Giving Thanks.

 

Giving thanks is simple, yet

I so often do forget

to discover blessings small --

and that God's behind them all.

The Unauthorized Autobiography of Me. Section One.

 

The back porch where I was born.

"The little piece you have just sent is good and very interesting. The last two lines are especially engaging. I almost said they cracked me up—but in reality that’s not what their effect was. What I felt was more a sense of admiration and pleasure at the artistry and cleverness, along with delight in the small puff of somewhat elusive insight into your way of thinking.

 

Having said that, the overall “sense” of this poem is VERY unclear because it goes all over the place, and some lines (unless their plain sense is deceptive) contradict others. I would have to talk to you to find out what your point really is, apart from “I do what I want to do and if you don’t like it, you can go to another trough.”

 

In any case, it saddens me that, if I’m catching your vibes, you don’t really want feedback, feedback that I believe would be helpful, if you were willing to consider it."

I start this story

which may or may not

belong to me

with an email from

a friend.

Tomorrow, I think,

he may just be a ride

to the Provo Rec Center.

So many helpful critics in my life.

So few close enough to warm

yet distant enough not to chafe.

Maybe it's because my parents

never let me have a dog.

If I was born, I don't remember it.

If it's all just a dream,

I will row away with a girl

on each oar.

I don't know if my father

Donald Sylvester Torkildson

was at my birth.

I doubt it.

Sometimes, as a child,

I doubted if my mother

Evelyn Marie Gagne Torkildson

was there either.

My very first memory

is of writing this prose poem.

Before that, all is supposition

and myth.

I was poisoned from the beginning.

Winston. Salem. Alpine. Tareyton. 

So many cigarette brands used by

the adults in my life;

in closed quarters during long winters --

it was like being incarcerated in the

proverbial 'smoke-filled room'

of political lore.

It was thought that if a candle 

were lit all the tobacco smoke

would be eaten up by the flame

and become harmless.

I cough myself awake most mornings.

Why was I born?

Ah, the first big question!

Requiring a flippant and

deceiving reply?

I was born to make people laugh.

And to make them cry.

And to get them riled up.

And so so often to bore them.

and puzzle them.

And finally I was born because

a fantastic plan is in place --

a cosmic conspiracy involving 

the whole human race.

And I am a crucial part.

As are you.

My mother had two boys before me.

Leonard and Billy.

She had two girls after me.

Sue Ellen and Linda.

So I was the pivot.

The hinge of fate.

The toad in the hole.

The world revolved around me

until my mother slapped me

when I was six.

For sticking my tongue

out at her and not eating 

my Maypo, which I had

begged her to buy for me

because it looked so delicious

on the TV commercials.

But it was just oatmeal.

Nothing special.

Why didn't my mother

recognize how cheated I felt

at that moment?

I need to hijack 

the Way Back Machine

to tell her I was frustrated

and disappointed, but not at

her -- at the Maypo, mom!

The Maypo!

So much of my life has been Maypo . . . 

A Prophet Speaks This Very Day

 

President Russell M. Nelson.

A prophet speaks this very day;

and will we hear what he will say?

Or will our worldly disbelief

so rob us of his good relief?

A humble heart, not analytic,

will make believers of each critic!

 

Today's timericks.

 

I'm using all the brains I have to get by nowadays/I doubt if it is ten percent -- I'm always in a haze/The rest of my grey matter's on a permanent vacation/It's incommunicado at some tropical location.

Pastors want their churches open, it is plain to me/so they keep on working and collecting a fat fee/Idle clergy do not get much manna from the Lord/and empty pews give clergy but a trivial reward.

The elephant has sad old eyes/and so it comes as no surprise/when eccentrics guarantee/the animal's humanity/But if I were a pachyderm/that would really make me squirm/Since humans are so very cruel/and rarely live the Golden Rule.

Free radicals are after me/so full of rank duplicity/in my bloodstream they do lurk/doing hemic dirty work/hurry, mountebanks, to me/with your nostrums gluten free!

I love scallions, yes I do/but if I should breathe on you/your reaction is to make/faces at me like a hake/so I'll switch to garlic corm/as my staple snacking norm. 

Inside the house I wear my shoes/because bare feet are bugaboos/they pick up lint and turn all black/and I might step upon a tack/If I could float like Voldemort/I'd take 'em off like a good sport.

Today's Timericks

 

I love sauerkraut, you bet/yet I often do regret/eating it so late at night/with a fiendish appetite/I have dreams that Hitler would/call a reason for sainthood.

Sore losers come in many shapes/gnashing on their sour grapes/but the current prize goes to/a certain White House bugaboo/he's so brittle and unreal/he sounds just like a glockenspiel.  

Don't travel on Thanksgiving/that's the word from CDC/just stay at home relaxing/watching football on TV/Order Chinese takeout, with a six pack on the side/and if you grow despondent/try a little cyanide. 

state governments are trying many things to fight the plague/but somewhere 'long the line they're still a-thinkin' mighty vague/they're closing schools, then curfews start/but ask them to shut down/biznesses again and all you get's an angry frown.

Rudy Giuliani is a bedbug crazy guy/who leads his legal team to doom while hollering 'banzai!'/he hasn't got a chance in hell, but that won't stop the suits/he's filing like a madman for the client and his mutes.  

The grave shall have no victory

 

No victory goes to the grave;

Christ our Savior all will save --

some to great estate beyond,

while others their estate have pawned --

but all will resurrected be

I testify most happily. 

Today's timericks.

 

The scourge of nighttime peace and rest/Insomnia comes like a guest/unbidden and unwelcome too/who stays no matter what I do/The only way I find repose/is writing soporific prose.

Christian Krebs could just not learn/never to speak out of turn/He was fired for this vice/by a leader thick as gneiss/It just shows that solid truth/goes down with some like cheap vermouth.

Museums mild and peaceful are/only if they have a bar/where the patrons can imbibe/and avoid all diatribe/Beauty lasts forever, but/right now I prefer rotgut.

Democrats have sadly learned/that they will get badly burned/when they cry "Defund Police"/Voters want to keep the peace/They'll put up with bad cops cuz/it's better than all lack of fuzz.  

Presidents will always gripe/that the press is full of hype/Republican or Democrat/the press ignores their caveat/Is it any wonder they/wish the press would go away?

New York City public schools are closing up again/tighter than an oil drum or a Puritan's 'amen'/When they may reopen is a question for the ages/So I wonder who will pay their idle teacher's wages?

In Congress Republicans snort/their leader is coming up short/With tweet after tweet/he discounts defeat/and thinks that he's going to court.  

Love the truth and be not shaken

 

Love the truth and be not shaken;

Christ this world has not forsaken.

When all others fail and stumble,

God above sustains the humble.

Today's timericks.

 

"I suspect you could help some of the journalists cut down their longer ramblings to more focused pieces..."

James Mackintosh. Journalist, Wall Street Journal.  

A vaccine against ignorance/or maybe even greed/is what investors ought to seek/and what we ought to breed/there is no cure for folly/and inoculations fail/to keep the market steady/or the borrowing to scale.

Like a drunken sailor, Uncle Sam used PPP/to paint the nation ochre with a monetary spree/but bankruptcies are spreading and small bizness goes kerplop/with the sound of shuttered doors at ev'ry other shop. 

Cardboard boxes fill the land/Amazon is feeling grand/when recycled, all those boxes/makes good paper, mulch for phloxes/books and cups and straws galore/let's stay at home and shred some more!

The Senate's warning Zuckerberg and others of his kind/that they expect to see their platforms quickly more refined/to stop the silly rumors and the mongering of hate/otherwise the Senate will . . . continue to just prate. 

The Wand of Odemer: A Farcical Fantasy. Chapter Three.

 

CHAPTER THREE.

Designing a dragon by committee,

and dealing with the powerful

Clang Bakers' Guild.

A few days after the last chapter, just as word was beginning to spread about the wonders of socks, Brumpton summoned his demon servant Mortlock for a conference. Mortlock had been out in the park that surrounded the wizard's decrepit castle, roaring and ripping up the ground with claws that threw clods of dirt a mile or more. This was a regular activity for the demon; who might otherwise vent unwisely in the presence of his master. His master knew about this activity, which played hob with the shrubbery and fruit trees, but, as he told the demon one day when both were in pleasant moods, could he but rent Mortlock out to local farmers to harness and then plow their lands there'd be a pretty penny in it.

But no pretty pennies were in evidence today. Brows beetled once again, the wizard curtly explained to Mortlock that his bootless efforts at protecting the Wand of Odemer had led to a fine pickle of fish -- they were both in danger of the King's wrath. Not that the King could do much to a wizard as eldritch and mighty as Brumpton; it was just the look of the thing -- so embarrassing to be called on the carpet about it. So a diversion was needed -- something to keep the King from summoning a Grand Council and then discovering that the great Wand was AWOL. 

"So we are going to Clinton Hill, where I may counsel with my fellow sages and mages in complete secrecy about the matter" the wizard informed his demon servant, bidding him get things ready for the trip.

*********************

At the same time, King Tubal and Queen Wannamaker were already  involved in a diversion that promised to keep their minds off the Wand of Odemer for a long time.

The powerful and ruthless Guild of Clang Bakers had sent their Guild Master, the worshipful Osip Greenland, to haughtily inform the king that, things being as they were -- with plague raging in the North and barbarians raging in the South and pirates infesting their East coast -- the Guild was giving serious thought to replacing the King and Queen with a new set of royalty imported from a kingdom in the far West, such as Odalum.

Instead of having Greenland's head chopped off for such insulting impertinence, King Tubal graciously bowed his head and said he hoped the Guild would not be too hasty in having him and his Queen removed from their thrones. Then he offered Greenland a cup of tea.

How did this mere baker, with white flour dust drifting from his clothes, come to dictate such terms to his monarch? Very simple -- clang bread was the very bone and marrow of all Vanillia. Without it, the country would wilt away like hoar frost.

You see, clang is a very special kind of a bread. Most bread, as is well known, grows stale and moldy, becoming inedible, the longer you keep it. But clang was just the opposite -- like a fine wine or premium cheese, the longer it aged the better it tasted, and when it finally turned black after about two years it was considered more delicious and healthful than anything else in the world. It was an imperishable commodity that only grew in value the older it got. And all of Vanillia ate it at every meal. For the humble, it was often the only thing they ate. The clang bakers, who carefully guarded the recipe so that no outsider ever learned it, never charged exorbitant prices for a loaf of clang. All could afford it whenever they wanted it. And they wanted it all the time. "As reliable as clang" was a saying on the lips of everyone in the kingdom when they needed to reassure one another of something or someone who was considered iffy. And right now the King and Queen were considered iffy by the Guild of Clang Bakers, and not as reliable as a single crumb of clang -- and if they decided to pull the plug on the daily clang in protest of the King and Queen's policies and practices, the populace would undoubtedly pull the plug on the King and Queen in short order. 

"But what about our beloved Infant Heir?" cried out the Queen in anguish. 

"Well, what about the Infant Heir" replied Greenland, with a disdainful shrug. "You see one baby, you've seen 'em all. We wants no babies interfering with our internal affairs, anyways. We've lined up a swell pair of royalty in Odalum, without any offspring, and they promise to toe the Guild line -- hook, line and sinker!"

"But our Infant Heir is entitled to respect, remuneration, and rank and file protection!" the Queen continued stubbornly, ignoring the King's frantic hand signals to be quiet and let him get a word in edgewise. 

"You've had me final offer, then" asserted Greenland with a calm finality. "Things must improve in the North, in the South, and especially along the East coast -- to stop them thieving pirates from robbing us of all the incoming grain we need to make clang for the hungry masses. Do so quickly -- or start packing."

Greenland stalked out, without even touching his buttered clang and cup of tea.

"I think I'd like an apple and a slice of cheese right about now" the King said quietly to his servant, who bowed low and went out.

"Oh, how can you think about food when the Infant Heir is about to be displaced!" cried the Queen.

"How can I not?" asked the King wearily. "As things stand, it may be the last good meal any of us get for a long time to come . . . "

******************************

Once arrived at Clinton Hill, Brumpton went into immediate conference with his spell casting peers in an ancient watch tower at the edge of a poisonous green swamp, where there was no chance they could be overheard.

Now, as I said earlier, the minds of witches, warlocks, sorcerers, necromancers, and wizards, are a closed book unto me. They never allow their minds to be read by anyone, and so their thoughts are an eternal mystery. They do, however, take meticulous minutes at their meetings , and I just happen to have a copy of those particular minutes. Which I will now share with you. Unfortunately the first few pages were used to wrap up a large carp some years ago, so I will have to pick up about halfway through the meeting:

It was moved and seconded that a dragon would be summoned, refurbished, and trained to fly about the countryside causing terror and general chaos but not any damage to life or limb, in order to discompose the royal couple and postpone the Grand Council meeting until the Wand of Odemer could be located and secured.

Grimber the Great then suggested the dragon's color be green, with shades of purple down it's pointy spine. After some debate, this point was taken up and approved.

Mendenhall the Modest then suggested that the dragon be given a cast in one of its' eyes to keep it biddable, but this was shouted down by all present, and Mendenhall was escorted out of the watch tower by the sergeant at arms, and then set on fire for a few minutes to teach him a lesson.

Miss Honeypenny asked if the dragon could be used to deliver packages when not busy combusting the countryside. After considerable debate it was decided that such activities would be too demeaning for such a titanic creature. Miss Moneypenny apologized to the group for her 'daft' idea (her own word for it)and voluntarily withdrew into a corner, where she buttered willow wands for the remainder of the day. Her sister, Miss Grackle, then proposed a break for lunch and pinochle. The meeting stood adjourned until 3 p.m. that afternoon.

Promptly at 3 p.m. the matter of how many heads the dragon should have was earnestly discussed. Brumpton the Mangle Heaver stated his opinion that a three-headed dragon would not be fully appreciated by the simple folk of the countryside. Eric the Pink countered that a dozen heads might be just the thing; giving the local yokels something to tell their grandchildren about. At this point someone threw a chair at our committee leader Thurston Thundercloud, and all hell broke loose. When the dust had settled it was discovered that someone had made off with the dessert cart. By unanimous vote it was decided that whoever threw the chair did it as a distraction so they could hijack the dessert cart, and the meeting was adjourned sine die. 

An ad hoc committee was then formed, consisting of Brumpton the Mangle Heaver, Gristlebone Buttonfingers, Miss Marpole, and Black Eustace, to hunt down and capture a small and defenseless dragon to feed vitamins to until it was built up enough to begin a reign of terror swooping about and roaring like anything. The ad hoc committee decided the dragon would have no head at all, be bleached white, have its wings clipped so it couldn't escape, and be named Pooty. 

A good time was had by all.   

In the event, no dragon was ever captured or summoned or trained, or, thank goodness, named 'Pooty.' Word finally reached the sages and mages that the King and Queen were in danger of being deposed in a bloodless coup, which would keep them busier than ants at a funeral for the time being.

A few of the mages and sages angrily confronted Brumpton, upbraiding him for wasting their valuable time. But in reality wizards and witches, and all their ilk, always have plenty of time on their hands, since they rarely do much of anything for anyone else. Most are content, apparently, to perform something strange and dazzling once a year, and then call it a day. Brumpton, for instance, caused mincemeat pies to rain down on the royal castle  during the winter solstice, and could rarely be bothered to exert himself otherwise. He himself never gave an explanation as to why he had riled things up by snatching the Wand of Odemer from the evil grasp of Eustace the Black, thus starting a great and tedious cycle of recrimination and revenge -- but his demon servant Mortlock was overheard more than once saying that his master needed the wand to solve a particularly tricky jigsaw puzzle. And besides, King Tubal had commanded the finding and keeping of it -- and Brumpton was under a spell cast by King Tubal's grandfather to obey his grandson in all things. 

Or it may have been Just One Of Those Things that people talk about long after any interest in it has evaporated. Like quoits.