Tag Archives: Microtext

Micro-fiction

Arson

He still has the scar where the monkeybar hit his face. The old road always leaves its mark. There, children forever etched in his memory, the times-tables flashback, the laughter when another fell and bruised a knee. The dogs look like they might smile and no manner of preying serves them mercy. The rafters and the bar heater lead, the insulation might not mark the skin. The old road and more corpses on the television to celebrate the glory of our times; my knees worn flat, my tongue swollen, the pages soiled as I bleed on the tattered analogies of books superseded by the new attention span. They may catch and try to brand me, but I have ‘sovereign’ tattooed across my shoulders. I have cut from my own back the flag you see outside my mansion. I see the toads in the mouths of those that usher us to our demise.

No use to shake your placards outside the New World Reichstag.

You cannot put your tongue right on the diplomatic clitoris (because) that whore-horse will buck you off.

The day I befriend an arsonist I am on my way to dictator.

Anecdotes

My best worst friend

World’s gone mad, you know. I said this to my best worst friend.

He replied, shouting over the howl of a vacuum cleaner, which he
rudely started when I was in mid-sentence.

“Just accept that you’re going to get old in servitude.”

I laughed, how could you not at this horrible truth, saying
“I’ve just got to get through this year.”

He’s slamming the vacuum cleaner around the room.

“Let me know if you need help cutting your wrists.” he says.


© Brentley 2011

 

Micro-fiction

A new microtext

To Whom it may concern

This morning in the post office the manager rudely asked me to leave. The reason, he said, was that some junky had shat in the foyer. An accident! he protested. Now I am not sure whether this justifies my not being able to collect my packet of herbs from Afghanistan. Impatiently I waited for weeks, often unable to sleep. Late yesterday afternoon a hand came through my slot and dropped a card onto the carpet. ‘Parcel awaiting collection’ it said. It breaks a person. My beat doll is torn. Having to wait until morning. There remains a stampede in my skin. I waited on the steps for 14 hours. I was the first through the door. I don’t even know how that junky got in. I felt like Jerry in the Flaming Globes of Sigmund. Deflected from the dream at the very last minute, stared down by the rude child who owns the swing-set. Told I can’t use the trampoline, the roller coaster is off limits…I exceed the height limit or some such rubbish. It’s just not acceptable, so I thought I’d protest, hence this letter. Hope you get it.