.
The barrel hit the bottom
with a sound something like 'thwelp'.
The first was a 'thud' on mud,
the second definitely a 'Help!'.
Slim rolled from the wreckage
doing his best to look nonchalant,
and failing.
Its hard to look casual
sprawled face down in the dirt,
a help speech bubble floating overhead.
But he did his best
picking himself up slowly,
no-one else was going to do it.
Remarkably, or not, he was unhurt.

Kelm found a rib-cage,
the remains of a large fox,
and he was delighted.
Do barbarians dream of culture nights?
Kelm had, and he liked hitting things.
He had lost all interest in fishing,
in Bruce, in dolls, in girls,
even with the story he was in.
Because now he was, as stated, delighted.
He had his very own
Ex-why-low-fone.

She reached the bottom
blind panic in her open eyes.
She saw the figure of a man
picking himself up slowly.
“Poet!” she shouted at him.
“No” Slim said off-handedly
though he had a few select words.
“Then … I've killed him” she wailed
“Badly?” asked Slim
“No. Rather well actually. He's dead”.
Then she spied the sword
stuck fast in a rock, at a jaunty angle.
Aesthetically pleasing in fairy tales.
And a tiny figure grimly holding on,
reached up for a better grip,
touching the Green stone in the hilt.
Jerrica and Slim were blinded by a flash.

The tingling increased
and the sword felt power
surge through its length
and explode in a bright light.
The connection was complete.
The sword sneezed.
It knew him, he knew it.
Neither of them particularly liked it.

The moment he touched the stone
he felt the tingling feeling
and he felt the connection hit
like a brick wrapped in wool.
His head exploded in pure light,
the sword sneezed
and his future was sealed.
He felt so powerful and … elastic.

“What can you see?” shouted Slim.
“Nothing” Jerrica replied
“Which way is it going?” Slim asked.
They had sunspots, flash-spots,
dancing on, in and through their eyes.
They both needed a *** ***.
But as vision cleared
a shape, a shadow, a form, a man,
greeted their returning sight.

The poet stretched and kept on stretching.
He took stock, he looked great.
From 6 inches to 6 foot
in a matter of moments,
he had grown up.
He took a look around him.
Jerrica and Slim were gawping at him.
The sword felt warm in his hand.
And very smug.
He was a sword wielding poet,
he spoke.

“I do thank thee kindly Princess.
For being my friend and rescuer”.
She blinked quite a lot.

Her body was telling her what boys were for,
but her mind was really not quite sure,
and what if there was no known cure,
but he did make her think thoughts impure.

Seeing his effect upon Jerrica
he smiled in that Poet's flirtatious way.
She blushed even more.
“What is its name? Slim piped in.
“What?” the Poet asked.
“The sword, what's its name?
Fairy tale swords have to have a name”.

Tink, tinky, ******, tong, tung.
Kelm hit the bones with a stick.
Each cracked bone had its own tone
but lacked volume.
He used a bigger stick
and invented bone-shaker music.
He even became famous
with his own backing band
The Clandestine Trolls.

He held the sword
and asked it its name.
It maintained silence
in an embarrassed sulk.
“Aw c'mon” crooned the Poet.
Silence replied.
“Come to think of it” said Jerrica
“what's your name Poet?”.
That got him right in the logics.
He looked back in baleful silence.
The sword chuckled.

The singing bowl woke up,
aware of the presence of Magick,
it started to gently hum.
The sword started to hum.
With its own resonance
aware of the presence of Magick.

Startled Jerrica stumbled
falling through the waterfall
that had with immense interest
being watching proceedings.
Her arm flailed
and knocked the small plinth.
Jewel encrusted, humming, alive,
the bowl landed upside down
on her head.
And the connection was made.
Tingling Jerrica, tingling bowl.
The sword joined in
with a song of joyful union.
Quick as a flash
Jerrica was up on her feet
smoothing down her attire.
A princess neither flounders nor trips.

The Poet had had his hand extended
to help her to her feet.
She looked and smiled
'thanks but I'm ok' at him.
Their eyes locked,
their hearts threw away the key.

Slim got the familiar feeling of
I don't need to be here.
He looked at the smashed barrel
and thought philosophically
'something to tell the grand-kids!'
He headed for a tavern, any tavern, anywhere.

And our hero and heroine?
Well ..
they lived fairly contentedly ever after.

Except for the incident with
the anarchist fortune cookies …
but thats another story.


© Pagan Paul (June 2019)

.
Morfine and Choklut were trapped,
searching for a sword,
they somehow hit a dead end
and were being attacked by fear.
The fear of being Lost.
But Choklut had an escape plan
“Quick!” he said “head for stanza 4,
we have some friends waiting there”.

Kelm was a difficult child.
“Ten green woggles round ten boy-scouts necks,
ten green woggles round ten boy-scouts necks,
and if one green woggle should accidentally
be ripped from the throat by a giant killer wolf,
there'll be nine green woggles round nine boy-scouts necks”.
He sang,
as he pulled the legs off a centipede.
He wanted a worm to go fishing,
but couldn't be bothered to dig.

Jerrica also sought a sword.
She was a Princess!
But she had a point to prove.
A very deliberate point about girl power.
Girls can go adventuring too!
She championed Girlyism.
'Herb up your life!'
Her favourite slogan.
Why was it always a sword?
It was just so … fallick.
Why not a magick singing cup?

They waited. And waited.
Then they lurked about a bit.
They waited and lurked for ages.
Then they went down the Tavern.

The words ******* and sheep
crept into his little mind.
Though not necessarily in that order.
It happened when he met Bruce.
Bruce was on Walkabout.
Kelm was fishing by the river
and was thinking his luck would change
if he fished in the river.
That must be where the fish were hiding.
Bruce had walked straight passed Kelm
as he was watering a tree.
He zipped up and slapped the tree.
Bruce had an accident.
“Geez mate, I thought you was a croc”.
Kelm suddenly felt intellectually superior
“Its salt water, so I'm an alligator”
he paused “or a camen”.

Morfine and Choklut missed stanza 4,
had slid right through 5,
and slapped 6 right in the face.
It got in a huff and walked away …

Jerrica put out her herbal cigarette,
she took her slogan seriously,
today's herb was marjoram.
Now she was hungry
so she wrote the word 'lunch'
on  a piece of paper.
And swallowed it.
Completely veggie and only 3 calories.
Jerrica flinched when she saw the males.
The first – late teens, silly shorts,
carrying an Abbey Winters catalogue.
The second – pre-teen boy with a big stick.
She sneakily approached, circuitously,
she could hear them talking.
“Maybe I'll turn you into a pair of shoes”
“I think a clutch bag would suit you more mister”
“My name is Bruce” said Bruce.
“Bruce? Kinda boring name
for a fantasy farce poem isn't it?”
“Oh yeah. I suppose you got given a better one?”
“I” stated the boy “am Kelm the Barbarian”
Bruce felt sobriquetiously inadequate.
Jerrica watched.
And asked herself girl questions.
About boys.

It seemed there was a lack of interest,
nobody wanted to know their story.
Morfine and Choklut couldn't find
a welcoming stanza anywhere.
Its seems they were all full.
Dejected they trudged to a Tavern.

As she withdrew she wondered
'What is the ****** point of boys?'
It was during her retreat, circuitously,
that she found a Poet.
He was underneath a rock,
so she put him in her breast pocket,
for safe keeping.
Boys were useless, but Poets were useful.
They knew all about love and romance.
And for some reason
feather pens excited Jerrica.

After a long day waiting and lurking
Shadow Boxer had got drunk,
tipped a serving girl a wink,
and retired to bed.
Slim Grainy was drinking alone.
He was rather miffed.
All that waiting and lurking in stanza 4
and his mates hadn't shown up.
Maybe Shad had had the right idea.
Drink and bed.
The door of the Tavern opened,
his friends walked in.
Morfine saw him and smiled
and greeted him with a hiya.
Slim fixed him with a baleful look and spoke
“Of all the stanza's in all the poems,
you had to walk into mine”.

Somewhere under a bridge too far
an anxious troll shook and shivered.
He wouldn't make it. He would never recover.
Why had he agreed to hear their story?
3 ****** days to tell 3 ****** segments
of a quest that could have been summarised
in 3 ****** phrases.
Went there. Found it. Came home.
Over egging the pudding.
Spinning a pointlessly long yarn.
A thought struck him,
in the head.
A rare occurrence for a troll.
He was going to devour
Morfine and Choklut.




© Pagan Paul (11/01/19)

.
Jerrica had found Lost.
The treasure buried above ground.
The memory foam with dementia.
The quill with no nib …
she thought about feather pens.
Catching herself from falling
the swoon had caught her cold.
This **** ****** sword
was proving to be elusive
and now she was under sustained attack.
From a personal fetish.
It just wouldn't leave her alone,
creeping into her mind unbidden.
She needed to scratch an itch,
if only she knew what that itch was.

Trolls are magickally bound to their bridge.
Leaving it is usually fatal.
But Gyb had bones to gnaw,
and once he had his teeth employed
his mind was a captive onlooker.
A crazy plan formed in his head,
possibly avoiding the brain.
He took mud and formed a figure,
then some of his hair clippings
moulded into the head.
Then he took a leap of disbelief!
He looked into the river and … Click!
Snapped his fingers and fixed the image.
He cut it out of the meniscus
and attached it to the doll familiar.

“Did Achilles have damp ankles
or was he well heeled?”
Morfine had asked Choklut.
“Neither. He was the one who sneezed
and opened the Fête of the Suitors”.
“No. I think he was called Telemarketing,
he sneezed and they drew the tombola raffle”.
“Wasn't there a Goddess involved as well?”.
“Um … Yes, maybe the Goddess of Tissues?”.
“Snivel? No, she is more tears than snot.
I think its the one who turned her husband
into a swan, and made him ****** her handmaiden”.
“Oooo Nasty!”
“No, Nasty fell in love with his own profile,
and called things off with his nymph,
the reverberations can still be heard today”.
There was a brief pause … then,
“What are we doing Choklut?
We found a magickal sword and …
talking of which, where is it?”.
“I don't know. You had it last”.
Just then a serving girl gave them a note.
It said. Tomatoes, Peppers, Onions, Eggs …
“Not that side you dyk” she said.
Morfine turned the note over and read.
“Quick, no time to lose.
Someone saw the sword in the river.
We have to get to stanza 8
before it goes over the waterfall!”.
“Oh” said Choklut “I've never seen a stanza belly flop”.

It was true.
Contrary to the laws of physics.
Kelm saw the sword floating down river.
It looked like any other sword.
So he let it be, dismissed it.
He couldn't swim anyway.
He mused on the irony of that.
Nobody learnt to swim and yet drowning
was an undignified death for a barbarian.
If he could swim
he could find the fishes hiding places.

Jerrica had also been musing.
With a Poet.
That was during the last 3 stanza's.
But now …
she saw a sword floating in the river.
Something didn't quite fit.
Something was not in the right place.
She placed the Poet back in her breast pocket.
'If only he wasn't just 4 inches high' she thought
'he is rather handsome and intelligent'.
Bingo! She had it. But she didn't want it.
Armydiseases Principle of Liquid Dispersement!
It states!
Introduce a solid object into a body of liquid,
then the corresponding volume of liquid is dispersed
back to the nearest solid.
So, right now there is a very small flood
in the shape of a very small sword
ravishing the local area.
She decided, quite rightly as it turns out,
that she was feeding herself a red herring.

Slim stood on the bridge
staring at the churning water below.
How did it happen?
A stanza all of his own,
ruined by the intrusion of morons.
“Morfine and Choklut” he bellowed
“I'm going to eviscerate you”.
The wind carried a few of the words away,
but that was the gist of it.
“Hello” a voice said.
Slim had an accident, and jumped out of his skin.
And plunged into the cold water.
A strong arm pulled him out,
and he was face to face with a troll.
“My name is Gyb. I hate Morf Chok also”.
Nothing had prepared Slim for meeting a troll.
Not even the etti-queue-etti lessons at school.
'Would you care for afternoon tea?'
seemed rather inappropriate.
Gyb broke the awkward silence.
“Look! Sword floating”.
Slim didn't look.
Convinced the troll would eat him.
Thats their way. Distract and devour.
But he couldn't help it, he snuck a look.
And the sword slid on by gently bobbing,
tiny little runes glinting in the sun.

For its part the sword was serenity itself.
Chilled out to the max.
Resting on the water. Relaxing and reclining.
Life was good for the sword.
It had just passed a boy fishing,
poking his rod down a fish hole.
It had passed a young woman,
who looked confused and flustered.
It slid under a stone bridge.
A troll with a doll,
and a man with questionable odour.
And then he heard the roaring.
He sent out his senses,
no mean feat for a sword,
and 'felt' its surroundings.
Its image eye caught sight of the future.
It was an effing great waterfall.
And the future was the way he was heading.
For now.

Narrative Interlude

At this point in the story the author, Pagan Paul, is compelled
to inform the reader/listener of a complaint received
from Messrs Morfine and Choklut.
The substance of which amounts to the following:
That the said author is willfully under using their talent
as supporting cast and denying them access to many stanza's.
Furthermore they are threatening to expose the authors
'irregularities' in his relationship with Princess (name redacted).
The author, Pagan Paul, responds thus:
I should like to remind Messrs Morfine and Choklut
that, with astroke of my quill, I can eradicate them.
Drop them from the story all together.
And with reference to Princess (name redacted) -
'Its my Poem and I'll irregularit if I want to'.
Dear reader/listener prepare yourself for stanza 9.
It has a waterfall in it.
Maybe Morfine and Choklut will appear, maybe not.
They are the ones over a barrel.

Minutes after the sword floated by
something else caught her eye.
To boys on a barrel, in the water.
Boys barreling along or a barrel buoying along?
Choklut noticed her by the bank.
'funny place to have a cash machine' he thought.
Doing his best to impress and look brave.
Morfine waved and nearly fell off.
Suddenly the barrel lid opened
and Slim poked his head out like a tortoise.
“What the …?” said Choklut.
“Just repaying a debt boys” he said.
“But you owe us nothing” Morfine replied.
“Oh but I do” snarled Slim
“I owe you one times intrusion into your own stanza”.
He ducked back inside, and slammed the lid.
“Of all the fatherless ...”
“I blame the author” said Choklut.
“Yeah well, he is the one who's gonna be sorry,
we've just muscled in on stanza 8,
and relegated that waterfall to stanza 9” Morfine chimed.
“Morfine. Morfine! I hear the waterfall coming”.
“No! Not now. He has to leave it until 9 now,
we are about to cross the finish line on 8”.
The waterfall loomed.

Actually the waterfall knew nothing of weaving.
It just stayed where it was, pouring.
Spectacular, it was a very pretty waterfall.
It must be. It attracted tourists.
And it had fun!
It loved watching detritus tumble,
teeter on the brink. And fall.
Especially tourists.
It was over 300 paces high,
less than 40 paces wide,
its descent magnificent liquid ballet,
sparkling droplets shining like jewels,
forever transcending light refraction,
and plunging, plunging, plunging,
into a gorgeous azure puddle.
About ankle deep.



© Pagan Paul (17/01/19)

.
The future was heading its way very fast,
it pondered the alternatives.
It could gently levitate
and reveal its magickal powers.
But now was not the time.
Not quite yet.
It relaxed, in the way swords relax,
and waited for the drop,
a tune humming along its full length.
Tension just a distant memory.
Its point tipped over the edge.
It fell,
in the manner of magickal swords.
Gracefully.

The waterfall felt the ripple of enchantment
as the iron thing crested its … crest,
and failed to plummet.
That disappointed the waterfall.
It also felt the girl,
in the swirling flow on the edge,
fail to catch it before it fell.
It 'heard' the naughty words
and the scream …

… she had screamed
as she lunged for the sword
and missed,
the Poet had been unceremoniously
ejected from her pocket
and disappeared over the edge.
So Jerrica screamed.
She didn't know what else to do.

Kelm was stalking fish.
They hadn't been hiding in the river
so they must be in the trees.
He had his catapult ready
and maggots to fire at the fish.
Then he heard a scream
so he started off towards it.
He saw the girl staring in horror
and then she bolted off.
Down the side of the waterfall.
“What the hell are girls for?”
he wondered as he wandered off.
He decided to go and hector Bruce.

They had abandoned ship.
Well, jumped barrel.
And now they had gone awol.
But the author didn't care
about a couple of slap dash bit parts.
He hoped the Troll had got them.

The sword floated serenely.
Mattering not in the slightest
that the water was vertical
and flowed quicker in that direction.
Then it felt a jolt,
a ripple in its pond of calm.
It was slightly amused
as something grabbed its hilt.
And held on.
It felt the panic, it felt the relief.
Then it felt … a connection.
Something tingled along its length.

As his tiny arms clutched the sword
a wave of dread passed by,
waving at him with a sharp smile.
A wave waving in waves.
The Poet considered the images
and clutched harder
as nausea also comes in waves.
Instead he thought about physics.
How could it be he fell faster than
an iron sword?
And how was it possible
to slow descent to a mere saunter?
Most of all he asked
“What does this all over tingling feeling mean?”
A barrel plummeted by
too fast and too **** close.

Kelm was exploring
and had found the tiny bridge
upstream from the excitement
and was poking about,
as is the want of curious little boys.
Thats when he found the clay doll.
Ugly in a crude kind of way.
He wondered if dolls could swim
and attached it to his fishing rod.
He dunked it.
Like a biscuit in tea.
The result was a sticky mess
so he threw it in the river.
He made a decision and wandered off,
he was going to look for fish nests.

The Troll was confused.
He had accidentally discovered Hide and Seek.
But didn't understand the rules.
Morfine and Choklut were hiding
and he was out of ideas.
A fairly normal state of mind for a Troll.
And now his body was dissolving.
He remembered his doll familiar.
It must have got wet.
And he was fading out of the story.
“Goodbye reader. Thankyou for knowing me”
he says with a regretful voice.

The astonishing thing about light
is it stops you bumping into things.
And the sword was very light,
as the tingling pulsed through it.
It did not bump into the boulder
at the bottom of the waterfall.
Rather, it slid gently
into the middle of the large stone.



© Pagan Paul (10/02/19)