2.12.08

a little tale

I went into the woods in my sleep. It was early morning, almost 4am and I could hear the birds whispering to each other in the trees. I didn't remember to put any shoes on when I left my bed, so I was very quiet on the path. I crept up a Madrone tree. Climbed to the top. It was too dark to see the branches and I fell back to the ground. Both of my legs had turned into shapes I couldn't make out. They shuffled and slid beneath me. I felt surrounded by the dark. It was penetrable, but thick.

Later I found myself sleeping again in a narrow space between two stumps. Moss had grown over my arms and I was fixed to this place. I tried to pull the moss off. I grappled giant stretches of it, but every time I pulled away at it, more would take its place. It smelled like a ship in the night. I began to worry that I might miss breakfast.

The birds woke up and ate away the moss. They started to sing the breakfast song. I was hungry. They gave me some eggs which I put in my pocket.

The light began. The woods looked like woods instead of the thick dark space. I crawled. There was a sound like the breathing of a snake. It leaked through the branches and nearer. When I turned around there was a beast. It was extremely old and had the body of a white whale. It croaked as if it were made of wood. It had the feet of a pacaderm. It spoke in the hissy snake voice and pushed against my knees. It told me to give it the eggs so I did. I put them in the dirt by its snout and I waited to see what would happen.

It ate them very slowly.

I was sort of disappointed. It shook its whale fur coat and made a circle before it lay down on my path. It breathed with great huffs of its back.

I left it with the egg shells.

In the morning I woke up to find out I was still very hungry. I made a strawberry toast sandwich. We were out of eggs.

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