Mini Stories and Poems

MY PRAYER

BANG …BANG

I woke suddenly. The noise was right over my head. I lay on the bed in total darkness paralysed with fright.

I thought there was a scrapping sound and movement. I was alone in a big old house, my parents' six-bedroom farmhouse, far from neighbours. The noise came from one of the bedrooms on the upper floor. I hardly went up there anymore. After the death of my mother and father, I converted a small sitting room on the ground floor into my bedroom.

There had been possums in the house at times, but this sounded too heavy for a possum. I reached out and found the big Watchman’s Torch. I didn’t know what to do. My rifle was locked in a gun-safe and the ammunition in another. The police, when available, were thirty minutes away. I remembered my father had kept a baseball bat hidden under a coat by the front door. It was still there. I crept up the stairs, part terrified, part determined that nobody was invading my house.

There was a faint light under the door of the last room in the upstairs passage. It had been Uncle Edmund’s bedroom and study in years past. He had fallen on hard times and my father had given him the room so that he had a chance to recover. He never did.

I reached the door; took a deep breath and flung the door open. There was a man searching the drawers of the desk.

“Uncle Edmund!” I exclaimed.

He looked up. “Oh, hello, Tony. Sorry if I disturbed you.”

I could hardly get the words out. “You’re dead.”

“True. Bit ghostly, eh? But I had to come back and sort out a few problems. I was a bit of a prankster, and one went wrong. I sent your sister a telegram saying she had failed her university entrance. Bit stupid, I suppose, and untrue. Anyway, she took it to heart and was terribly upset. I was sure I sent a letter of apology, but it seems that I didn’t, and I was just looking to see if I posted it or not. I must sort it out before I can go any further.”

I glared at him. “When I was ten you gave me a pair of bathing trunks for Christmas. They went transparent in the water.”

“Wow, you should have seen your face when you came out of the sea onto the beach and realised why everyone was staring at you. That was a laugh.”

“It was the most embarrassing thing that ever happened to me. It still hurts.”

“I’m really sorry. I apologise. I seem to spend all my time now apologising. Hell, here it is.” He waved a letter about. “I never posted it. I’ll have to ask for forgiveness. On our side of the grave, of course, not yours. Really, I was an idiot. Look, do you mind putting down that baseball bat?  It is not much use against a ghost. Lean it against the bookcase.”

He seemed to become aware of the incongruity of the situation. “Tony, go back to bed and forget about this. Go now.”

I was in such a daze I went. 

I awoke next morning conscious of having experienced a disturbing dream. But there remained a feeling of disquiet. I went upstairs to the end room and opened the curtains. Had the desk been disturbed? Possums?

Then I turned to leave. I stopped breathing. Leaning against the bookcase was my father’s baseball bat.

It remains there still to this day.

From ghosties and ghoulies
And long-leggedy hairy beasties
And things that go bump in the night,
Good Lord, deliver us!  

Marcus Porter

Marcus Porter was consistently overdressed. He was a corpulent man born with an excessively deep fascination about his own existence. He caught the eye because he was too much. From his shoes polished to gem-like lustre, he reflected quality up through his silk socks to his Signature suit of pale grey with a pinstripe in purple just a shade too wide, to his crisp white shirt. His tie loudly declared that he had attended Melbourne Grammar but left one to speculate whether he rose any further. 

All of this was a frame for his waistcoat. It was a tartan of an as yet undiscovered Scottish clan, In rich reds, blues and purple, shot throughout with gold thread and edged with gold and purple cord hinting at a distant royal connection. The gilt thistle buttons dominated this excess.

Marcus Porter was the head of a large furniture company that he had inherited. His career had taken him from his initial position as Deputy Executive Officer to President on the death of his father, and the company still made an excellent income. 

It perplexed many people that a man as pompous as Marcus had married another human being, but his wife, Celeste,  maintained her position by marital obedience, and appeared in public dressed as he directed, in a manner designed to provide a contrast to his consummate display. She managed, as a dutiful consort, to always walk at her husband's side with a half-pace delay.

Marcus often appeared at charitable events. He was without compassion for anyone but knew his presence at such events was good for business, or to be more precise, helped inflate his ego.

Only one thing caused Marcus’s good-natured beam to fade. A person who referred to his waistcoat as a vest was forever banished, eternally gone from his splendid presence. A vest was a singlet. His mother had taught him that, so it was true. And a man’s waistcoat defined his character, and his character was outstanding.

As every day has a sunset, so the glory of Marcus could not last for ever.

On a bright Saturday afternoon in February. Marcus Porter, dressed in his usual splendour and accompanied by his wife Celeste, presided over a minor yachting race from the tip of the St Kilda pier. This was a charity event to raise money to support the Youth Yachting for Mental Health Foundation. Marcus was at the edge of the pier cheering vigorously during the race, when he was hit with considerable force in the back.

A teenager of some fifteen years named Archie Prentice was endeavouring to double-flip his skateboard on the planking at the outer edge of the pier. His education had failed to inform him that exposure to wind and wave eroded beams at the flank of piers and exposed the bolt heads. His skateboard and a bolt met at a crucial moment and Archie flew through the air and rammed Marcus Porter in the back. Owing to a rule made by Isaac Newton, Marcus Porter consequentially flew through the air, and landed in the water.

The crowd was awed by the sight of a spluttering Marcus Porter dragging his waistcoat upward in an attempt to save it, ignoring the life-buoy that was tossed beside him. Or perhaps it was stunned by the shrieks if his wife, “Marcus, your vest, your vest!” But whatever, clutching his waistcoat, Marcus sunk beneath the waves. Gone was the glory. As string touched to a candle splutters brightly for a moment, and only ash remains, Marcus Porter went under.

I’ll never go there again.

I’ll never go there again. I have this sad thought. I climbed Adam’s Peak twice, some fifty years ago. I will not be able to it again.

Adam’s Peak is in Sri Lanka. The jungle surrounds the mountain. It has always been a holy mountain, a place of pilgrimage. There is a large indentation at the peak, Sri Pada, the sacred footprint. It is 170 cm long and 18 wide in the rough shape of a human foot, attributed variously to Adam, St. Thomas, Buddha, and Shiva amongst others.

The climb is steep. It takes about three hours, depending on your fitness. There are very well-worn tracks up the mountain, but all, nevertheless, rough and difficult.

My second climb is the one I remember best. I went with Chris, an engineer I had met. We were both white Europeans and stood out a bit. The pilgrims were mostly Sinhalese and Tamil. Some people climb in the dark to reach the peak at sunrise, but that was not for me.

We set out early in the day. Chris was accompanied by a local servant, a man in his mid-thirties, who carried our supplies. There were several rest places on the way up, so he would climb ahead of us and prepare tea, clean up after us, and trot ahead to the next rest point to again have tea ready.

Fit people could climb faster. We moved at a modest pace. It was a shock to see a six-man police patrol jogging, actually jogging up the track past us.

A group of Sinhalese pilgrims returning from the Peak were chanting together as they descended. Chris translated; they are singing, “Look at those stupid Europeans who don’t know what they are doing.” They were probably right.

When we reached the Peak I rang the Pilgrims Bell twice, as this was my second achievement. The religious activity at the peak was predominately Buddhist. There is a Buddhist monastery that dominates the scene. 

I did not climb as a pilgrim. I am a Christian, but of a Western disposition, and not into legends of giant footprints. I was, however, a member of St. Thomas’ College, so I had that affiliation.

The atmosphere of Adam’s Peak is holiness. I was comfortable there because I lived in a Christian community that was also home to Buddhists, Hindus, and Muslims. I expect for the inexperienced, the scene may have been noisy and chaotic.

Our trip down was marked by sadness. After a long climb up, the steep descent can cause a knee to lock and a fall. Children are more agile but also more careless. We met a man going down. He was carrying the lifeless body of his five-year-old son who had tripped over the edge and hit his head. There was a very evident depressed fracture of the forehead. It was not reported in the media. Accidents don’t happen on the holy mount.

It was all long ago. It is part of my holy memory. But I will never go there again.

HIDDEN MEMORIES

The children said, “Daddy nodded off”, but I’m not so sure. I came to my senses in a damp jungle. It felt stifling and wet. I had no idea where I was. There was a machete in my hand; totally unfamiliar. I started hacking a path without any sense of direction. Bloated mottled leaves and creeper rasped over my face and overlarge twigs caught my clothing. My clothing! I was wearing heavy cotton trousers and a coarse leather top I had never seen before, with gross boots that weighed as if armour plated. There was a damp cloth cap on my head.

Insects and birds didn’t seem to notice me. Then I became aware of the noise in front of me. It puzzled me for a moment, and then a whiff of smoke told me all. Fire! I turned back and began hacking a way to escape. I had no sense of time; maybe hours passed, and I grew weary. Just as I was beginning to despair, I broke through into a pine-lined corridor roofed by overhanging branches. I jogged down it, still moving away.

The jungle was on the run. Animals ranging from mice to largish cats and monkeys moved across or along the pathway. I dodged birds in flight. Flight in flight? My head began buzzing with mad phrases. Suddenly a leopard landed in front of me, turned on me, and snarled. Maddened by rage or fear, it leaped at me.

I am not athletic. When your hour has come, what do you do? I fell over backward and thrust the machete in the air. A huge threshing weight land on me, and then was still. I was very sore, but alive.

By dint of straining and wriggling, I was able to ease the impaled leopard off me. There was a deep gash in my left arm. I twisted the remains of the sleeve around it to control the bleeding. With muscles at the limit, I hauled the machete from the leopard. I didn’t know what else I had to face. I staggered further along the path.

At the end of the path there was a lake, and a boat already packed with locals. A slope-shouldered boatman was about to push off, but paused his craft to let me aboard. We travelled away from the fire to an island.

I was taken to a palatial home and met by the most beautiful woman I have ever seen. She said, “You are wounded. I will help you”. I lay entranced on a bed. She spread an ointment over the wound in my arm. “It requires stitching. This will take away the pain.” She didn’t stitch, she embroidered. While I gazed into her sparkling green eyes and watched her expressive lips, she finished my arm. I focussed on her handiwork. There was patterned lacework around the wound, and at its centre the stitching spelled ANNA . “That is my name”, she said, “Just so you remember me.” She stroked her hand over the wound, and I would have sworn her eternal loyalty.

Just then I was shaken awake by the children. “Daddy, it’s half past two. Basketball in St. Kilda. Come on.”

My left arm felt very sore. I went into the bathroom and rolled up my sleeve. My gut turned over. It couldn’t be true. What is reality? The wound and stitching were there. ANNA. I will have to hide it until it heals and perhaps have something done by a tattooist.

My wife’s name is Judith.  

LEAVES

Antonio Marino was a barber. He had a Barber’s shop in Lygon Street. His father and grandfather had owned it before him. It was a very traditional Men’s Barber, unchanged for decades. It was for men. Few women ventured in here; boys mostly came with their fathers or uncles. Not many teens came; they preferred more modern styles. Those teens who did visit had realised that Family was more important than fashion. Most conversations in the shop were in Sicilian or Italian.

Because it was all about Family. And the big event of the week was Friday night. The shop closed at 5.30 pm, and then Mr. Marcu Costa arrived for his weekly trim. Mr. Costa was a man of Respect, Head of the Family. Perhaps in Australian slang a capo of the mob. He was always the sole customer. He was very particular about his appearance. His two nephews, Vinc and Paulu, loitered outside the front door, mainly because they smoked and were not allowed inside, but also because their function in life was to honour and protect Mr. Costa. They both wore floppy black suits which served the purpose of more or less concealing the pistols they wore.

A group of half-a-dozen drunken sailors wandered by, moving along the footpath to the left in the direction of the City They sang and caroused noisily, which is probably what distracted Vinc and Paulu, who didn’t notice the car which glided to the curb to their right, nor the two slugs which hit each of their hearts from silenced machine pistols. Two balaclava-covered men jumped over their bodies and smashed through the door.

Mr. Costa departed this life at 5.47 pm with seven bullet holes in his person. Antonio was hit once in the shoulder and collapsed, hitting his head with a violent whack on the floor.

Antonio woke in a room hopefully labelled ‘Recover’. A surgeon appeared and smiled at him, “Mr. Marino, you will be pleased to know that there was no serious damage. You will be back to your old self in a couple of months. But I’m afraid we’ll have to keep your arm strapped to your body for a while. No movement in the shoulder at all.”

He was interviewed by the Police. He had seen nothing. The Family code made the Three Wise Monkeys sound like garrulous alcoholics. Nevertheless, he could take a good guess at the identity of the assassins. There were only so many Sicilians in the inner City, and he had seen the pair. The Barber Shop was ruined, and Antonio decided that it was time to retire. His only son, Maceli, had declined to become a barber, instead researching Physics at the University, something incomprehensible like irrational systems in unsynchronised particles, if Antonio had heard him correctly.

It took a month for the coroner to release Mr. Costa’s body for burial.  The funeral took place at St. Monica’s. Antonio had paid his respects to the widow and Mr Costa’s three sons, and then withdrew apart from the family, as was proper. The body was interred in a family mausoleum at Melbourne General Cemetery. 

Antonio stood apart amongst the graves while the priest droned on. His gaze was caught by the Autumn leaves fluttering gently to the ground. A bit like people, really, he thought. Bud, mature, and die. But the leaves were beautiful and took his mind to higher things and the Divine Glory to come. His mind was on heaven when the bullet passed through his head and took the wing off a marble Angel ten metres behind.

Leaves no loose ends.

A FUNERAL IN OUTER SPACE

The guillotine or a trip into space. That was the choice I was given. I didn’t want to lose my head and space could be interesting. My crime was simple. I had been in a bar when a fight broke out. I slid along the wall on my way out when I was confronted by a man with a broken bottle in his fist. He looked nasty, so I hit him, apparently too hard. He died and I was sentenced.

The trip to outer space was an experiment. NASA had developed a rocket that would launch and accelerate vastly faster than had ever been achieved. The question was, could a person survive the initial thrust and the acceleration? I was sent from Paris to the USA. I was going to be the person in question. I was very fit and well built. They strapped me onto a stretcher and wired me up until I was just a jumble of connections to computers. There was an incomprehensible and unreachable dashboard containing a TV screen showing roughly ahead and a view of each side; I think for NASA’s benefit rather than mine.

I don’t remember the lift-off. I guess I blanked out and didn’t regain consciousness for about ten hours. On the screen in front of me there was nothing but blackness lit up by stars, well, galaxies, I guess. Apart from feeling that I’d landed flat on my back from ten stories above, I didn’t think I had suffered serious damage.

The enemy was boredom. I had distinguished a planet or two, but otherwise there was endless night sky. I had food and water; there were two nozzles I could poke, like a caged chicken. I didn’t know how much food there was or how long it would last. This was a one-way trip. I had no return ticket. Presumably NASA expected me to die of something sometime, as the rocket hadn’t exploded at launch. 

There were no nights and days, so I’m not certain for how long this continued. I did get the impression that I was travelling faster and faster. Maybe two weeks?

I knew I was hallucinating. A face appeared on the screen at the side camera; well, actually, a helmeted head. Then there was a solid clunk and the screws on the dome above began to undo. I was terrified. Then the dome was lifted off, and it was clear that another spaceship had somehow locked onto mine and the air pressure balanced. Three helmeted figures looked down at me.

“We’ll look after you, Earth man,’ one said. They moved down and began disconnecting all the wires to my body.

My terror was unabated. “Who are you?”

“We call ourselves Marnons, but you won’t have heard of us. We are invisible to Earthlings. We exist in wave patterns different from electro-magnetic so  they haven’t discovered us yet.”

“Then how come I can see you?”

“We’ve already transmuted you. You’re the first Earthling to come out this far.”

“But you speak English!”

One of the Marnons finished disconnecting me and lifted me into their spaceship. “We speak any language we please.” They climbed out of their suits. 

“You look like people from Earth!”

“What did you expect? Little green men? Evolution works much the same way anywhere in the universe. But we’ve developed a different lifestyle from Earth. We don’t have wars, and greed is vigorously discouraged. We live in family clusters. We’ve transmuted you because otherwise you would just wander on and suffer and die. You’re welcome to stay and be part of our world.

Now, what would you like done with your space rocket?”

I suppose it was a bit naughty, but I couldn’t help it.

MEDIA RELEASE FROM NASA
NASA today denied rumours that a space probe rocket had unexpectedly returned to Earth and safely landed at Cape Canaveral in daylight without  landing wheels or human intervention. A spokeswoman said, “As it’s impossible, it didn’t happen. Fake news is corrupting society.” A former NASA employee who is believed to have started the rumour has been placed on sick leave and a collection of faked photos destroyed.

The Person I most wanted to meet.

Christmas Eve was a real pain. My wife’s brother and his wife came to dinner. Laura insisted on inviting them. It’s Christmas, a family time, she said. The dinner was utterly nerve-wracking, and when they had left and we put the children down, Laura and I finished the remains of the third bottle of wine we had shared.

I woke up with a start. I looked at the clock and it was just after two in the morning. There was a small noise downstairs. It had to be the children sneaking down at this ungodly hour to open presents under the Christmas tree.

I crept down the stairs. The light in the living room was on. I marched in and came up short. Sitting in my chair near the TV was a guy in Father Christmas outfit, long white beard and all, munching on a slice of cake left out for Santa Claus.

I glared at him. “Who the hell are you?”

He smiled at me, “Not the most appropriate welcome, and I would have thought my identity was obvious.”

“You’re some loony dressed up as Father Christmas. Father Christmas doesn’t exist. How did you get in here?”

He took another bite out of the cake. “I came through the wall. Now that people don’t have chimneys, Himself gave me permission to go through walls.”

“Himself?” I queried.

He waved his hand vaguely upwards, and then said, “Your son wrote to me. It was a very nice letter for a boy of six, and he simply asked for a trampoline for himself and his little sister. I’ve set it up in the back yard.”

“This is all bulldust. How come you’re sitting here eating if you’re supposed to be delivering presents all over the world?”

“Oh, I don’t live in the same dimension as you do. Our time is different from yours. Mainly because your time is a function of your universe, and I’m not in it anymore.”

“What do you mean, anymore?”

“Well, I was Bishop of Myra in the fourth century, but died, of course. In what you now call Turkey, or rather, Türkiye. Hey, did you know the Brecon Beacons National Park in Wales the Welsh have named Bannau Brycheiniog. It will drive the English tourists mad.”

“Help,” I moaned, “I’m calling the police.”

“Not recommended. I’m invisible to most people, and you smell of wine. Now, when you were little, you really wanted to meet me, and, see, I’ve granted your wish. Your last request as a boy was for a Meccano set, and that wouldn’t be much use to you now. Recently you have been poking about on Google about quantum particle physics. But you are having a bit of difficulty getting your head around the concept that the fluctuation of basic particles in and out of the fifth dimension is possible. You’re hanging onto the inadequate science you learned in school.”

He finished the piece of cake. “So, for your Christmas gift, I’m going to give you a demonstration.”

I gawped. “How can you give me a demonstration here?”

“Watch!” He leaned against the wall, gave me a beatific smile, and faded from sight right through the wall.

Back at Uni. I’ve just completed my Master’s in Quantum Mechanics, and settling in for a Doctorate, but I’ve never told anyone what motivated me. I wouldn’t want anyone to think that I was delusional.

APRIL FOOLS

I generally sleep until lunchtime. Mainly because I work until 5:00 AM. I have a little business selling used car parts. Most of the sales are with people I know. I don’t get much money. They don’t ask too many questions. It’s very profitable. Cindy, my missus, has a few cleaning jobs to keep her in pennies.

Mostly the parts are for Fords and Holdens. We are getting more requests these days for other brands. Usually they are slightly older cars. The kids go out of an evening and nick one  for me, after dark, of course. The thing with the kids is, if they are caught, they probably only get probation because they’re underage. Jimmy’s the big boy. And he wears a cap to give him extra height so it’s like an adult’s driving. The two girls, Jessie and Lizzy, keep their eyes open for  police. and people with suspicious eyes for kids like mine.

In recent years we’ve had a few problems with the electronics of cars. A mate  got hold of a device which scans cars and allows us to open them and start the ignition, and  Jesse, my older girl, is really good with locks. The kids can walk up to a car and open it and have it away before anyone notices. They whiz it home and put it in the garage and close the door. I and Jimmy go down later and start stripping the car. Nearly everything is sellable. You just have to find the right buyer. 

One night I opened the garage and nearly died of shock. Sitting there was a big shinny police car. I was frozen, paralysed for a moment. I charged into the house and  roared at the kids. “What have you done?“ In unison, they shouted. “April Fool, daddy. It’s just a Range Rover that we re-decorated it for you.”

I didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. Just then a horrible thought struck me. “Where did you get the blue flasher?”

Jimmy grinned. “Oh, we did nick that off a police car. The blues were busy in a house, and it only took a moment.” I wondered whether the police had GPS on their vehicle parts. Probably not. Just the same, it was a bit hot for me. I was still angry. But grounding them for a week would ruin the business.

Just then, the doorbell rang. Followed by hard knocking. Sounded too much like the police. I’d be inside for a few years. I sent the smallest girl to answer the door while  I hid behind the couch. Lizzy came back and signalled me that I had to come. “It’s the police,” she said. I went to the door and pulled it open. There was my wife, Cindy, with a big grin. She said, “April Fool! And it’s only the 28thof March!”

I thought to myself, You lot, just wait for April Fools’ Day. I, too, can play.

Rumours of Electricity

Our Gwen had an astonishing tale. She’s in service as a maid in the Manor House outside Cardiff and come home on leave to the Black Mountains. 

“Ma, a man from London came and said that they had some lights in the house called electricity made of tiny lightening. No candles. Not for Servants, of course. And there was talk that this electricity might light the streets and run machines and put people out of work.”

I told our Gwen not to be silly, but she went on about it. Then someone else in the village heard the same and everyone was talking. It sounded dangerous to me. There was that story about a man flying a kite on a wire when there was lightening. He was fried.

In our cottage after dark there is the fire, and if you have to leave that, there are candles. We sometimes have enough beeswax, but mostly tallow, and there is a lantern if my Alun has to go outside for the stock. Not that we need candles much, as nobody moves far from the firelight, even to eat supper. Peter and I have a bedroom but the children all sleep in the wall cots and mostly go to bed soon after dark. They chatter a lot and listen to the mice in the walls, though Gwladys is the only one who has enticed one out and made a pet.

The mad speculation about electricity went on. The Price boy even thought they could make a machine to push water uphill, but he’s none too bright and hates working the long pump for the high fields.

For what reason would you want an electric to light the house or cook or sweep? And how would it pump or plow or shepherd or butcher? We don’t even have the gas they have in Cardiff that lights streets but people in the city seem to get out at night and some of the gentry have ballrooms lit, Gwen says.

I am writing in Welsh, of course. I had some schooling some days when we weren’t snowed in. Gwen is translating it into English. She is a very bright girl, our Gwen, and may rise to be a Housekeeper one day.

My Alun carves candlesticks by firelight. And how would electric help him do that? I think these city people have too much money and invent ways of spending it.

They were talking in the ale house, and someone was asking the Teacher whether there was anything in the stories about machines doing work with electricity.

“Oh, no,“  he said, “God never planned anything like that for us. It’s against nature.” He roared with laughter. “Why, next thing you’ll be telling me there will be flying coaches!”

The Minister has come out against it, but then, he is against most things. We have to hide the magic charms in the corner of the fields secretly since he came. Some people say they don’t work, but why risk the crops?

Anyway, the whole electricity thing may be a fairy-tale, because the story comes from London, and, as you well know, you can’t trust the English.

DAYLIGHT DREAMS

Dream a rainbow. Long I gaze,

In a waterfall’s light haze,

as gleeful angels wildly play,

freely dancing in the spray. 

A cloud of golden butterflies

rise to shimmer in the skies,

a foretaste of the home of Light,

Glory rightly my delight.

Meanwhile, nappies, dirty dishes,

Lunch packs, kids, and lonely wishes.

While my heart hunts life divine,

I’ll hang the washing on the line.

© David Townsend

TIME FOR A CUPPA

When I was a child I wasn’t allowed to say “cuppa” at home. Aunt Mary said that it was working-class and vulgar and therefore should not be used.

She had all sorts of Rules for us boys. You didn’t leave the house unless wearing a tie. You stood up straight and behind adults when they were speaking to others. You always tipped a bowl outwards when eating. You always raised your cap when meeting adults. You never swore. It went on and on.

She ruled my home and her side of the family. But school holidays were an escape. I went to my grandparents in a country town. My grandfather owned a grocery shop. This was back in the forties. I was eleven and allowed to work behind the tobacco counter. You wouldn’t get away with it these days. My brother Tom was two years younger than me. He came to the shop but sat in the grain storeroom and read books. He was different.

Old men used to come in from farms or the hills and buy Plug tobacco. “Six blocks, boy. And don’t you ever smoke.” Grandad said that some of them used to shave the blocks with an axe to chew.

My grandfather was respectable. He was a Freemason and a Churchwarden, but he had a rough childhood in London. He didn’t stand on ceremony. There was always time for a cuppa in the shop. Not a smoke’o, that was for the outside workers. There was no smoking in the shop. Mind you, my grandfather smoked, even though he’d been a cement worker in Portland when he first came to Australia, and it damaged his lungs. In later years when he had an X-ray his lungs lit up like neon tubes.

A cuppa is sometimes a soother if there’s difficulty. It was part of everyday life. Not that we spent time thinking about it. We lived in Malvern. My father was an accountant and always busy. My mother had a haberdashery shop. Tom and I were sent to boarding school. I think this was part of Aunt Mary’s urging. Respectable boys went to boarding school.

I didn’t spend a lot of time with Tom as we grew older. He was a loner and always tense. I found out why one Christmas when I was eighteen. The whole family was there for Dinner, and afterwards, Tom said, “I have something to tell you all.”

There was an expectant silence, and he said, “I’m gay.”

There was a hair-raising silence. I looked at grandad. He seemed a little puzzled, as if he didn’t quite catch on to the problem. But my father looked as if he had been hit by lightning at the same time as something nasty had been inserted into a delicate part of his anatomy, his face frozen, just before a gigantic explosion.

There was a loud sigh, and Aunt Mary broke several Rules. “Jesus! I have a feeling it’s time for a cuppa.”

FOX FEVER

I was climbing out of a taxi in Collins Street in the City about 10.15 at night after a liaison meeting when I saw a thin dog flit across the street and disappear into a wall. I had heard of urban foxes, though the CBD was a bit much.

I went to the wall and there was a small trapdoor. I tapped it with my foot, and it swung. A foxhole? 

A friend of a friend worked for the City. I asked him about the trapdoor. “You’ve got fox fever,“ he said. “People see movement and shadows in the night in the city. It’s caused by car headlights reflected in windows. Optical delusion.” I wasn’t so sure.

“But,“ he said, ”there are all sorts of tunnels under the city. Right from the beginning. There were tunnels for the night-men, you know, sewage disposal. And for water pipes, electricity, phones and gas. Do you want to see some; maybe find your trap door?”

I said yes. It could be interesting.

At 9.30 on a Thursday morning, I met Ted Patterson at a side door of the Melbourne Town Hall. We entered and went down a flight of steps. He handed me a hard hat and a torch. Then he tapped a code on a pad at a door marked NO ADMITTANCE and we entered a tunnel. He had a map of sorts, and we began an exploration in the direction of the trapdoor.

It was dark, sooty and creepy and there were pipes of all sizes everywhere. Ted said, “You’ll have to stoop. The main tunnels were made for men about five foot three and then they put all these pipes in. The smaller tunnels are crawl spaces. We’ll avoid them.”

We moved into a tunnel where there was quite a bit of rubbish, and walking past a recess Ted called out, “Someone’s even left their boots here. Shit, there are legs in them!”

There were. Ted called the Police. Ted said, “You know, they can carbon date bodies and things to see how long they have been here. Could be hundred years or more.

“I don’t think that will be necessary,” I said. “They are Doc Martin’s boots and I recognize them. See the initials burnt on the sole. GF. That’s George Fenwick.”

There was a lot of noise and a Foreman arrived with a Police Sergeant. Ted helpfully opened the conversation saying, ‘He knows who it is.”

“Do you?” asked the Sergeant. “How’s that?”

“Met him a few times. Thought he had gone overseas.”

George’s forehead had a bullet hole so it was murder. I spent hours in a Police Station making statements and was then allowed home.

I went straight to my office, opened the safe, and removed an unregistered phone. I pressed a preset number. There were dial tones and whistles and clicks as it moved through sundry servers in the Dark Web.

A voice said, “Hello.” Maybe in South America. My cousin Ken.

“Ken, they have found George. It was me. I was chasing a fox under the City and I and the guide found him.”

“They say I’ve got a screw loose, but you beat that, chasing foxes under the City. Anyway, they can’t trace anything to me. Relax. There’s a really good restaurant above where you found the body. Try the Salmon, It’s fantastic.”

I didn’t say anything to anyone. We’re a family.

POEMS FROM THE LOCKDOWN

From Ward 6 , Farout Psychiatric Suite.

REFLECTIONS

I thought I saw a pussy cat

Sitting in a tree

But the tree was in a mirror

And the pussy cat was me.

I though I saw a yummy mouse

I leapt upon in fiercely

It really was a porcupine

And tasted rather beastly.

My doctor says that there’s some hope.

He’s given an injection

As well as half a dozen pills

I’ve swallowed in reflection.

The trouble is the mirror’s there

But on which side is me?

I tried to walk away from this 

But fell out of the tree.

Another person in my ward

Has got a mirror too.

It really is confusing now

Am I whom I view?

But reflecting back and forward

Through many a mirrored brain,

Has proved to me conclusively,

I’m absolutely sane.

   ©David Townsend 

CORONAVIRUS

I keep an open coffin
on the floor beside my bed
I’m hoping I won’t need it
until I’m really dead.

It’s this wicked coronavirus,
It’s got me rather worried.
With all the wild confusion
I’m becoming rather flurried.

Requiescat In Pace
isn’t what I want to hear
lying in the casket

nicely propped up on my bier.

The priest will speak quite nicely
to the ten that have been asked;
that’s provided it’s not raining
and they’re all grotesquely masked.

So I’m locked up in my office,
isolated from the crowd,
protected from the virus
alone with head unbowed

linked to the world by wireless
they call it Wi-Fi now.
I am universally present
so I think I’ll take a bow.

I’m still alive and kicking
The sun comes up each day
So join me on the internet,
And grow in a great way.

I’m dancing on the coffin lid
(temporarily replaced!)
It’s party time for all the world
The President’s* been disgraced,
displaced, etc. *Fill in your own choice,
writing in sand and then erase
because the CIA has universal access
to all computers and
They are watching you.

My psychiatrist says I’m paranoid,
I think that means I’m mad.
That is a super real diagnosis;
At last! Join me, I’m so glad!

    From Ward 6.

ADDer wandering

My Psychiatrist’s on home release
From a hospital with bars.
They say that it was all my fault;
nothing to do with Sars.

It seems that he lost his mind
while looking into mine.
Attention Deficit Disorder
And I can’t keep track of time,

Or anything else, really;
I’ve lost my list of lists,
and my powers of concentration
are somewhere in the pits.

Now my problem is a mind that leaps
from one thing to the next;
it switches sideways every phrase;
I can’t stick to a text.

It gets worse every moment;
it all comes out in verse.
I feel a poem coming on.
I’d better call the nurse.

He left me in the hospital.
Damn! My psychiatrist is free!
I thought for once I’d found a friend
to share the ward with me.

Rejection Sensitive Disphoria
just makes my life a pain.
I have to stop this poem now-
They’ve lost track of my brain.

Some ask about Disphoria.
It’s Greek for a heavy weight.
I thought that no one liked me;
That was a sad mistake.

Ha! Here is a solution.
I’ve re-aligned my mind
I’ve turned the whole thing inside out
I’m loved by all mankind.

David Townsend
  Ego sum laudatus

Dark Trade

Uncle Charly’s been released;
thirty days inside.
He had a set of handy tools
Only locksmiths can provide.

Three a.m. and all was dark;
along the street he slipped
when from a hedge a bobby leapt
and Charly boy was nicked.

It didn’t stop the family trade,
Charly saw to that.
He taught me skills that keep us fed,
I pick in seconds flat.

Of course, caronavirus means
I’m OK in a mask,
but people mostly stay at home
which complicates my task.

I’m very fond of cat doors
because I’m rather slim.
I slide quit easily through them,
there isn’t any din.

And animals just love me.
They never make a sound,
they think I’m just the sweetest thing,
They follow me around.

They lick my leg as I pocket
the jewelry from the drawer,
They let me lift a pile of cash,
They beg me, Take some more!

Of course you’re wondering
is it something Zen?
The truth is very plain, you see,
next year I’m turning ten.

My Family

I’m descended from an Emperor
and several Kings at least,
as well as Father Owen,
a naughty Irish Priest.

There were also Vikings,
Hit the West Isles like a flood.
They ravished all the villages.
I’ve got them in my blood.

A shipwrecked Spanish sailor,
the last one of his crew,
He married Gwen from Swansea,
which is why my eyes are blue.

I’ll mention Jack the goat-herd
and Lairds amongst the crags.
Then some Flemish weavers,
who brightened up our rags.

There also was a German;-
Came in sixteen forty-two.
Married Liz, the hatter’s daughter;
Children quite a few.

Then, Moish had come from Lebanon,
a Rabbi on the run.
Hardly got to London Town,
before he had a son.

I’ve got this great collection,
A family tree that grew,
that proves beyond a trace of doubt:
I’m British through and through.

The Davies Goat

I’ve come to the end of my tether,
I’m a lonesome Billy Goat.
I’ve chewed my way through the pasture
and come to the end of the rope.

There’s a bunch of delicious berries
four tail-lengths more away.
I’ve been really puffing and straining;
can’t get them into play.

I strain and contemplate them:
They’re something that I miss.
It’s rather like the feeling
There’s more to life than this.

There’s a rumour down the goat-vine-
(we never get a grape)
we once roamed free on mountains
and even on the Cape.

My mother was a Spanish goat
My father came from Wales.
A Davies from Glamorgan,
or so I’ve heard the tales.

We once roamed free and blissful
upon the open hills
and leapt from rock to hillock
undaunted by the spills.

We leapt from every outcrop
Our hair flaired in the rush,
We chased excited Nanny goats
Across the Hindu Kush.

It’s just genetic memory,
Day-dreaming in the sun,
But maybe there’s a heaven
where we goats can run.

He’ll need us up there anyway
to lead the Sheep in line.
And I think I heard there’s mountains;
Mind adrift in Bible-time.

Uh, huh! Here comes trouble,
Now it’s ‘walkies’ to the barn.
Little Charlie’s got a tow-rope.
They’ll comb me for my yarn.

I know we’ll meet again one day
chomping through the grass
Meanwhile I’ll butt this aweful boy
he has a tempting arse!

MIDWINTER

In the bleak Midwinter
Far beneath the snow
Elves have built an igloo
In a place they know.
 

Warm burn golden oil lamps
Tended by a gnome,
Dozens of hydrangeas
In the perfect loam.

Pruned and dressed for winter
Here they quietly rest
Hibernating sweetly
Forming powerful zest

To burst forth in spring-time,
Glory of the earth
Beauty multi-coloured
heaven’s bliss to birth.

Very close to heaven,
here Dave’s heart is girth,
beauty stored to leaven
gardens of the earth.

Skipped coronavirus
as their heart is strong!
Metered multi-distant,
Best way to belong.