Rosie Lost Her Flip-Flops

Rosie Lost Her Flip-Flops

It was a real dungeon, just like the ones in monster movies and Disney castles with sweaty prisoners and mean-looking guards holding spears and truncheons. It was a real dungeon but the prisoners and guards were only actors, at least that is what the guide book told us. Rosie was braver than me, but she wasn’t stupid. She kept her distance from both the mangy criminals and the well-fed officers.

Rosie and I talked about what we should wear when we visited the castle. It was hot so we chose light t-shirts and shorts. We both wore flip-flops. I know now that we should have worn laced shoes, sneakers anyway, but flip-flops it was. Here in Scotland we probably looked strange with our beach shoes but we were tourists and tourists can get away with anything as long as they are not in church.

Rosie and I grew up in a small coal town in Pennsylvania. We had been to Philadelphia and D.C. but never out of the country like this. Rosie was only two years older than me but she was much taller and I was the tagalong little brother all the time. I wished I could be the boss sometimes. At least I was boss of our cat, Sprinkles. Well, sometimes anyway.

I don’t know how we got separated from Mom and Dad in the castle. I don’t know how we got down into the dungeon either. I know there was not an elevator. I think Mom and Dad slipped off to the wine-tasting tables in the refectory. I don’t know what a refectory is but it was really big. Anyway, Rosie and I just sort of drifted away and found ourselves surrounded by these stinky old buzzards and their caretakers. Rosie wanted to talk to one of the prisoners. I didn’t.

She waltzed right up to one of the cages; I think they called them cells. I don’t know why they called them cells. I thought cells were batteries. Anyway, there she was, talking right in his face. I told you she was brave. The man raised up, rattled his chains and yelled huge un-understandable words at Rosie. Rosie jumped ten feet and ran like mad. I could see that she had lost her flip-flops but I wasn’t about to go back and get them for her.

 She’s supposed to be the brave one and she is two years older than me, so let her take care of her own flip-flops.

Well, I didn’t lose mine, but I don’t know how that happened ‘cause I sure wasn’t thinking about keeping them on my feet. When we got up to the refectory floor, Rosie looked down and saw that her feet were all red and blue and she had no flip-flops. So, guess what? We have to figure out how to get the flip-flops back without running into that scary prisoner.

 Mom and Dad seemed to be feeling pretty good so we didn’t bother them, just put our minds to work on the problem. There was our tour guide. Maybe she could help. Nope, she was at the wine-tasting table too, smiling at all the guards.

How about our driver? As usual, he is out by the coach smoking a cigarette. Imagine! Smoking! In this day and age! I don’t know why they call the bus a coach. I thought a coach showed you how to play football.

So that left me and Rosie all alone to get her flip-flops back. We didn’t have a fishing pole so that was out. Rosie’s feet were getting sorer and colder. We rummaged around and found some gunny sacks piled in a musty corner of the castle room. I’ll bet you didn’t expect me to know a word like musty. Rosie taught it to me. I don’t exactly know what it means but it isn’t good.

Anyway, we both put gunny sacks over our heads for a disguise. I don’t know why they call them gunny sacks. We slithered down the stairs to the dungeon, hugging the walls. We didn’t really hug the walls but that’s how you say it. When we got to the floor, we were standing almost next to the biggest guard and we could see Rosie’s flip-flops. Boy, were we lucky. The guard was snoozing; standing straight up and snoozing. How did he do that?

There was another guard down the hall but he was leaning against the wall and paying no attention since there weren’t any tourists around. We tip-toed across the big cobblestone floor, which was hard for me because I was wearing flip-flops, and hard for Rosie because she was barefoot and the stones were cold. We snatched Rosie’s flip-flops and turned to run when the mangy prisoner saw us and started yelling those un-understandable words again. The guards came to life and we ran like the dickens. I don’t know why we were so scared; we weren’t criminals. Anyway we got our little selves out of there, Rosie’s flip-flops in hand and sat down outside the refectory. Rosie put on her flip-flops and just about then, Mom and Dad and the tour guide came out of the refectory and patted us on our little heads and said what good children we were to wait for them so quietly.

Hah! That’s what they think!

(894 words)

Spy Jeans

Spy Jeans 

by 

Jack Wilson

Kerry ambled out of the posh boutique on Rodeo Dr. mumbling to herself. “I just bought these five-hundred dollar jeans and look at this. Now who would plant a trick button on the fly of these Gucci pants?”

Once home she took off the jeans and replaced the false button with one not quite right but adequate. She put the offending object in a 4x6x5 inch cherry wood box her Grandma Cerise had left her. She did not realize that the button was a GPS device.

Kerry had inherited more than a cherry wood box from Nana. Kerry was rich. She had no particular interest in culture or hobbies or plants or anything except shopping and hanging out in clubs. She had a degree from Claremont but did not think much and never read a book she could skip. She made no effort to understand the why of it all.  She didn’t care. She was really, really rich.

The spy-cam sat in the cherry wood box, beeping almost silently. The beeps contained no information except the location of the cam. Knut maneuvered his Miata in tightening circles, or rather squares, till he got the strongest signal, uncoiled himself from the diagonally parked car and inspected the apartment building. He knew that anyone buying absurdly high-priced jeans would live well but he was not expecting such a fortress. He sidled up to one of the sentry plants guarding the entrance, stood in its shade and pondered the possibilities. He depressed the button to call the doorkeeper.

He had dressed in overalls and wore a cap with an SRP logo and carried a toolbox. He presented himself as an electrician requested by a Mrs. Johnson. The doorman knew of no Mrs. Johnson residing in the building. Knut scratched his head and suggested that someone must have played a trick on him. He begged the doorman’s pardon for any inconvenience but asked if he might use the bathroom in the lobby, indicating by his body language a certain urgency. Without expression the doorman directed him.

After an appropriate wait, Knut slipped out the bathroom door and glided down the hallway, listening in his earbud to the faint beep growing little in strength. Must be on another floor. He slithered up one flight and heard the beep reaching maximum volume. He lingered at the correct door. He snaked through all the hindrances and got inside, moved directly to the bureau containing the cherry wood box and pocketed the cam. Now to find the booty, fill up his toolbox and fly.

He felt smooth, getting into the flow of the caper, slightly giddy. He was on the right track when he heard a keycard in the lock and a shuffle outside. He sought to hide, but on quick reflection, chose to face the pants. He planted his feet solidly in the frame between the sitting room and the hall to the bedroom. When Kerry turned on the light, there he stood; quiet, smiling.

Kerry giggled.

Kerry marched right over to Knut and touched his nose with her right forefinger. “What’s your story, hot shot?” Knut said nothing, grabbed her around the waist, pulled her to him and kissed her surprisingly softly. She liked it; kissed him back.

“Let me tell you a story,” said Knut, “about a trick button I planted on your fly.” Kerry listened, enchanted, while signaling to the waiting doorman to take a hike. The cam beeped.

End

The Last Circle

The Last Circle

A rock plopped
From a low ledge
With a splash
Into my still pond.
Spreading from the vortex
In lessening urgency,
Ripples stirred the water to pulse.
Hunkering on the far bank
I watched the wide motion
Touch my shore.
If the ducks
Had helped,
The last circle
Might have
Soaked my sandals.

Jack Wilson 2010

City Lights

City Lights

by Jack Wilson

Damn! Forgot the number. The ad said to call first, then we'd meet nearby. Where am I going? What the hell did I do with that newspaper anyway? I thought I had it in my overcoat pocket. Too much of a hurry, don't even know which direction to head.

She hinted that she would pay some in advance. Just what I need. And I can do the job, I know I can. The guys at the gym will want to buy me a beer after this one. Where can I find another copy of that paper?

--Hey Newsy, you got a Chronicle? No, no. it's gotta be a Chronicle. There, that's it. Now, page 27 I think... Ah.

"Hello, hi, say, uh, about your ad... Yeah? City Lights Bookstore? 4:30. I'll be there."

4:19. Plenty of time. Cable car took me right there. What did she say she was going to be wearing? Blue coat, stripes. Ah, there she is. "Hi, are you Elisabeth? Okay, good, here I am. Yeah, you're early too. Um, uh, you want a cup o' tea?" (I always carried a Thermos of tea and some plastic cups).

Elizabeth and I stood close together behind the display window of Ferlinghetti retro stuff sipping warm tea and talking for about 15 minutes. It was agreed. Tomorrow I would rid her of the pest for a big bundle of cash, half now, half later. She turned, laid a brown envelope on the book table, pushed it slowly toward me with what seemed to me an intimate glance, cinched up her blue striped coat and started toward the door.

The UPS truck skidded slowly over the white fire hydrant, demolished the trashcan on the sidewalk and trundled right on through the multi-paned wood-and-glass window. Elisabeth was beyond all help and I was left as you see me now.

End

Clinic

~
Clinic

Like the top of a great grey whale
Or a cartoon snake resting
On a tropical branch,
Like a section of escalator rail,
A mitten for handling radioactive
Pellets or a bent, deflated
Pontoon,
The arm of this institutional chair
Invests the waiting room with
Ponderous anonymity as
Patients shift their gazes and fuss
With magazines no one will read and
Look longingly at the door which
Opens frequently for one-at-a-time, and – finally,
Me.

Jack Wilson

~

Frida, Rome in a Day, Medical Exam

~
Frida

Spitting out her beauty and disgust,
She jiggled ghosts and skeletons,
Emptied blood and I was there.
I cleaned up her mess,
I fed her dog and I made her bed.
I watered the garden by the pyramid
And it blossomed.

In life or death, I must see her again.
She’s just like me;
God and the devil
Wrapped up in one tamale.

Jack Wilson
Rome in a Day

Rome sits on its seven haunches
And the pines, with fountains in their branches,
Old road markers in the Appian sun,
Are stolid, green and well run.
A conservative morning begins with dawn
And makes its logical way as a pawn
Is moved one square at a time
To Noon. It seems all right, but I'm
Conscious of a skip in my heartbeat,
And the day pops like corn in the heat
Of a sudden three o'clock. The wrench
Of time ticks in my ears. I hunch
My watch into a shadow to hide
It's face from the white glare. Inside,
The gold hands turn green and catch
On the number six. I light a match
To see if they will stick there
As the fountains, with pines in their sprays, share
Their fate, dwindle and dry in the light
And Rome gets marching into the night.

Jack Wilson

.......................

Medical Exam

Two soldiers, one all white, one all red,
Guard the north wall of the cubed room.
Squat, each with a pedal
To open the lids hands-free.
Fourteen inches square, fifteen high,
Steel with polished mechanisms,
Spare, utilitarian,
Made in Switzerland.

Plastic liner bags skirt the tops,
Peek from the edges of the covers
Like play-filled children unready for sleep.
The sentinels neither bark nor rattle.
They stand so white and so red
Keeping all predators at bay.

Jack Wilson
~

Three Poems

~
A Swallow Speeds On
Morning:

Two eggs, coffee with cream.
A fly noisily zigs and zags.

Noon: Ham and cheese on bread.
A butterfly silently flits and flits.

Evening: Steak and French Fries.
A hummingbird looks on while hovering.

Night: Four cookies and milk.
A bat menacingly zooms.

-Jack Wilson

.............................

At The Center
"In Emergency Push To Open,"
The automatic doors read on the unwashed, dribbly glass.
The further, outer door carries the same remark.
Between the first and second lies a cross-hatched
Block-built carpet, mole-grey brown.
The door to the entrance-garden has the same dribbles
And moves just as automatically.

Inside the inside, thick nurses, men and women, pad by.
Television gurgles softly, patients and personnel murmur,
Little clicks and taps identify heels and wheels,
Medical machinery and dropped tongue depressors.

Outside the outside, greenstuffs, and
Traffic tooting and squealing.
Between the inside and the outside lies a
Cross-hatched, block-built, mole-grey brown
Carpet.

--Jack Wilson
.......................

Tidepool

Invent the waves and vivid pools with me,
Cool, industrious, dibbling at our toes,
And let your knees snatch back at laps of sea.
Wade deeper toward the hole where seaweed grows,
Kick lively now, hitch up your sagging suit
And hold my hand. If you cannot see,
Loosen your grip, sit on my friendly foot,
Relax and let your hair float out to me.
I`ll pull you to a swirl for us alone
Where we can touch and float asleep or wake
And be content awhile with what we`ve sown.
To love where all we give is all we take,

As fishes waken from their restless sleep
To watch us drifting till we`re in too deep.

Jack Wilson
~