Kiotae

I had the pleasure of reading several installments at Poetry on X in Dallas Friday night. Thanks to the hosts Carlos and Opalina for a great event and thanks to everyone who was there for the great reception!

Thank you to everyone who has enjoyed reading Tales of Coyote Four. The support has been wonderful.

Anton Janse (from the Netherlands):

The tales did me remember an almost forgotten era. The earth was still flat and we could speak with the animals.
A story from that period tells us the adventures from Hans and Grietje, grandma and the angry big wolf, all around the cookies house.
Sometimes I wish that those world still existed !
Compliments,
Anton.

One person who has seen what’s coming, said:

You revel in the unusual, the dark.
You see, recognize, identify and can portray the unusual, the weird, the struggle, the dark.
… (you) can travel down there, to that and bring it back…

Thank you. House, Cat and company are going in interesting and strange directions. Please share with others and know: more comes.

He didn’t talk. People would say hi and sometimes he would wave as he walked. Since he didn’t talk, some people had to give him a name. Some people took to calling him Angel.

He had a cell phone but he never called anyone (since he didn’t talk) and no one ever called him (since he didn’t talk… and… no one had his number).

The one thing he did do was send text messages. He poked letters, numbers then send. And then, he would keep walking until a reply came back.

Sometimes, he would look at the message and stop. Usually, he’d read it again and then turn and walk to someone and show them the message. Sometimes people would tell Angel what to send back.

Every once in a while, it would turn into a conversation. Angel would show the message and whoever he’d walked up to would give angel a message to send back. And then Angel waited for a reply to show back. It would keep going like that: back and forth.

Certain people received more messages. And one in particular… was really really good at having long conversations: the Storyteller. House liked how her Storyteller knew how to talk and how to listen, too. Even though they had to read them, they still had to be listening when they did. Not everyone knew how to listen (even when they could read the message again and again).

Storyteller?

Storyteller knew how to listen.

After he rescued Mrs. Gerelbahrd’s Squark and told Cat about his day and put out an orange fire in a tree house and filled up the firetruck and put out an avacado fire in Dog’s Garden and stopped a leaky fire hydrant from flooding the park, Joey the Fireman was especially grumpy.

When he realized it was almost dawn, he got even grumpier.

Then he remembered it was April First and he had to help Caterpilar today.

He got grumpier.

Darn April First.

Grumble.

He decided if he was going to be up before dawn, he’d wake up Caterpillar’s other friends… and get them grumpy, too.

So he went and used his ladder to get Caterpillar’s cocoon down out of the tree. Then he went and got Caterpillar’s friends.

But the sun isn’t even up, they kept saying.

But Caterpillar’s already fallen out of the tree. We said we’d help him get out of his cocoon if he can’t do it and falls out of the tree. Remember how worried he got about getting out?

Now Caterpillar’s other friends were Grumpier, too.

When they got back to Caterpillar the sun still wasn’t out.

So they started breaking Caterpillar out. The shell was still hard so they chewed and poked and pushed and kicked and stuck their tongues out and punched until they finally broke through.

And Caterpillar could crawl out. When he opened up  his wings they were still wet. Wet enough to be dripping in spots.

The sun finally blinked
over the mountains
and the light hit a drop
falling off the top of Caterpillar’s left wing.

The light bounced through the drop and lit up his beautiful blue and ruby wings.

He stretched his wings.

And yawned.

Turned his head a little.

And smiled a sleepy smile.

He hopped around a little and pulled his wings back.

He hopped around a little and stretched his wings out as he jumped into air.

The sun blinked again
And the light bounced
through a drop
falling from his right wing tip
and lit him

as his wings became a blue and ruby and purple blur up.

Black liked to lean against lamp post. Black used to be a shrub. And Black… was shy.

During the day, he leaned against lamp post in a parking lot near House. The parking lot was surrounded by a tall wrought iron fence. That was fine with Black because even though you could look between the posts, most people only saw a fence.

The fence had a gate that let some cars in and then let them out. That was fine, too. Black was short and small so he could lean up against lamp post and most people rushing from their cards wouldn’t notice. You’d think he’d melted into lamp post. It was good that he really really liked leaning.

When it got late and people slept, he liked walking. And Black, being quite small and very short couldn’t just look look through the wrought-iron fence, he could slide between the posts. He would walk until he found Cat. Cat liked sitting under the shadows of a pine tree. So Black usually found him there. And Black would stand under the shadows of the other pine tree.

Sometimes Cat looked over at Black and blinked. Once, they say, Cat said hmmmmm.

Houses tell stories in different ways. One night Cat came to visit House. House said hello and Cat blinked back.

Cats are very minimalist.

A blink, for a cat, can mean many things, depending on how their head is tilted, how their eyes are open, whether they are looking at you and which way their whiskers are pointed. This blink was definitely Hello: a Hello reserved for someone Cat had decided to allow to know Cat.

House wanted to tell a story and it can be challenging to tell a story to someone who spends so little time speaking.

While House thought about the best way to tell Cat a story, it began to snow. Little flakes, almost too small to see, drifted past.

House closed her blinds and her windows became like mirrors, reflecting shadows of ghosts dancing across the porch.

As Cat watched, House danced memories across her windows. The other Houses watched. And one House began a slow deep
woomp
woomp-woomp
pah

And the wind and trees join in to the dance with a
swoosh
swoosh swoosh

and a car driving slowly by turned on its wipers
whicka-whick-whack
whick

as it tires thrummed up and the dancers
twirled
and the tires
thrummed away

and the snow flakes drifting down decided to swirl with the dancers

and House started humming hum humming through his Chimney
pop
poppa dwo pop
diddle doo bop
poppa doo pop
liddle liddle
do pop
as well as I can imitate House’s Chimney

boppa
do hu-wop
boppa boppa
do hu-wop

and the trees went from just swaying to swooshing

and House reflected her memories of the dancers adding a
shuffle spin
to their twirl and dance

and another car floated by slowly rapping
boy
you gonna
thumpa thump
thumpa thump

and House went
hu-wop
boppa boppa

boy
you gonna
thumpa thump
thumpa thump

hu-wop
boppa boppa

boy
you gonna
thumpa thump
thumpa thump
hu-wop
boppa boppa

and the snowflakes… began bouncing and jumping

boy
you gonna
thumpa thump
thumpa thump
hu-wop
boppa boppa

and the wind got the trees snapping
hu-waah
ka-rack

hu-waah
ka-rack

boy
you gonna
thumpa thump
thumpa thump
hu-wop
boppa boppa

and Cat still hadn’t said a sound or joined the dance. He looked at House, blinked and (some say) showed just a hint of a smile and jumped into the shadows.

Joey the fireman seemed to like being grumpy. Except around Cat. Then he liked pretending to be grumpy. Cat would examine the room then sit, look at each person in the room and think. Cat rarely talked except to Joey.

When he was around Joey, he still didn’t speak much.

One time, Joey was being especially grumpy. And when Joey was especially grumpy, he’d complain about how everyone only thought about themselves.

And Joey was complaining and complaining.

Complaining was one of his favorite ways to be grumpy.

And Joey, was really enjoying pretending to be grumpy.

Finally, Joey stomped his foot. “I’d like them to think about me for once.”

And Cat looked Joey straight in one eye, then the other and stared for a moment. And then said “Joey, you know what I like,” and cocked his head up and, after a moment, smiled.

Joey laughed and scratched Cat’s cheek.

Cat said “oh yeah, you know” and started purring.

In one of House’s stories, Ms. Gerelbahrd walked her invisible pet by House.

House asked “What are you walking?”

Ms. Gerelbahrd said “My Squark.”

“But I don’t see anything; not a squark. Of course, I don’t recall what a squark looks like.”

“Well… I heard the smallest bit of stuff, so small you can’t see it no matter how big your microscope. I heard it was called a quark and I figured my pet can’t be seen either but was cuter and full of energy so I decided squark. Cute, huh?”

Dog likes to chase Ms. Gerelbahrd’s squark. In fact, last week, Dog chased her squark up a tree. Ms. Gerelbahrd had the fire department raise a ladder into the tree to get her squark back down.

The fireman were grumpy afterwards.

It’s tough to find a tiny invisible pet in a tree.

The house liked to tell about chair pusher. Chair pusher had been around a long time and had a chair with wheels. He would push that chair by the houses when he wasn’t talking with a house or a person. Sometimes he would help people by taking them places. Sometimes he would give kids rides, smiling as they giggled in the sunshine.

In the middle house lived a storyteller. His House would tell wonderful stories when he was busy in his garden. But then his House knew all his best stories and all the wonderful stories people had told on her porch since she’d been born.

No one could remember when that was and, Houses not worrying too much about calendars, just said “many stories ago”.

Houses don’t have much use for calendars. Time never changes; it just keeps moving. Houses are like that: not really changing. They rarely move or grow new rooms or sprout new doors let alone do something really different like create porches or add new floors. So they like things that change: they like surprising stuff. That’s why they like people and stories. For if there’s anything that people and stories share, it’s that they’re always full of surprises.