2259. Dead

Hi. My name is Andreus. I regard myself as a realist. Some people just can’t face reality. I’ll give you an example or two.

When I read Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard by Thomas Gray I thought how morbid to be writing poetry sitting among all those dead people. Then I thought that those cows in the lowing herd that were winding slowly o’er the lea are now dead. Every one of them dead as a doornail. They’re not mooing anymore. They’re dead.

That got me thinking about other things. You know in “Oh what a beautiful morning” from Oklahoma? They sing “All the cattle are standin’ like statues; They don’t turn their heads as they see me ride by”. That’s because they’re all dead. For goodness sake! Nor would the corn be as high as an elephant’s eye because by now the elephant and the corn would be dead. There’s not a happy song left in the world because most things that inspired the songs are now dead.

The bluebird of happiness is dead.

When I went to the library a day or two ago I was fingering my way through a history picture book, and I thought that all those people in the pictures are dead. History is about dead people. There are dead people everywhere. Dead! Dead! Dead!

Some people are obsessed with dead people. Thank goodness I’m not. That’s one thing I’m dead sure about.

2176. Whizzing along

Neil was whizzing along the highway in his little blue car when suddenly a bit fell off. He wasn’t sure what bit it was but couldn’t stop because there was traffic everywhere and they were moving along as if in convoy at a reasonable rate.

Anyway, the car seemed to be going well, and then the outside mirrors on both sides fell off. Before he could think, the hood (bonnet) had blown off and then the trunk (boot). Next he saw a wheel race along the road ahead of him, and then another.

It didn’t take long before he was whizzing along clinging to nothing but the steering wheel.  Next thing, wouldn’t you know it, even the steering wheel zoomed off into nowhere.

It was then Neil realized what had happened. A few miles back on the road he was in a car accident. He was dead. Now he was whizzing along in another dimension altogether.

Poem 103: ANZAC Day – Only the dead

(Today is ANZAC Day in New Zealand and Australia, when we remember those who fought in wars. ANZAC stands for Australian and New Zealand Army Corps. The date is set on the day of the greatest military loss of both countries in a single day: Gallipoli. The form of this poem is modelled on the Ghazal).

Foolish folk sometimes dream the end of war,
but peacetimes never mean the end of war.

No more dog eat dog; lion and lamb lie down;
is this a sign of being the end of war?

The cosmos consumes itself in chaos;
yet night sky seems serene, the end of war.

Let’s pray that earth will smack of peace, and know
in air, space, land, marine, the end of war.

Poor Bruce repeats old Plato on this day:
Only the dead have seen the end of war.

To hear the poem read aloud click HERE.

1898. The dead tree

I don’t know if you can see the photo of these two old trees. One’s dead, and the other is barely alive. My husband and I planted these trees years and years ago. He’s dead now – the husband. He planted the dead one. I planted the other one, the one that’s gnarled and barely alive. I’ll be eighty-seven this coming October.

There used to be a house roughly where the person taking the photo would be standing. That was our house. The first and only house we had. The two children were born there. It was our dream place; a lovely house, not too big and not too small, set on twelve acres of what could only be described as park land. We planted those two trees (and a number of others here and there) as part of the “landscaping” of our park. Our life was like a perpetual honeymoon.

Jude had built the house himself. And I helped of course, as best I could. I sewed drapes and did the painting and wall-papering and so on. Jude was the one with the saw and the hammer and the screw driver and the muscle. It was like a dream come true!

After the birth of the second child things fell apart. We’d been in the house for four years and we put it up for sale. No one ever bought it and Jude disappeared before any divorce proceedings began. I leased out most of the land to a neighbouring farmer and stayed in the house with the children. They’re gone now – the children. Tony’s a lawyer up in the big city, and Rachel manages a business that teachers adults how to do basic computer things.

My current house gets quite cold in winter, so I’ve asked Tony to come and cut down that dead tree for firewood. The one that’s barely alive has a few more years left in it. It might sound cruel but I’m looking forward to burning logs of Jude’s tree throughout the winter. It’s good he’s serving some purpose at this stage of my life. Apart from building the house he wasn’t much good for much when he was here. In fact he was useless. And mean; really mean. It’s why I did him in.

Repeat of Story 209: Angora rabbit

(This is the fifth story in a week or so of repeats. “Angora rabbit” first appeared on this blog on 7 May 2014.)

Anton had a cat. The neighbour had a beautiful white angora rabbit. The rabbit was in its hutch. The cat was free.

One day the neighbour was at work, and Anton’s cat turned up on Anton’s doorstep with the rabbit. It was dead. The rabbit was larger than the cat. The cat had dragged the rabbit through the mud.

Anton panicked. He washed the dead rabbit’s angora fur thoroughly; hair shampoo and all. He dried it with a hair dryer. The rabbit looked as good as new, but dead. Anton crept over to the neighbour’s place, and put the dead rabbit back in its hutch.

Several days later, Anton chattered to the neighbour over the fence. This was the dreaded moment.

“You wouldn’t believe it,” said the neighbour. “My rabbit died.”

“Did it?” said Anton, feigning surprise.

“I buried it in the garden,” said the neighbour.

“Poor thing,” said Anton. “I’m sorry to hear that.”

“That’s not all,” said the neighbour. “After I buried it, I came home from work and it was lying dead back in its hutch.”

1651. The dead wife

(Thanks to Alex Raphael for the opening sentence.)

“Hang on a second. I thought you were dead.”

“I am. Or rather, I am pretending to be.” Ursula had made a sudden appearance at the home of her best friend, Flora. Flora was in shock. She had grieved for her friend at the funeral and, quite frankly, spent an undue amount on a bunch of flowers.

“How on earth did you stage such a believable death?”

“It wasn’t easy, especially since I had to organize it all on my own. In the end I got help from the man at the crematorium. But it worked. My husband is having an affair and this is the almost improbable way to give him the fright of his life, and his lover whoever she is. I could kill the both of them. In fact I probably will.”

“But how did you find out about the affair?”

“When I went away for a week to visit my daughter, I came home and she had left her shoes in the closet. And what is more, a woman knows these things. I could sense that she had been there all week. I asked my husband about it, but of course he denied it. Once I find out who that woman is, she’ll be taking my place at the crematorium I can tell you.”

“But,” joked Flora, “who would make your husband the tomatoes on toast for breakfast that he so likes?”

“How do you know that?”

1583. Dropped dead

Yeah, well, I was walking down the street when this guy walking along in front of me dropped dead. Just like that. He didn’t have time to turn around and say Help! or pop into a shop he was passing and say Can I have a drink of water? or something. Just PLOP and he was dead. Lying flat on the pavement.

Of course everyone rushed to his aid. He must’ve hurt himself in the fall because there was quite a bit of blood. There were enough people helping him so I moved on. Too many cooks spoil the broth as the saying goes. So I thought it better that I don’t get in the way. Besides, if I’m to be really honest, I don’t know much about first aid. Anyway, when a guy drops dead he’s dead, and I saw he was good and proper dead as I passed.

You often don’t know what’s going to happen next half the time. The guy could’ve been a Chinese spy or anything for all I know. Although he didn’t look Chinese. He might’ve been a Russian spy. They look more like us. You never know these days who is walking right in front of you.

I dare say it could have been captured on video camera. Streets have these cameras for security, but as far as I know this section of street doesn’t have any security cameras because I checked it out.

I see in the paper that the police are calling for witnesses. Apparently he was a foreign national working as a double agent. It’s funny how things come out in the wash. The guy didn’t have a heart attack. He was shot slap-bang in the back the police said.

Must’ve been shot by the guy walking behind him!