The Temple of Bague

It did - with a very loud bang and a splattering of delicious orangey brown beverage. It wasn’t made clear to me at the time exactly why the teacup exploded, but explode it most certainly did.

I was a small boy a the time, no taller than four inches, and a teacup was - in my limited world-experience - a subject most unsuitable for rapid deconstruction.

Through the years I have often cast my mind back to this strange day but have never been able to fully escape the unease caused by everyday household items spontaneously going kablooey.

I’m sure there’s a lesson in there somewhere.

I once had opportunity to visit a strange old lady who swore blind she could nasally extrude ectoplasm. She’d sit there, in the dark, rocking gently, and then whoop loudly, causing me to leap in the air.

Invisible to all eyes except hers, a languid ectoplasmic tentacle would peer from her snout and poke around the room, examining all those present.

I always found the practice disgusting, preferring to keep a handkerchief in reserve for such moments.

As I was walking to the wash-house one day, I happened upon a little man pushing a very large cart. I approached him and noticed his particularly leathery visage, which seemed to fit very well with his miniature stature..

“Good Morning,” I said.

“Good Morning yourself,” he replied.

“If you will pardon my curiosity,” I continued, “where would a leathery little chap such as yourself be going with such a large hand cart on a lovely morning like this?”

“I will not pardon your curiosity,” he replied, “but will answer nonetheless. I am taking my cart to the market .”

I looked at him ascance.

“But but but today is a Tuesday. The market is closed on a Tuesday.”

At this, the small leathery man appeared somewhat crestfallen.

“Bah,” he snorted. “What will I do with my onions now?” He opened the top of his cart, struggling somewhat to reach it. “These are perfect onions, grown by request of the King.”

I peered into the top of his cart. I saw no onions, and told him so.

“What?” he cried.

I reaffirmed my assertion.

“Of course there are onions, you fool!” he snorted. “Huge, golden onions, fit for a king!”

Taken aback by the leathery man’s obvious conviction, I reassessed the onion-to-nothing ratio of the cart and found it wanting.

“I am very sorry,” I explained to the man, “but all I see in your cart are huge, golden, nothings. Perhaps a small child has made off with them while you weren’t paying attention.”

“I always pay attention,” snapped the man, meeting me with a hard stare. “You don’t produce onions like that by being whimsical.”

He began to move off, lifting the handles of his cart back over his shoulder with not inconsiderable effort. I watched his receding figure as he stalked off towards the market bearing his fictitious onions. I continued on my way to the wash-room, swinging my empty washing bag merrily, and looking forward to spending the morning washing the clothes therein.

A little girl named Dot once thought the sky was made of sea
and up above that rolling ocean was another world to see.

And as she looked up from her garden
at the swirling cloudy skies
she thought that it must be a happy place
where no one ever cries.

Up above there, in the cloudses, there’d be birds as big as houses
and the mouses would be huge and grey and fluffy, and the louses?
Why the louses, they would scamper back and forward and would pamper
all the little baby louses in their houses in the wind.

And just imagine all the flowers, daffodils as tall as towers,
Daisies brightening the glowers of the world’s most grumpy men
And if only we could see them shining, show them to each other
pick a giant rose for Father and a buttercup for Mother,
from the land within the wind.

Among those lovely petals would be sparkling jewelled beasties
who would gather up the nectar of the flowers in the Spring,
taking pollen from one plant and buzzing off to see another
spreading life throughout the garden working extra hard to bring
wondrous colour, scent, and beauty to the land within the wind.