Salt and Pepper Short Stories and Poems

by Susan Sowerby

  Dragonfly Smoke

  Susan Sowerby

  A shimmering, delicate, mortal

  Vanishes like smoke

  Fleeting beauty gone

  A cruel cosmic joke

  I live in the middle of nothing

  For nothing everything is

  A thought in a dreaming mind

  Who cares nothing for this?

  My hectic head, aches for sense

  My heart begs rest in non-sense

  Between the two, I learn to dance

  Nature’s religion - Balance

  Upon a tight rope taut with stress

  Embracing a pilgrim’s loneliness

  Yearning for wings with the power to express

  Freedom’s wild restlessness

 

  In a stormy search for the core of love

  Below I’m told, is as Above

  Eternal truth of futures past

  Is found anew,

  By each,.

  At last.

  ##

  Vampire in the bottle

  Susan Sowerby

  Once you danced, sweet princess

  Holding fast your man

  You walked together through life’s maze

  Strolling hand in hand

  But now Sherrie, you dare not look

  Into your lovers eyes

  You see a mocking stranger there

  Wearing his disguise

  Grief shatters you, why should I care?

  For I’m the new ring master

  I crack the whip and you will dance

  Faster Sherrie, Sherrie, Faster

  I love it when you mirror me

  It triggers sweet despair

  He beats you when he cannot face

  My dark reflection there

  How can he partner you, Sherrie?

  While he is slave to me

  Another swinging marionette

  Upon my brewery tree

  Just a slight of hand, my sweet

  No time for social graces

  I’m out of the bottle and he is in!

  I’ve cleverly switched our places

  The tune is mine, and I say dance!

  Your man is yours no more

  He can’t resist my dominance

  Sherrie, you’ve lost the war

  Oh! Help me quench a vampire’s thirst,

  M’dear, what can I do?

  His wine red blood is not enough

  For now I yearn for you

  Forsake yourself and turn to me

  Sherrie I’ll take you there

  Sons and mothers wives and lovers

  All makes tasty fair

  So drown your sorrow little one

  Your every need I’ll meet

  Come to me, my sad Sherrie

  Your flesh is young and sweet

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  The Search of the Fool

  Susan Sowerby

  Life has meaning I haven’t found

  'Its Tirra Lirra River' gets me down

  So I walk the streets a friend to hale

  And meet a man without a pail

  Who milks a cow which sups up ale

  From a huge and crumpled horn

  I ask of him how he will drink

  Without a pail, without a sink

  What he’s about I cannot think

  He cries

  ‘Sit down and hear my tale’

  ‘Once life had meaning,’ comes his sigh

  ‘Then looking on the world one dye

  I saw its meaning by and by

  Is only what I give it.’

  Assaulted by that meddlesome thought

  My mind lies empty holding naught

  I cannot think of what to do

  So I sit and talk to you

  Which is of course,

  Meaningless.’

  ‘Is such a thought of any use?’

  I ask of this strange recluse

  ‘Exactly!' I've already said

  'What use to be alive or dead?’

  His words needle me

  I sit and stare a little while

  Completely blank and out of style

  My new coat dabbles in the dirt

  As he milks his cow another squirt

  And gazes wisely down

  Say I, ‘I’ve sat here long enough

  I need to go and do my stuff

  Yet don't know why I’m doing it

  I feel I’m just a senseless twit

  Going round and round and round’

  So if you see an odd little man

  Who milks a cow without a can

  Do not stop, don’t ask him why

  Hide your questions, walk on by

  Or you’ll never be the same.

  Tomorrow I will pack my bag

  Roll my blanket, strap my swag

  And walk out in the empty day

  To see if I can find my way

  In a world that’s lost its Meaning

  ###