°

Roused by the pleading and the distinct sound of a man’s bawling, Fritz came to his senses. He had been hugging his legs in a fetal position on a checkered linoleum floor with small crystals embedded in it that briefly caught his curiosity, and reflected on the glass that was surrounding Fritz in his odd spot that he was still trying to understand. Suddenly, a light switched on, along with the loud sound of heavy electricity, and he could see that he was in the center of Ethel’s Mirror Maze. Not too far from his squatting form, Fritz gazed upon a discarded leather jacket sprawled out on the left side of the room.  At first the jacket had resembled a very scared black cat that lay paralyzed beneath a tall mirror.  The tall mirror was actually a succession of many mirrors, and escaped around a narrow hallway that exited his room. The hallway was also sheathed with mirrors, and it radiated a foreboding evil from it’s entrance that reflected back to Fritz, and sent a chill down his already chilled spine. To the right of him, Fritz could see a network of mirrors that seemed to go infinitely into darkness. The first layer of mirrors appeared to be clear, and allowed the viewer to see different sections of the maze that weren’t visible in any of the jerkier, funhouse mirrors that either stretched one’s height ridiculously tall, or squished one into a bloated midget. As Fritz peered into the one glass segment that allowed him to investigate beyond his limited vicinity, he realized that he could see, albeit in a rather fractured way, a veiled figure who appeared to be struggling beyond the many seeing glass plates in the dark. To Fritz he appeared like a beetle caught in amber; hopelessly lost to a undesired fate. Helplessly, Fritz watched as the tormented figure collapsed to his knees, and then toppled over on his face. This was all the nightmare Fritz needed to see to be petrified with an expectation of heart-pounding doom. Throwing himself to his feet, Fritz flew like lightening through the hallway lined with mirrors that led out of these small confines.  The mirrors repeated themselves over and over again as he ran.  When the hall finally changed, it forked into a multitude of options.  Fritz chose to turn right, and noticed in his flight that sandwiched between the rows of mirrors were planks of wood that had holes burrowed into them. Each hole appeared to be the exact size, and at the right level of a human eyeball. As Fritz came up again at a point where he had to make a decision in his path, he heard cackling laughter, and the gurgle of a throat that sounded as if it were overflowing with vital fluids.  Fritz chose the left direction, and hurried towards what appeared to be a definite outlet.  Slamming his face into a deceptive mirror, he cursed to himself, and spat blood at the glass wall.  Whoever was out there would get him soon, and here he was making the world’s dumbest mistakes. He hastened back from where he came, and took the right path instead, intent on at least solving the brief puzzle that he was now presented with. Thinking back to his past couple times frequenting this attraction in the past, Fritz chastised himself for never trying to get further in the maze then he did.  He would only drift here, and there, and then when his mind started to crawl back towards the bottle hid in his hotel, he’d give up, and walk home without any sense of revelation.  Fritz clawed at the glass walls, and bucked against them, but they were held firmly in place.  He rounded another corner in a huff, and glimpsed a slot in the wall that slid off into blackness.  Sucking in his gut, he slipped into the small fissure, and found himself in the shadowy backroom of the Mirror Maze.  Relieved to be somewhere different where he face wasn’t scowling back at him in desperation, but still anxious at every odd shape in the darkness, Fritz kept his back to the wall as he scanned the room as best he could for an exit that would lead him outside.  Someone’s breathing was quite audible now and almost seemed echoed similarly like the mirrors reflected his image.  The breathing sound increased his anxiety, as it seemed to resonate through the entire building.  As Fritz tip-toed towards what looked like a steel door in the unlit gloom, he pushed against it, and as the door cracked open, Fritz stared down at a woman bent, and writhing over a man who’s bare toes were pointed up at Fritz. She gaped up at him with eyes as black as midnight, and a face completely drenched in gore. She was chewing on something rubbery, and the man on the floor was still fluttering in a pool of his blood.  His legs and arms continued to flutter like a dying butterfly as the life left his mauled body.  His stomach was scissored open, and his intestines were exposed to the open air. Fritz sprung from his shock, and slammed the door behind him just as the deadly woman dragged herself to her feet.  The whole time her eyes were continuously locked with Fritz, and held his gaze.  Her face tightened into an ugly snarl that spoke the promise of his death.  Fritz finally shut out the face with the steel door of the cooler that the woman had been crouched in.  He attempted to lock the door, as he had backed up from in horror, but found no latch to the door. Changing tactics, Fritz desperately felt all along the walls for a light switch. A low growling sound could be heard from the room where he had witnessed the murder of the man that he imagined owned the motorcycle jacket. At long last, Fritz felt a draft of cold air on one of his hands that was probing the dark for an on/off button. He was able to pop his head through the opening, which might have at one time been a window to the outside. Fritz heard the steel door behind him swing open as he recklessly raked half of his body over the broken shards that lay scattered on the ledge of this opening. He tumbled outside on some wet sod, and immediately scrambled towards the nearest hill, and let his body roll and roll, with his hands catching clumps of dirt along the way, until he had put a vast distance between himself, and that ill-fated Mirror Maze.

Fritz laid still for quite awhile, staring up at the legion of stars in the night sky. When he finally felt like he was safe in the silent darkness of the night, he took a roundabout way to exit the fairgrounds.  He had discovered this route one night, in search of a place to throw up his lunch, from a day drunk, out of sight of busy patrons. He was drifting towards the spicate fence that led out of the park just as a grubby hand shot out of the dark, and pressed his palm into it's vise-like grip.  Fritz gasped, and then recognized the fortune teller, an ancient gypsy with a crinkled complexion. The old man was fondling Fritz's silver wristwatch, that flickered like a diamond in the moonlight.

“Where you get such a fancy clock, fella? I never seen anything this fancy in all my years. No never seen nothing this fancy...No, nothing ever like this...”

Fritz gazed at the man in vague amusement. It was really only a knock-off of a much more luxurious timepiece, but he thought that if he gave the fortune teller his shiny watch that maybe he could get out of this dangerous atmosphere that he still remained on the periphery of.  He had no way of knowing how far off that psycho bitch was.

“You want it, it’s yours, I don’t really use the fucking thing anyway,” Fritz said as he let the watch spill into the gypsy’s hand of leather.  Fritz shivered from the cold, and looked off into the distance, distracted by his fate.

“No, no, you cannot go until you let me read you your scalp! I must repay you for this most generous act of kindness!”

The short, old man drew Fritz to the ground with his hand, and then darted behind him playfully. He started muttering an odd limerick of some kind as the reluctant Fritz waited to feel the aged fingers of the old coot on his thinning patch of hair.  Fritz bowed to get it over with, sighing because of this inconvenience.  Instead the gypsy grabbed him by the wrist and swiftly cinched both hands behind his back just as the blood-thirsty woman from the Mirror Maze burst out of the bramble in a mad rage.  As her eyes flashed, she advanced upon Fritz in his state of helpless captivity.  The old man laughed out loud, and Fritz knew that this was...

...THE END

©

2017

Bunny Villaire 

i shook her 'til she 

spit and howled

under the spot-light

Of the source.

summertime,

And we be wild!...

beach bound...

senseless,

our love is coarse...

...pay no mind...

we come on strong.

i, who is, we, who is, i.

(candles for our nearest head-rush)

Moon boy, moon girl...

Wo-moon, me-mo mo-me, moonbeam...

me/her flesh weeped,

pressed

an an + nude

my flesh raked 

Against the

fence of 

her night that bridge two 

worlds,

an when we adapt to this

Crass as can be the crude world

newly formed 

wet freedom totem discover him 

bored

cactus that if it were heart-ache could only see through walls

cost become felt bouquet - - - - - - - - - -- - - --

or a drop in a stream,

pupp  et for some but not for we/me.

water pools up to that

hole in my knee.

©

2017

Bunny Vil lair e 

I met a fox in the forest today, while taking my usual evening stroll. It sat cleaning its paws, until it saw me and the two of us made eye contact. We watched each other apprehensively for a few moments, until finally I broke the stare and looked up at the green canopy of leaves above me. Then the most surprising thing happened: the fox spoke, "What do you think of when you think of a fox?"

I snap my gaze back to the fox, my jaw almost dropping in surprise. After taking a moment to collect myself, I pondered its question then answered, "I think of a sly, cunning, trickster, maybe even a thief. But, most definitely not one to be trusted."

The fox nodded its head thoughtfully, "Let me ask you this: what if it's all a misunderstanding? What if us poor foxes have just been given a bad reputation?"

"Are you saying that maybe we should give you guys a chance to redeem yourselves?"

The fox pulled its mouth back into a sly, toothy grin,"What I'm saying is don't always believe what you are told; watch what is happening, what is actually being done."

And with that, the fox slid behind me into the thick cluster of trees, never to be seen again. I wanted to tell someone about my experience, so I reached into my back pocket to call my mom. When I felt around for my cell phone though, I realized that it was gone, also to never be seen again. 

as oceans hold you

beneath waters dark,

the low tide tends

its warm pools

and salty air

while stormy seas churn

your restless thoughts,

the white shores mold

into blankets soft

and sandy sleep

when cruel waves steal

your only breath,

i hope you dream

of a ship

in the fog.

Will I look back upon this day

And say, it was the start of something

grand

Or simply another granule of sand

Lost to the flippant winds of time

brittle canyon walls

crumble under weight

of nothing

desolate, as far as eyes can see

reverberate, silence echoes back to me

I'll forever stop chasing shadows

to see your eyes shine with pride

behind those stubborn glasses 

Eating dark chocolate every Saturday night

Smiling to each other rolling your eyes 

I was sitting in front of the TV at the living room floor 

A dream I barely dared to dream of

Will I forever reach for butterflies

Until death 

Goodbye...

broken pony

beautiful winged creature

beautiful

why did you

swallow those pills

why did you

delegate your bills

you tried to live (most days)

but a cage

surrounded you

and no one knew

i wish i had known you

gorgeous and alone

just like me

and Jesus Christ

wise in your own way

same as any day

i wish i had known

why did you

swallow those pills

why did you

grab that rope

i could have helped you

wash away

that rain from your

beautiful

broken body

for Chris Cornell

The cameramen...The crowd...

The lady in her shroud...

The mega hunk...The cream...

...The extrovert...A scream

That very deeply builds

Behind this silver panel...

The idiot...his slave...

...The sex behind the scene...

A caterpillar crawl

Through 

Nightmares,

And pit-falls...

The canvas, and 

It's rip...

...White light

Streams

Out of it...

The cameramen...The crowd...

The lady in her shroud...

The mega hunk...The cream...

...The extrovert...A scream

That very deeply builds

Beyond your dollar bills...

...The very silent crease

That rises from a sigh

When unborn souls,

Deceased,

Slip out through world's

Denied...

The buying in...The score...

The tear upon the screen...

...The secrecy...turned up!...

The cameramen, the scene...

©

2017

Bunny Villaire  

Hi guys!  So one of my favorite challenges has been @Soulhearts spoken word challenge. According to what I remember, it should still be active.  Unfortunately, I cannot find the challenge nor the wonderful entries that were posted for it.  I was looking forward to doing something for it, though with a bit of a twist (as a sung-word as opposed to spoken-word lol), so I decided to post it here.  One of my poems, called Siddhartha, was actually written as a song.  I just recently finished the demo version of the music and would like to share it with you.  In the track, I sing the song, and I also produced it and made the arrangement and played the instruments (digital and real).  Hope you enjoy it, I'm always open to your honest opinions and feedback.  Using headphones is always better : )

https://soundcloud.com/syne_music/siddhartha-rough-demo

PS.  This is not something that has been officially released yet.  I plan to release this officially sometime in the future.  But as I enjoy sharing the process of my work with a select few and consider the community on Prose a tightly knit artistic group that I am a part of, I am happy for you guys to listen and even download the track if you would like. Consider it an exclusive limited pre-release version ;)