’t you? I can see fjord drippings on your neck.”
Alfie shrugged and turned around, leaving Gelfred to pick his way through newspapers and empty cans on the floor.
Tetanus shot tomorrow, Gelfred vowed.
Alfie had carved himself a single spot on the couch in the living room that was free of trash. He curled up on his spot, eyeing Gelfred suspiciously.
“Tired of spying on me?” Alfie asked.
Gelfred sniffed. “I know what you’re doing. My Milly has been gone over a decade and I still have urges to swallow large parts of Canada but I resist because Milly always liked those Mounties. Also eating large parts of anything is wrong. Gives you indigestion.”
Alfie stared at his hands. “What am I gonna do then? When sadness empties my belly so that I hunger and hunger with an appetite so big I might as well be inside out?”
Gelfred peered down at his feet. “Well first we clean up your space a bit. Give you some walking around room.”
“And then?” Alfie asked.
“Then,” Gelfred said, “I suppose we can decide from there.”
Just to be safe, Gelfred took the wooden box with him when he left. He liked to take it out sometimes, wondering what Mozambique tasted like.
But Gelfred knew the boy’s secret.
Each night, the boy sat at his desk and opened a small wooden box. Inside the box was a large round object that Alfie would cut into.
The next day a country would disappear. Gelfred would ask his neighbors if they remembered Poland or Pluto.
No such place, they’d say.
Which meant that the boy was eating the world. One bite at a time. Planets too. Oceans and land and all the people in between.
Well Alfie had to be stopped didn’t he? Gelfred planned to act before Denmark or Saturn went as well. He quite liked the rings around the latter.
In the morning he put on his tweed suit and clipped on the red bowtie Millicent always said made him look official.
He hadn’t been next door physically in years. Not since Alfie’s parents and grandparents all died on an ill-advised trip to Disney World Scotland when they ate haggis on a stick that had spoiled.
Alfie had come back hollow eyed, his ribs protruding in a disturbing manner. Most in town had avoided the boy after, for fear whatever was haunting the boy would manifest in them.
Gelfred had thought the boy was getting better. For sure Alfie had gained pounds and pounds, filling out until he resembled a cooked dumpling.
Gelfred could still see the boy’s ribs, above the potbelly and waddling knees.
Alfie’s door looked different. Gelfred remembered a cheerful lion door knocker with a ring through its mouth. The lion now had the patina of old metal and snarled, making him hesitate to use it.
“You won’t give me a disease?” he asked the metal lion anxiously, wringing his hands.
He knocked once and waited. If no one came to answer he could at least say he tried saving the world.
Five minutes later the door opened a crack.
“No solicitors,” the voice croaked.
“Is that you Alfie?” Gelfred asked. “I came to speak with you but I’m not selling anything. Unless you’re interested in some very fine china I found at a yard sale last week. It’s got little blue octopuses painted on it. Quality work.”
The door opened and there Alfie stood. His shirt was stained in bruised purple and green stains that matched the patches of food on his chin.
Gelfred squinted. “You’ve been eating Finland haven’t you? I can see fjord drippings on your neck.”
Alfie shrugged and turned around, leaving Gelfred to pick his way through newspapers and empty cans on the floor.
Tetanus shot tomorrow, Gelfred vowed.
Alfie had carved himself a single spot on the couch in the living room that was free of trash. He curled up on his spot, eyeing Gelfred suspiciously.
“Tired of spying on me?” Alfie asked.
Gelfred sniffed. “I know what you’re doing. My Milly has been gone over a decade and I still have urges to swallow large parts of Canada but I resist because Milly always liked those Mounties. Also eating large parts of anything is wrong. Gives you indigestion.”
Alfie stared at his hands. “What am I gonna do then? When sadness empties my belly so that I hunger and hunger with an appetite so big I might as well be inside out?”
Gelfred peered down at his feet. “Well first we clean up your space a bit. Give you some walking around room.”
“And then?” Alfie asked.
“Then,” Gelfred said, “I suppose we can decide from there.”
Just to be safe, Gelfred took the wooden box with him when he left. He liked to take it out sometimes, wondering what Mozambique tasted like.
ljidol; Solvitur ambulando
Nov. 14th, 2019 02:36 pmrosa, the robot
she has seen machines
churning waves of metal
burning skies until skies were black
she fixes
cars-she unmuffles mufflers
attaches
shiny
wheels
over real wheels
make it louder-replace
ears-add muffler
factories thicken
urban gravy-rosa
applies spikes
bare knuckle tires
unmuffles mufflers
applies garbage bag
to headlight
the future is bright
chime in her ear-she
can't hear never fixed
that part
she watches cars become men
humping each other for oil slick
nothing sick-these are all american
manufactured biomechanical reality
she has seen machines
churning waves of metal
burning skies until skies were black
she fixes
cars-she unmuffles mufflers
attaches
shiny
wheels
over real wheels
make it louder-replace
ears-add muffler
factories thicken
urban gravy-rosa
applies spikes
bare knuckle tires
unmuffles mufflers
applies garbage bag
to headlight
the future is bright
chime in her ear-she
can't hear never fixed
that part
she watches cars become men
humping each other for oil slick
nothing sick-these are all american
manufactured biomechanical reality
ljidol; Living rent-free in your head
Oct. 4th, 2019 11:39 pmxenomelia: a love story
First Alex smelled bonesand, hot flecks of hard white bone misted in the air around him. His body stilled. He'd paid for this and he wanted to get it right.
The Doc's face was hidden behind a white surgical mask. His eyes were cold, concentrating on veins and suction as his surgical saw bit into Alex's leg.
No anesthesia. Technically, this was body modification and the funny rules governing what could and could not be pumped into his body said the the shots were only for really important things like wisdom teeth or appendectomies.
Still, he was loaded. Benzos. A rainbow of anti-anxiety meds. Pain pills of dubious origin and age.
Oxana gave them to him. Wished him luck.
His mouth quirked. He thought she was beautiful and foreign and exotic. She'd lost a leg somewhere in Russia.
He'd envied her. Not for the tits (though they were nice). Or the booming prostitution business she operated out of that one-room flat.
They pay extra for crips, she'd told him, brushing the hair away from his forehead.
The saw made a particularly loud whine and Alex winced, the sharp pain breaking through the fog.
"My friend, I tell you, do not move. You want Pietro to cut off your manhood instead of leg?" Doc said, raising an eyebrow.
Alex blinked. "Sorry. Maybe tighten the chains?"
Doc sighed and tightened the chains holding Alex down. "I know men who would pay good money for this but no you want dismemberment. Americans, you are strange. Pumpkins disguised as gold. Why do you all hate what you are? Women are men. Men are women. I tell you I had one man implant a unicorn horn on his forehead? Some rich fellow keeps him as a pet now."
Alex made what he hoped was an agreeable sound. He couldn't explain. Not to the shrinks or his mother. Not to his lovers or friends. When he looked in the mirror, he only saw what did not belong. His leg, the insult attached to his body. He saw it as deformed, blackened. A demon sucking the life from his body.
Under Doc's saw, healthy blood flowed. Alex knew he saw things no one else saw. He knew they all thought he was insane.
Not Oxana. She'd understood. She'd given him Doc's number.
You should be as you want, she'd said, smoking that strange long cigarette. Your body is the only thing in this world that is truly yours. Keep it how you like it. Rather like decorating a house. Sometimes you need to move things around.
Smoke had curled out of her nostrils and he'd known then she was a dragon. Hoarding secrets in her den. In her eyes.
Fire burned his leg. He screamed at the smell of his own flesh as Doc cauterized the wound.
Doc threw something on the table next to Alex. The black flesh on the slab hissed and spat ichor that sizzled on the stone floor.
Alex whimpered, trying to crawl away from the awful thing that had come from him.
"Do not worry, my friend. This I do for free," Doc said. He held a torch in one hand and a mask in the other.
The blaze of heat was a lion. Alex closed his eyes and hoped they'd open again.
First Alex smelled bonesand, hot flecks of hard white bone misted in the air around him. His body stilled. He'd paid for this and he wanted to get it right.
The Doc's face was hidden behind a white surgical mask. His eyes were cold, concentrating on veins and suction as his surgical saw bit into Alex's leg.
No anesthesia. Technically, this was body modification and the funny rules governing what could and could not be pumped into his body said the the shots were only for really important things like wisdom teeth or appendectomies.
Still, he was loaded. Benzos. A rainbow of anti-anxiety meds. Pain pills of dubious origin and age.
Oxana gave them to him. Wished him luck.
His mouth quirked. He thought she was beautiful and foreign and exotic. She'd lost a leg somewhere in Russia.
He'd envied her. Not for the tits (though they were nice). Or the booming prostitution business she operated out of that one-room flat.
They pay extra for crips, she'd told him, brushing the hair away from his forehead.
The saw made a particularly loud whine and Alex winced, the sharp pain breaking through the fog.
"My friend, I tell you, do not move. You want Pietro to cut off your manhood instead of leg?" Doc said, raising an eyebrow.
Alex blinked. "Sorry. Maybe tighten the chains?"
Doc sighed and tightened the chains holding Alex down. "I know men who would pay good money for this but no you want dismemberment. Americans, you are strange. Pumpkins disguised as gold. Why do you all hate what you are? Women are men. Men are women. I tell you I had one man implant a unicorn horn on his forehead? Some rich fellow keeps him as a pet now."
Alex made what he hoped was an agreeable sound. He couldn't explain. Not to the shrinks or his mother. Not to his lovers or friends. When he looked in the mirror, he only saw what did not belong. His leg, the insult attached to his body. He saw it as deformed, blackened. A demon sucking the life from his body.
Under Doc's saw, healthy blood flowed. Alex knew he saw things no one else saw. He knew they all thought he was insane.
Not Oxana. She'd understood. She'd given him Doc's number.
You should be as you want, she'd said, smoking that strange long cigarette. Your body is the only thing in this world that is truly yours. Keep it how you like it. Rather like decorating a house. Sometimes you need to move things around.
Smoke had curled out of her nostrils and he'd known then she was a dragon. Hoarding secrets in her den. In her eyes.
Fire burned his leg. He screamed at the smell of his own flesh as Doc cauterized the wound.
Doc threw something on the table next to Alex. The black flesh on the slab hissed and spat ichor that sizzled on the stone floor.
Alex whimpered, trying to crawl away from the awful thing that had come from him.
"Do not worry, my friend. This I do for free," Doc said. He held a torch in one hand and a mask in the other.
The blaze of heat was a lion. Alex closed his eyes and hoped they'd open again.
"I am not what I am."
Possibly my favorite quote along with "My mother is a fish." One of which I have tattooed on my body
I write fiction and poetry. Right now I'm doing a series on asoiaf which is weird because I barely watched the show and got to the part where the tween married some horse dude before I gave up and watched Forensic Files instead.
Mother of Dragons
these children of mine
so ugly-missing plate and fire
always showing soft underbellies
I breathe warmth into hearths
bleed gold for their pockets
still my children flee
some chase me-sharp metal
sticks-barking dogs
bang my door down
curse my name
children-so foolish
always
I punish them
tail whip-puffs of smoke
all say I love you
I love you
I love you
I break spines
crack teeth-split
lips-take limbs
souvenirs of children too rough
to be civilized
all to say
I love you
I love you
I love you
Song that is my jam right now;
Dear E,
Hopefully this isn't strange.
Okay, I know it is.
I found your p.o. box on your website and wanted to write you.
I read your poems after we met.
I didn't remember you reading them at that coffee shop. I kept staring at your skin and wondering how soft it was.
I was the girl in the front row, wearing green and gray. I had a sunflower behind my ear. One of those plastic ones you'd buy at tourist shops.
You were beautiful up there.
Sometimes I want to do the same. Jump on the stage and scream for hours.
Thanks for reading,
A
Dear A,
I remember you. Freckles right?
I thought about mapping them. Maybe finding constellations on your cheek.
That's a bit weird though. It's easier to write than to speak.
I shake every time I go onstage. I scream inside, at the terrible monster who tells me I am failing. That I am a mistake.
Write me again.
E
Dear E,
So secret pen pals? Who only hold conversations on crisp white paper?
Maybe it's because you're Colombian.
Yes I followed your Facebook and Twitter and anything else with your name on it.
Your bio says your mother was from there and that she died but not how. It says you never graduated from college which makes me think you're a rebel.
I tried to get rid of my freckles when I was younger. I rubbed lemon juice on my skin until my eyes stung.
A
Dear A,
Send me a picture of your thighs. I am strange today.
E
-
Dear A,
I appreciated the size of the picture. No Polaroid for you. No, in comes a rolled poster to cover my wall.
You are strange too.
I have drawn a house from the freckles on your inner thighs. And I wonder what sort of house you live in. Perhaps a basement apartment or a ramshackle cabin.
I've lost my home. It gets harder to build a new one each time.
E
Dear E,
You must be trying to guess my age with that drivel about my pale thighs. I could be a ghost.
I'm twenty-five. Yes, you are older but I am no spring either.
I live in a tiny house on the back of my friend's property. She had it built out of a desire to rid herself of possessions. Then she said it got weird.
It's quiet here. The walls are so thin that I shake when it's windy.
A
Dear A,
You shouldn't fall in love with ghosts. We like haunting too much.
I can see the ocean here. Smell the salt and deeper things. I have sent you a pink shell that I found near the shore. It was dark and gray, the sun only beginning to come out.
I feel it pulling me. I am magnetized.
My children say I am turning into a gargoyle.
Ahh but I would be a very attractive stone. Would you lay offerings at me feet?
E
Dear E,
I know you're not going to read this. I know you can't.
I have the shell and the letters you've written me.
I am moving my tiny house nearer to where you died. I want to scream at the sea that swallowed you. Though they said you threw yourself at it.
But that's how it always goes. Never the ocean's fault. Only the woman and the swimsuit.
Love,
A
Hopefully this isn't strange.
Okay, I know it is.
I found your p.o. box on your website and wanted to write you.
I read your poems after we met.
I didn't remember you reading them at that coffee shop. I kept staring at your skin and wondering how soft it was.
I was the girl in the front row, wearing green and gray. I had a sunflower behind my ear. One of those plastic ones you'd buy at tourist shops.
You were beautiful up there.
Sometimes I want to do the same. Jump on the stage and scream for hours.
Thanks for reading,
A
Dear A,
I remember you. Freckles right?
I thought about mapping them. Maybe finding constellations on your cheek.
That's a bit weird though. It's easier to write than to speak.
I shake every time I go onstage. I scream inside, at the terrible monster who tells me I am failing. That I am a mistake.
Write me again.
E
Dear E,
So secret pen pals? Who only hold conversations on crisp white paper?
Maybe it's because you're Colombian.
Yes I followed your Facebook and Twitter and anything else with your name on it.
Your bio says your mother was from there and that she died but not how. It says you never graduated from college which makes me think you're a rebel.
I tried to get rid of my freckles when I was younger. I rubbed lemon juice on my skin until my eyes stung.
A
Dear A,
Send me a picture of your thighs. I am strange today.
E
-
Dear A,
I appreciated the size of the picture. No Polaroid for you. No, in comes a rolled poster to cover my wall.
You are strange too.
I have drawn a house from the freckles on your inner thighs. And I wonder what sort of house you live in. Perhaps a basement apartment or a ramshackle cabin.
I've lost my home. It gets harder to build a new one each time.
E
Dear E,
You must be trying to guess my age with that drivel about my pale thighs. I could be a ghost.
I'm twenty-five. Yes, you are older but I am no spring either.
I live in a tiny house on the back of my friend's property. She had it built out of a desire to rid herself of possessions. Then she said it got weird.
It's quiet here. The walls are so thin that I shake when it's windy.
A
Dear A,
You shouldn't fall in love with ghosts. We like haunting too much.
I can see the ocean here. Smell the salt and deeper things. I have sent you a pink shell that I found near the shore. It was dark and gray, the sun only beginning to come out.
I feel it pulling me. I am magnetized.
My children say I am turning into a gargoyle.
Ahh but I would be a very attractive stone. Would you lay offerings at me feet?
E
Dear E,
I know you're not going to read this. I know you can't.
I have the shell and the letters you've written me.
I am moving my tiny house nearer to where you died. I want to scream at the sea that swallowed you. Though they said you threw yourself at it.
But that's how it always goes. Never the ocean's fault. Only the woman and the swimsuit.
Love,
A
The monsters in my closet are singing again. I think they've formed a choir, all howling at once in different keys. It sounds like 'Poker Face', if Lady Gaga had two pairs of lungs and wet paper in her mouth.
They won't listen to me. They never do.
I sigh and put on my pink slippers. They sparkle as I make my way down to the basement.
Our basement is awesome. The stairs are old and wooden and make great creepy sounds when I step on them. Especially the one second to last.
I linger on that one, stepping high on the tops of my toes to make that sound last longer.
I think of zombies and mental institutions. Video games where the controller shakes along with you.
A bubbling gurgle sounds. It's almost like a lawnmower struggling to start.
"Okay I'll stop," I mutter.
My sister never lets me have any fun. Such a buzzkill.
Just because she's older she thinks it's okay to boss me around.
Her name is Denise which is an awesome name. She hates it. Says it sounds like a character on that old Dallas show who wears wide shoulder-pads and thinks her husband is gay but really he's asexual and can't come out because of the sociopolitical climate at the time.
Mine is Nuss. Totally the worst name right? I was named after great great great aunt Eunice who looks like a horse in the old black and white pictures of her.
I hop off the step to the basement. Green lights hang from low chains, swinging in the not breeze. One or two flicker, casting shadows on the cement walls.
Denise has the biggest cage because sometimes she grows wings. The other cages are dirtier and smell of mold.
Withered looking creatures barely look at me as I cross over to where Denise is sitting.
She has a game controller in her tentacles and is staring intently at the old bubble television in front of her.
"Which Mario level are you failing at now?" I ask. "Not the water level again."
What do you want pest?
I sit cross legged in front of her cage, watching her tentacle arms move delicately as Mario jumps and eats a mushroom.
"Look at him doing drugs. He's a bad influence."
Denise snort-burbles.
What do you know about drugs? You're twelve. Got into the candy cigarettes? Need an intervention?
"You are annoying."
Says the little sister.
"What's that supposed to mean?!"
Everyone knows little sisters are always brats.
"That is pure supposition without factual evidence."
Denise's five eyes roll at once.
Stop watching C-Span. You sound like a tool.
"I am edumacated."
She laughs and the other creatures howl or cry in their cages.
I lean into the bars. She strokes the top of my head with a few of her smaller tentacles.
Monsters again?
"Yeah. Daddy should invent a repellent. I'm getting tired of whacking them with my tennis racket when they get drunk and serenade each other. Plus they leave everything so sticky."
I'll tell them to knock it off.
I hum as she braids my hair. My eyes are heavy as I fall asleep to the sound of Mario and Luigi rescuing the princess over and over again.
They won't listen to me. They never do.
I sigh and put on my pink slippers. They sparkle as I make my way down to the basement.
Our basement is awesome. The stairs are old and wooden and make great creepy sounds when I step on them. Especially the one second to last.
I linger on that one, stepping high on the tops of my toes to make that sound last longer.
I think of zombies and mental institutions. Video games where the controller shakes along with you.
A bubbling gurgle sounds. It's almost like a lawnmower struggling to start.
"Okay I'll stop," I mutter.
My sister never lets me have any fun. Such a buzzkill.
Just because she's older she thinks it's okay to boss me around.
Her name is Denise which is an awesome name. She hates it. Says it sounds like a character on that old Dallas show who wears wide shoulder-pads and thinks her husband is gay but really he's asexual and can't come out because of the sociopolitical climate at the time.
Mine is Nuss. Totally the worst name right? I was named after great great great aunt Eunice who looks like a horse in the old black and white pictures of her.
I hop off the step to the basement. Green lights hang from low chains, swinging in the not breeze. One or two flicker, casting shadows on the cement walls.
Denise has the biggest cage because sometimes she grows wings. The other cages are dirtier and smell of mold.
Withered looking creatures barely look at me as I cross over to where Denise is sitting.
She has a game controller in her tentacles and is staring intently at the old bubble television in front of her.
"Which Mario level are you failing at now?" I ask. "Not the water level again."
What do you want pest?
I sit cross legged in front of her cage, watching her tentacle arms move delicately as Mario jumps and eats a mushroom.
"Look at him doing drugs. He's a bad influence."
Denise snort-burbles.
What do you know about drugs? You're twelve. Got into the candy cigarettes? Need an intervention?
"You are annoying."
Says the little sister.
"What's that supposed to mean?!"
Everyone knows little sisters are always brats.
"That is pure supposition without factual evidence."
Denise's five eyes roll at once.
Stop watching C-Span. You sound like a tool.
"I am edumacated."
She laughs and the other creatures howl or cry in their cages.
I lean into the bars. She strokes the top of my head with a few of her smaller tentacles.
Monsters again?
"Yeah. Daddy should invent a repellent. I'm getting tired of whacking them with my tennis racket when they get drunk and serenade each other. Plus they leave everything so sticky."
I'll tell them to knock it off.
I hum as she braids my hair. My eyes are heavy as I fall asleep to the sound of Mario and Luigi rescuing the princess over and over again.
ljidol; inkling
Feb. 15th, 2019 07:09 pmI give blood once a week. It's like an addiction, seeing the red and blue. Almost like we all have a coloring book inside our skins.
My arms are scarred from it. Too many pinpricks, too little time between donation.
I cover up the scars with friendly bandaids. Hello Kitty says there is nothing wrong here move along.
But sometimes I see a red lady. In empty windows. Mirrors. Reflecting from Roderick's eyes.
We're going to be married. At least I think so. He hasn't asked yet.
Roderick meets me at his apartment. We haven't moved in but I practically live here. I have left signs like discarded lipsticks and neatly folded laundry. This is to
show other predators that I have prior claim.
At first, I'm too busy watching his brown hair as he tears through it. I can't hear what he's saying.
I read his lips.
It's over.
I mouth them back.
Really? My hands move, scratching at his face. His blood sprays and he pushes me back, into the mirror behind me.
Glass shatters and my arms hurt. I am an emergency of blood.
Pieces of the red woman are in the mirror, all shouting at once.
I reach for her, my blood sister. Jam pieces of her into Roderick until he stops screaming.
I can teach you, she says.
I want to learn.
My arms are scarred from it. Too many pinpricks, too little time between donation.
I cover up the scars with friendly bandaids. Hello Kitty says there is nothing wrong here move along.
But sometimes I see a red lady. In empty windows. Mirrors. Reflecting from Roderick's eyes.
We're going to be married. At least I think so. He hasn't asked yet.
Roderick meets me at his apartment. We haven't moved in but I practically live here. I have left signs like discarded lipsticks and neatly folded laundry. This is to
show other predators that I have prior claim.
At first, I'm too busy watching his brown hair as he tears through it. I can't hear what he's saying.
I read his lips.
It's over.
I mouth them back.
Really? My hands move, scratching at his face. His blood sprays and he pushes me back, into the mirror behind me.
Glass shatters and my arms hurt. I am an emergency of blood.
Pieces of the red woman are in the mirror, all shouting at once.
I reach for her, my blood sister. Jam pieces of her into Roderick until he stops screaming.
I can teach you, she says.
I want to learn.
Therealljidol: The Sorrow Machine
Jan. 5th, 2019 06:21 pmThere was a man who felt perpetual happiness every moment of his life.
It was torment. He prayed for death.
Now if this were any other sort of man this tale would end here.
This man was a king.
He sent for his land's best Tinkers. His most powerful Witches. His most learned Scholars.
"Build me something," he said. "Something made of sorrow so that I might feel this."
The Witches shook their heads and told him that they could not make such a machine. To do so would cause harm in the world untold.
The Tinkers shook their heads and told him they would not make such a machine. To do so would violate their sacred oaths.
The King then asked the Scholars to research the subject of the Tinkers. To find every scrap of information about their history.
Then he took this research and found that the Tinker's held something even more precious than the oaths they swore.
Tinkers were gangly and thin. They looked sick even when at the peak of health. Even their children looked like stones or rocks.
Their children were fewer and fewer. Soon, there would be no more.
A long-ago curse had been placed upon them and their children was the source of their problem.
Curses were caused by Witches, he thought.
He gave the problem to them. Give him something to remove the curse with and they would receive a great reward.
The Witches thought and thought. They brewed and brewed. After many failed attempts, they had a potion they knew would work.
The King came to them for his solution, which they handed over gladly, eager for the reward he'd offered them.
"Oh that," he said. "I give you these final moments."
They looked at each other in puzzlement as the King's guard approached from behind, sliting each of their throats.
The King was already gone. He did not hear the screams and the desperate echoing quiet after.
He offered this cure to the Tinkers.
At first, they scoffed, denying any such curse existed.
He waited.
They offered to make themselves slaves, to work for him until his kingdom died.
He waited.
The Tinker's began to build. Swiftly, as if they stopped to think they would never complete it.
In two days time, they presented to him the sorrow machine.
It was brutal in its beauty, the King thought. Metal met metal in a coil of fire.
In front, the flames spewed an odd mix of blue and pink.
"Give us our children," the Tinker's demanded.
The King gave over the potion before starting the machine.
It made an eerie noise, a far-off howling. Something gathered there.
All at once he felt it. Sadness was not a rock but a trail of pebbles, all filling him up inside one by one. He drowned in it slowly and felt the world die with him.
With no sorrow, the world had become like him, golden with happiness. Glittering cruel happiness. Mothers turned on sons. Towns went dark, as though trying to lure unwary travelers in.
The King, seeing this, knew he could not let his kingdom end. He felt every sorrow his people were immune to. He cried memories, feeding them to the machine.
The machine was not a normal machine, Thought it had been built for sorrow, it felt what the King had been and still was. It felt happiness and content. It felt warm night's in bed and the soft lips of its lover.
It offered the King a bargain. The King would stay with it somewhere far away. The machine would only take some of the kingdom's sorrow, sharing it with the King.
So the King built a tower of metal and stone, far away from his own kingdom. His chosen would rule in his stead, as his kingdom healed from the wound he'd given it.
"How long must we do this?" he asked the machine.
He knew the answer.
"Forever," the machine said.
It was torment. He prayed for death.
Now if this were any other sort of man this tale would end here.
This man was a king.
He sent for his land's best Tinkers. His most powerful Witches. His most learned Scholars.
"Build me something," he said. "Something made of sorrow so that I might feel this."
The Witches shook their heads and told him that they could not make such a machine. To do so would cause harm in the world untold.
The Tinkers shook their heads and told him they would not make such a machine. To do so would violate their sacred oaths.
The King then asked the Scholars to research the subject of the Tinkers. To find every scrap of information about their history.
Then he took this research and found that the Tinker's held something even more precious than the oaths they swore.
Tinkers were gangly and thin. They looked sick even when at the peak of health. Even their children looked like stones or rocks.
Their children were fewer and fewer. Soon, there would be no more.
A long-ago curse had been placed upon them and their children was the source of their problem.
Curses were caused by Witches, he thought.
He gave the problem to them. Give him something to remove the curse with and they would receive a great reward.
The Witches thought and thought. They brewed and brewed. After many failed attempts, they had a potion they knew would work.
The King came to them for his solution, which they handed over gladly, eager for the reward he'd offered them.
"Oh that," he said. "I give you these final moments."
They looked at each other in puzzlement as the King's guard approached from behind, sliting each of their throats.
The King was already gone. He did not hear the screams and the desperate echoing quiet after.
He offered this cure to the Tinkers.
At first, they scoffed, denying any such curse existed.
He waited.
They offered to make themselves slaves, to work for him until his kingdom died.
He waited.
The Tinker's began to build. Swiftly, as if they stopped to think they would never complete it.
In two days time, they presented to him the sorrow machine.
It was brutal in its beauty, the King thought. Metal met metal in a coil of fire.
In front, the flames spewed an odd mix of blue and pink.
"Give us our children," the Tinker's demanded.
The King gave over the potion before starting the machine.
It made an eerie noise, a far-off howling. Something gathered there.
All at once he felt it. Sadness was not a rock but a trail of pebbles, all filling him up inside one by one. He drowned in it slowly and felt the world die with him.
With no sorrow, the world had become like him, golden with happiness. Glittering cruel happiness. Mothers turned on sons. Towns went dark, as though trying to lure unwary travelers in.
The King, seeing this, knew he could not let his kingdom end. He felt every sorrow his people were immune to. He cried memories, feeding them to the machine.
The machine was not a normal machine, Thought it had been built for sorrow, it felt what the King had been and still was. It felt happiness and content. It felt warm night's in bed and the soft lips of its lover.
It offered the King a bargain. The King would stay with it somewhere far away. The machine would only take some of the kingdom's sorrow, sharing it with the King.
So the King built a tower of metal and stone, far away from his own kingdom. His chosen would rule in his stead, as his kingdom healed from the wound he'd given it.
"How long must we do this?" he asked the machine.
He knew the answer.
"Forever," the machine said.
