Catch a Falling Star

She stood on the writing blotter in the center of my desktop.

She stretched herself up as tall as she could, three whole inches.

Looking me in the eyes she said, with a steely glare,

“So, what is this going to be? A poem or a fairytale?”

“It’s your story, Sweetie, tell it as you wish it to be.”

“I despise fairytales with their moral to the story and happy endings.

I am an elf and not a fairy. Fairies are stupid airheads with wings.

My name is Sweetie, the Candycane Elf, and this bow shoots magical sugar arrows.”

“And what does a magical sugar arrow actually do?” I carefully asked.

“It gives a Slow One diabetes,” she barked. “I hate humans.”

“So, it’s a weapon that can kill a man?” I asked even more carefully.

“Well, in small doses, it only makes the sour ones sweeter.”

She nocked a sparkly white arrow and looked at me as if accusing.

“Why exactly do you hate humans, the Ones you call Slow?”

“I used to target bickering children. I used to love my power.

I could reunite friends and repair romances, Make frowns turn to smiles.

But people have been getting harder to sweeten and renew.

They put poisons in the garden and poisons in the fields.

The air is getting toxic, and the conversations sour to spoiled.

They are forever angry and take it out on everything.

They can’t even see me when I’m glammered,

Yet they try to slay me like a pest or ugly bug.

I used to like the humans, especially the younger ones.

I loved them and they loved me, even though I wasn’t even there.

But you can only be punished by nonbelievers for so long

Before love becomes dark hatred and vengeance in my heart.”

I nodded with a sadness born of recognizing the truth,

And then I wrote down every bitter word, even some she didn’t say.

I have been drawing fiercely before my talent goes away. So, I will show you some of this week’s practice.

I drew this from a photo of one of the nudists in my doll collection. I always seem to have more dolls than clothing that fits them.

This also used a doll for the model. She had a dress on, but this one and all the roses are imaginary.

This is a picture of Susu, my imaginary granddaughter, modeled on a young Instagram friend that I follow. She likes my pictures.

This is a doodle portrait, drawn entirely from my head, without a model.

I sit at my drawing board, drawing quite madly,

Before glaucoma curses with blindness so badly,

And my age is advanced, so the Reaper is watching,

And papery skin all over is splotching.

I have to be vigilant and wise with my time,

And clever enough to catch the next rhyme.

Time’s running out on the next thing to do,

As I’m leaving behind small wisdoms for you.

She came over the fence at Elmer’s farm,

Leaping like a deer, the white tail flying behind her,

Into the middle of Elmer’s cookout seeking me.

“What’s this?” I exclaimed, “A faun wearing clothes?”

“Elmer’s oldest boy is a Sensitive like you,” she said.

“I don’t need farm boy to see me nude again,,

At least, not until I decide to seduce him.”

“You must be Su-Fey Pan,

Radasha told me about you.”

She grinned a sinister grin. 

“It must be nice to own your own faun.”

“I own him not,” I said of Ra,

“He came to me during my trauma.”

“He led me to the garden in my mind to heal.”

“That’s what I must do for Elmer”s boy, Wilbur.”

“Because he alone survived his mother’s car crash?”

She only nodded sadly. 

The farmer’s wives with plates of mashed potatoes,

Looked at me strangely for talking to myself.

“So, why have you come here seeking only me?”

“Because you write a book of poems,

And claim you are an awful poet.

And you know of fauns and fairies,

And what their uses are.

And you understand the metaphors,

And sling the symbols all around.

And you understand that poetry

Sucks the poison from your soul

And turns venom into candy,

With sound and fury and sometimes even rhyme.”

“And you are asking me to give you some of that for him?”

“That magic, yes, to save his life,

From you through me to him.”

“And how is this miracle to be done?”

“Kiss my cheek, and give it me,

And I’ll bestow on him.”

I kissed her lightly on the sun-tanned cheek.

She grinned, a twinkle in her hazel eyes.

And she kissed me back on the lips.

The magic took my sight away.

Su-Fey was gone.

“Mickey, are you all right?” said a farmer’s wife,

“Or are you having another episode?”

“Oh, I’ll be fine,” I said, still smirking.

“Is there any of that sausage left?”

“