"heady words", an excerpt from "Sludge White and the Seven Curmudgeons"

this excerpt from my novella-poem, "Sludge White and the Seven Curmudgeons"

adds to the 'night of dreams', wherein each of the charactes is visited in the span
of a single night.  in this portion, we visit the spookhouse in the woods (the cottage
the Curmudgeons call home) to see what's stirring in the kitchen.
*******

Lumpy slumped limply on his clumped, bumpy mattress

further sleep stumped by a scratch in his throat,

resolving at last to head for the kitchen

to drum up a helping of honeyed compote.

he wobbled down the steps weaving passed Gramps,

a mournful ghost wielding a wavering candle;

weirdly contorted by trembling shadows,

lugging more sorrow than he could stand to handle.

a gilt candelabra glitzed up the kitchen,

brushing its glitter on fritters and truffles.

the swashbuckling knives had retired to their drawer,

though tempers still flared in trifling scuffles.

Weepy poured milk for the pendent otter,

curving round his shoulders and peering in the pail.

Sleazy waltzed in after gadding about the inn,

plastered and pickled yet lustily hale.

"all right me lovelies?  are the riffraff sawin' logs?"

he reeled and stumbled, landing in a chair.

Lumpy clattered a bowl on the cluttered table,

flashing to Weepy an eye-rolling glare.

the bearskin watchrug inched past the doorway,

snapping at conjecture deflected in the hall.

an errant draft played havoc with the candles

and shady grotesqueries danced on the wall.

"the wind is changing" Lumpy thickly remarked,

mumbling while shovelling his syrupy fruit.

"those are heady words" Sleazy tartly observed,

emptying his pockets of aces and loot.

the cards were sticking together like thieves,

their slick edges polished by his amply greased palms.

forged papers slipped out of a hidden lining,

stashed in a sampling of pornographic psalms.

he pitched a pamphlet hawking stagnant swampland

and unloaded a pair of lopsided dice.

then he plunked down a pouch packed with laced roaches,

spurious simoleons, and sizzling ice.

next came furtive flasks and spicy lubricants,

and the keys to unlock unsavory lairs.

though Weepy and the otter had started for bed,

they could feel Lumpy smirking from the stairs.

dropping from his tethers into deepest sleep

Weepy soared in the old familiar pattern.

he'd been making this journey in the darkness

ever since sentience first kindled his lantern.

he'd never been able to direct the path

for unnatural sway nulls natural law.

he simply accepted events as they happened

and felt with his heart whatever he saw.

he glided above the unattached ponies

as daylight streamed from a swollen salmon sun.

they'd not yet exhausted their blissful exertions,

blistered and bleary yet still having fun;

freshly engaging a burgeoning freedom

the cult of control ripped apart at its seams.

and he flushed like a lighthouse, brimming with mirth.

for tears never coursed through his nightseeing dreams.
*******
(thus endeth the excerpt - Evan Hawthorn, 13th of May, 2015)