Content copyright . N Di Canio. All rights reserved.
SALLY THE TITMOUSE
Sally was a titmouse who lived in a tree house, she would make bread and her favorite color was red. She knew nothing and that made her quite sad, at least she did not think she did so every day before she went to bed, she would read and put more facts into her head. Sally did not think she knew anything worth knowing, yet on one breezy winter day when the wind was blowing she suddenly realized there was a lot more to know than just how cold it had to be before it can be snowing.
Sally sat down and wrote out a list or two, stating quite clearly all the facts that she knew. From top to bottom and A to Z, the shy titmouse realized she knew more than she thought could be. The list grew and grew until it took up two pages both front and back, and Sally put it up on her wall with a tack. She read it thoroughly over and through, making sure every thing on it was correct and true. As she read she realized she knew more than she thought she ever knew.
She knew where to eat, at the finest high branched places, and if they were closed, she would be blue but she knew how to forge for food if she had to. Sally the titmouse knew where her friends lived, Rodney the skunk in his hole in the ground and Mandy the bear in her cave so snug and round. She knew what to say when she met faces, both familiar and new. Wave and smile and say how do you do, and make sure her voice was genuine and true.
Sally the little gray titmouse who lived in a tree house thought she did not know a single thing at all until she went outside and almost took a fall. She opened her wings as fast, as could be, using her tail for balance and she soared back to the limb of her tree. Shy though she was Sally was smart, and all her friends knew she had a very big heart.
Sally sat at her desk at night and stared at the list, thinking each day if there was something she missed. She thought hard and long, reading each line to see if it was wrong. No mistake could she find as on to the white pages she peered, and at last she was cheered for she was not as ignorant and lacking of knowledge as she feared. She smiled and sat back in her chair no longer sad, for she had discovered that she knew more than she thought she had.
Gouge the Green
Skin, tough unyielding Protection
Wounded, Bleeding Life’s
Red Fluid.
Sweet Meat, Divine
Meeting of Laughing Eyes
Parted Lips
The Joy of Smiling
Combined Taste of Happiness
Rich in Hours of Merriment.
And now…
Genetically engineered Fruit.
No Seeds.
The Perfect Melon?
Or
A Friendship with no Growth?
Carrot Dreams
I ran and ran until I thought my legs would fall off. Still it was after me, I could feel its hot billowing breath just behind my collar. I could all but feel the sharp needle claws in my throat, ready to slice my precious blood from me. To drink my jugular vein dry. Still I ran, and still it followed me. For every foot I ran it gained an inch. Soon it would have me and I would be too weak to defend myself. I made up my mind. No matter what I did, run or fight, it would get me. I was as good as claimed; so I turned to fight it with my dying strength. In a desperate battle I would surely not win. I stopped and turned in my tracks and found myself face to face with it. Its huge claws seemed to glow in the moonlight. I could see every curve and every cold gleaming hard-edged blade and screw in its bottomless mouth. I could see through the transparent body and just make out its snakelike tail. Its bottom half was dark and square, looming like the faceless chunk of metal it was. I swallowed, and it let out an ear-shattering screech. Its prey was gotten. The snakelike tail reached down and wrapped itself around me, drew me up like a lump of decayed vegetable. Then I was thrown violently into the transparent interior, toward the rotating blades. To my doom. In the blender’s belly!
