Sixty-Six Words

Writing to some arbitrary rule is a practice technique. Not including the title, every word counts, except hyphenated words (such as sixty-six) count once.

The first poem is a Shakespearean sonnet in honor of a summer festival. Thus, it had be fourteen lines of iambic pentameter, rhymed ababcdcdefefgg, as well as exactly sixty-six words.

Of all the remaining stories, two have been published.

Guess which ones!

December storm shakes piers along the coast;
Poetic immortality releases
From residence ephemeral, a ghost;
Anon the tempest culminates, then ceases.
Astonished, but avoiding confrontation,
Pedestrians pass by, averting glances;
Regrettably, his eerie emanation
Eliminates communication chances.
With countenance eternally in sorrow,
Restricted by historical renown,
Through everlasting triplets of tomorrow,
He wanders surreptitiously through town,
Imagining an incarnation scheme,
Aspiring to sleep - perchance to dream.

Mmph was all she could utter, mouth filled with frigid pain slowly working its way along her teeth past the bridge of her nose to the eye sockets, as her three year old child, to whom she had just said, "There's no more ice cream left, we finished it all yesterday," wandered into the kitchen and gaped with silent wonder at such a blushing, tearful mother.

Such horror watching poultry in a pen,
Arrayed like cattle, ultimately branded.
Let freedom ring for every cock and hen!
It's evident strong action is demanded.
We'll set those corporation farmers straight,
With protests, pleas, petitions, truth, or lies,
And angry demonstrations and debate,
Until each captive sees the open skies.
Don't coop them up in tiny little boxes!
Let's liberate the chickens, said the foxes.

"Sis?"

"What? I'm in the other room."

"Your baby is biting my nose."

"What? You sound funny."

"I said, your baby is biting my nose."

"Oh. He's teething."

"Well, it hurts."

"Of course teething hurts!"

"I mean, my nose hurts."

"What? Your nose hurts? Are you coming down with a cold? And you're letting my baby play with your nose? Honestly, you men are so irresponsible."

Halftime on a hot day. At the drinking fountain are twin girls, maybe five years old, in pinafores. It looks like they just arrived from Mexico, so I try my textbook Spanish.

"Buenos dias, señoritas. Tengo sed y quería beber del agua."

"¡No, señor! Aún jugamos con nuestros botes."

The nerve! The textbook said that Mexican kids respect their elders. What's the Spanish word for brats?

She sprawled across my couch, languidly watching the fireplace. I hinted that it was time for her to go. No response. She just looked at me with those big, brown eyes.

Again I called the number. This time, it was answered.

"You have a dog named Ginger? She sneaked in through my patio door and I can't get her out. Can you come and get her?"

Thwump. That's the sound a soccer player makes when tripped.

I rolled over, and stared up at a little girl. "Don't take the ball away from my daddy!" she yelled, then kicked me.

"Yow!" I shrieked, as she pursued me down the field. "Referee! Foul! Get this kid away from me!"

But he saw nothing at all, as mothers along the sidelines cheered, "Go, Ariel, go!"

Thwump. I was here before, fifteen years ago. This time, a whistle.

"The way she decked you," says the ref, "Must have been retaliation for something awful. So I'm calling it against you."

"What! I did nothing. I just told Ariel that she might have grown up to be a good-looking young lady, if it weren't for the tattoos and nose rings. Whaddya mean, yellow card?"

So this Samaritan says to me, "Look, Jesus, your workmanship is just fine. But I don't care who your dad is, I can get it cheaper down the street." Let me tell you, ever since those Romans globalized trade, I've been undersold by Greek imports. If this goes on much longer, I'm going to have to give up the carpentry shop and find a new career.

"I'm looking for the boss. Is he around?"

The woman's glance said Die, chauvinist pig.

"Wait! You have a coffee cup in each hand. The boss would not be fetching coffee for others. A female boss would not order her subordinate to fetch coffee. Therefore, your boss is male. I'll find him myself."

Moral: Pigs who lie and run away, live to oink another day.

Fog. A great book started with that word.

Other possibilities would be rain or thunder. Better yet, sin. Right off the top of my head, I cannot think of any great story that doesn't have sin as its underlying theme, from start to finish. Do something bad; it has bad consequences; it is eventually paid back.

But never, ever, drizzle. No great book starts with that.

"You must play soccer," I observed.

"Yes!" she said, with flashing eyes. "I have the right legs."

That's for sure, I thought.

"I played in college," she continued flashingly. "My father taught me when I was little."

Sure a big girl now, I thought.

"In fact," she flashed, "Dad still plays. Do you know Johannus?"

"Uh, yeah. We, uh, play on the same, uh, over-40 team."

"Green! I win!"

"No, sweetie. That's blue."

"Green!"

The deal is, I mind my sister's pre-schooler while she's out, and she feeds me when she gets back.

"Sweetie, this is green, and that's blue."

"Green! I win!"

For the third time, I yielded. My sister returned.

"Sis, I thought you told me junior knows his colors?"

"Sure he does," she said. "But he cheats at Candyland®."

"Good day," the Russian tourist said to me. "Where is the KKK clubhouse?"

"Uhhh...," I replied, "What do you expect there?"

"Religious ceremony with burning cross, then keg party. I'm not religious," he confided. "But maybe I get free beer?"

"Oh. Well then, go three blocks, then turn left."

Away he went. I don't know what he found where I indicated. By then, I was gone.

"I know you don't like baloney but it was on sale so I got the family pack. You should eat more, you're so skinny. The last time I bought this, I had to eat it all myself because it's a shame to waste food. How come you stay so thin? Me, I can't stop putting on weight. I don't know why. Must be metabolism or something."

I bought my coffee, and glanced around the shop. Sitting in a high chair, looking at a picture book, was a three year old boy. He seemed to be very entertained by what he saw. So I strolled over, and peeked.

"Oh, that's soccer," I said, in my sweetest voice. "I play soccer."

He looked up at me, and in his sweetest voice said, "I don't."

"The retirees have nothing to do, so they come and feed the fish. There are so many of them, and they're really fat," she said.

The fish, or the retirees? I thought.

"They just mope around all day, waiting to be fed."

The fish, or the retirees? I thought.

"Why don't you bring a fishing pole?"

"No thanks," I said. "I don't play bin.., er, fish."

"Junior won't eat anything unless it's gourmet. What have you done?"

"Oh. Yesterday, I made a gourmet meal: macaroni and cheese shaped like a dinosaur, with parsley scales."

"Well, he's carrying on today. Cookie? Milk? Apple? No, gourmet!"

She would soon tell me how, when she was ten, her little brother (me) demanded gourmet food. It probably never happened, but I knew I'd hear it anyway.

Weekdays, she boards an inconvenient bus, joins her boyfriend in back, and snuggles up. He gets off at work. From the terminal, she boards the bus to the junior college, snuggling up when boyfriend number two gets on. Throughout this journey, I pretend to see nothing.

I often wonder what happens on weekends. An old Four Preps song, Down by the Station, runs through my head.

Honey, I want you, he thought, hoping his plea would curve beyond the horizon. Honey, I need you, he thought, hoping his intensity would power to the distant Pacific, where his love coyly loitered amidst the tropics, stroked by soft, admiring breezes. Honey please, he begged, when an angry storm lashes your crest and hurls you home, I'll don my best wetsuit and treat you right.

At first in the beginning, there
Was chaos, water, earth, and air;
Eventually, so they say,
Came protoplasmic DNA.

Much later, we evolved somehow;
Then history occurred, to now.
But intermediate events
Seem utterly devoid of sense.

So existential blame is laid
Upon a deity, who made
A universe of pain and woe,
Then exited a while ago.

Enlightenment? The Rise and Fall?
Unnecessary details, all.