Frere jacques

Art thou asleep father john? Awkward for her, the dear li'l sixteen year old. All alone in rich prissy france and all she knew of that language was that song she sung the children to sleep each night, frere jacques ferre jacques dormez-vous dormez-vous...and even that she hummed the last bit, for it was rarely she recalled those words. Sometimes she reverted back to english morning bells are ringing, morning bells are rining, ding ding dong, ding ding dong.

She crept into his office, father john. and sure enough he was asleep. afraid to wake him she crept back out again and back to the seminary. dear little miss muffet who likes strawberry shortcakes. Too afraid to wake father john. and so she lay in bed and her thoughts went all arond the mulberry bush so tempted to unroot it. She diverted but then all she could hear were the children singing ring-a-ring-a roses again and again. Drove her nuts. She had to leave before mary mary quite contrary came around to water them gardens. she had enough. So she packed them bags.

Dear little sixteen year old whose grandfather's clock just stopped, and gone was her guardian and only relative, for she was nobody's child. She was sent to father john. father john was nice, except he was asleep most of the time, and when he was awake, he took not much interest in the real world, all he talked about with her were of big fishes, and jack's beanstalk, fee fi fo fum, the next door lady lives in a shoe. Probably because the only real thing he remembers was the london bridge falling down, and no he didn't want to reminisce on that. Who would?

And so she packed her bags and ran to catch michael as he rowed the boat ashore, to see if he could row her back out again to the other side of the river. and then she ran pass humpty, who seemed to keep insisting he saw the cow jump over the moon, she could care less. She wanted something real. So she ran pass mary whose carpet bag seemed too light to hold that horse she just pulled out of it, and dear mr chimney sweep lifting his hat off to her greeting her - supercalafrgalistic god knows how u spell it. And then jack spratt argued with his wife, and sure enough she passed the old woman who lived in her shoe. Good grief! And then pop went the weasel as it ran pass her, and she thought, father john! he must be awake now. she must go back for she's just been a bit silly.

So she turned around, and left her silliness behind. and trotted back to neverland where peter pan was a really good friend. and there he was father john, wide awake and smiling, protecting her from dear handsome georgie porgie who thought he could kiss all them gals. Peter piper there again, with all them rats behind him, and there in father john's office, two new friends, just like her, dear gretel, gingerbread still in hand, and her brother hansel. Hansel was to cook for them. How lvoely. And then she passed by mary who was quite contrary as she walked back to her room which was beside the little girl who always wore a red riding hood, who always told of how her grandma was eaten by a wolf. NASTY!

She crept back into bed, and closed her eyes, exhausted. How glad she is to be back in frere jacques' care.

and then tomorrow, awaits her and unlike oliver twists' dreadful meals, hansel always cooks up some lovely pot-roast. blessings indeed.

Golliwog in, Golliwog out

He sat and sipped his coffee as she watched intently, a milllion thoughts firing the her mind. her mind, the atelier of most things in her life, whether or not concrete. A million thoughts fired, as he sat and sipped his coffee. Like an art, his coffee sipping. not delicate, and yet, not quite brash, nor bold. it's artful sipping.

The gallery owner was overseas and she had managed it quite badly. Point of conversation this morning as he sipped his coffee was the Roslyn gallery. The amonut of debt was unthinkable. Bad management, how it could be so destructive huh? She nodded. The sipping turned brash as he frowned at her disatisfied at her nonchalance. She sighed, this time resolved to let go for she knew what was in her heart, no need to explain, no need to explain. She was interested, and what he said was interesting, she just did not react the way he wanted. This time, she let go. The golliwog peered in.

Take the golliwog out.

She watched him intently. Golliwog spoke, she swore the golliwog spoke.

Take the golliwog out!

She peeered into the window, and watched intently. He sat and sipped, she watched and listened as he spoke. She peered into the window, she peered back out.

Take the golliwog out.

And then in the attic. Salt-fish cafe, fish-cakes and salted coffee, the specialty. And the familar comfortable picture. Emotions, senses as you stare at the picture. Senses which washes your body with a sense of relief, and your mind almost immediately relaxes as you smile. And that the heart stopped as her lips curled with disgust, golliwog in the garden of the salt-fish cafe. Golliwogs in her attic.

Take the golliwog out.

And he stood and smiled.

She watched intently and peered in the window. The atelier of most things in his life, his mind. A window. Clear blue sky, noon-day sun. Emotions and senses washed over her body again. And there at the edge of the painting, the sillhoute of a quarter of a golliwog, running.

Golliwog, golliwog, gone.

Peer in.

floating on black clouds

My lack of desire worries me, she says. To be honest, her lack of desire worries me even more and I see her floating up on black clouds. It worries me when she turns inside only to see a tar baby staring back at her, wrestling with it leaves her black and blue. It worries me to see her trudging along in her black canvas shoes with black shoestrings. I have witnessed it when the balance of all things in her little circle flips itself all out of proportion and she is balancing on a thin string amongst black clouds.

I want to scream, she says, in a strangely calm manner. I see red. It is when she screams silently I get worried. She is losing her grip and going back to a place where it is just her, alone, and she stops living. No one can get in, and she brings out her scissors to cut all strings. I see her retreating and I reach out. I try to hold her hand, so she can feel skin on her skin. Not tar. Isolation on black clouds turn all things black. Oh how I get worried when she starts seeing grey.

It has been a while since she saw grey. Life has been in colour for a while, and then the mat was pulled out from under her. I see her now struggling to stand, she is beginning to float.

Numbness radiates inside out, a numbness that aches, she says. And tears stream down my face. My extended hand may not be enough to pull her up from either side. The tar baby stirs and fights back and she has lost the energy to wrestle. I want to step in and kick it out, but how. I may drown in there with her. I want to stay out here, out where the black clouds are just a view, and I am still walking, not floating.

I am turning around, and hope, she follows me. After all, my hand is always extended.

honey coloured butterfly comes flying in

Her hope lens had faded a little and she was forced to see things through the other lens. The view always sucks from the other lens, because things are blur and everything is grey. Her hope lens gave it all colour so at this point of time all things were grey. Grey sucks the energy out of her.

The scale went out of balance again and as she looked out the window and some things seemed to slip out of place a little. Disorientated and a little lost she was. She needed to move forward because she walks on quick sand and stagnancy sucks her in right into the depth where darkness was the only real thing. She struggled to find concrete ground and yet there was never a spot that was such here on earth. Not fer her. The gound is never concrete under her for too long, soon enough she would see the quick sand the illusion of concreteness hides so well.

It sucks for her when her hope lenses lose focus and she is left on quick sand with grey vision. Her brain clicks from the technicoloured pictures back to grey as it drifts from memory to vision, and back to memory again. Long enough and she would forget which was real. Things before her seemed like an illusion and she began to question the purpose of it all again. It makes her want to run. Run so fast to beat the quick sand. She needed to run, fast, now.

Running does an amazing thing, it alters your vision. Picket fences disappear to reveal the complete picture if you run fast enough past it. But most importantly after a while, you are forced to look ahead, straight ahead, with all your might in order to keep running. You start to focus foward and the floating and fading things that surround start to appear once again in its concrete form. Not so much like peeled paint or melted icing no more. Running. She needed to run, fast, now.

There she is, she began, picking up the pace, she began running. Hope she's got the right shoes on. Oh well, if she doesn't she'd just bear with the pain until her feet got used to it. Hopefully she's going in the right direction, otherwise she'd just hit the dead end. Oh well, she can always turn back and keep running until she is heading the right direction again. After all it's all a journey. No matter.

I looked up and began to stand. I struggled to see through what was the small clear spot in my hope lens. All my vision began to focus in on that spot and I geared myself to get ready to run. It was time to run. And so I ran. And as I ran I saw a honey coloured butterfly come flying in. I began to run, run behind the honey coloured butterfly. Just because. And as I ran the heaviness lifted and the goo stuck to my skin began to wear off with the wind and sweat.

Let me run. Run after the butterfly I see through my hope lens. Then it'll all be ok, because what is fading, will look right again. My vision will be clear again, soon. After all, the quicksand isn't fast enough to catch me. It ain't, honey coloured butterflies fly fast. Fast enough. Let me run focused on the honey coloured butterfly I see through my hope lens and let me beat the quicksand and see the big picture again. The picture without the picket fences.

Honey coloured butterfly, beautiful blue sky and no fences to fence me inside.

I am running, fast, now.