Spoon Tale.

A Ghost Story.

The ghosts swarm.
They speak as one
person. Each
loves you. Each
has left something
undone.

- Rae Armantrout, ‘Unbidden’

The boy is 3, purebred rascal; eerily alert; his olive eyes hissing sparkler fire in this kitchen of his home. When he pops a spoonful of smashed berries in his mouth there is true waffling silence, yet, when the bitter fruit tarts down into the nerves of his short tongue he shrieks. And he cackles. The sun crashes through the back window in slanted rafters as basic poetry often does, so the child slams both fists down in unison. Curiosity and joy seem to be his whole schtick. Danger lingers, just off stage, same as ever with these types, yet the spastic movements of the boy, the sudden quivering of his arm, the effortless way he gazes at his fingertips, reels them close to his eyes, swiftly backs them away again, we have to notice that there is both disgust and genuine awe in his face at that point. He appears diligently charmed by his own existence.

Which perhaps explains how he avoids all judgement, such a fair shake from the tree of his unrecognized lonesomeness. He is all alone, this is true. Well, except for the liver-spotted spaniel who sits energized by her own faith in his chaotic tendencies and radiates just to the left of his high chair. Back lit/ the lad’s magic is born over and over and over again/ every few moments some might say. His hair is mangled to his fair scalp and it dangles like stretchy drips of summer barn fire as he releases a thin slice of buttered bread down onto his dog’s face.

This: a morning.

In the past.

Mother missing.

Father missing.

Our lad in his chair and this dog at his side.