TALE OF A TUB

--for Isabelle

      The waves came in at us, one after the other, at first sending us in our skiff way high on the water and then down into the trough before the next one caused the narrow boat to rise again, hesitate and totter some, then dip, and we clung to the sides of the skiff in the dark -- there were no stars in the sky, and so the bay, the boat, the sky seemed continuous --and if we could have we would have prayed, though I'm not the praying kind, and neither, I believe, was Billy Boy, the mutt pup, nor was my dear friend Pajamas, the little elephant, and yet at the same time we knew that none of us could swim for the shore to summon help because we had never learned how to swim and besides even the best swimmer would have had a hard time of it trying to negotiate this nasty battering storm, and it was everything we could do just to hang on to one another -- I had Pajamas by the trunk and Billy Boy had me by the tail (I was always rather shy about the length of my tail until now; now that its size has probably saved my life) --as wave after wave came crashing, crashing against our boat.
      And how, you might ask, did Billy Boy and Pajamas and I get ourselves into such a mess? --how indeed! how indeed! It doesn't seem fair because all we were out to do was to have ourselves a pleasant seafaring excursion during this our only vacation of the year, and here we had rented this small boat, for a modest fee I might add, being as neither Pajamas nor I nor Billy had ever made much money in the carnival, but that's another story, and all we had wanted to do was to go a-sailing, and to witness the flying fish and see the Sargasso Sea, and be dazzled by the frolicsome dolphins and charmed by the sea lions who love so much to float on their backs while they break open abalone shells on their chests, but I'm getting ahead of myself.
      You see this was Pajamas' idea. I never wanted to go to sea. Neither did Billy Boy. Pajamas is the adventurer. I kind of resent it at this moment. I bet Billy Boy does too. But since we're just silly characters in a story I know we will get out of this jam eventually, and that leaves me in a position not to get overly mad at Pajamas. He's allowed. He's allowed.
      Meantime we are getting wetter and things in fact don't look so great because for instance what are those sharp fins tracing their way in circles around us, aren't those the fins of the famous nasty sharks, the kind of sharks that close in on helpless drowning sailors such as me, Billy and Pajamas, no I don't like the looks of those blue-gray fins circling us any more than I like it that our skiff has begun to take on water -- take on water indeed! -- take on water to such an extent that we have to admit now that the boat is gone beneath us, drifted away into the murky brine, and that the three of us are floating, adrift now, and that what we had hoped was only a squall has turned out to be some kind of big-time hurricane, and that most likely all is lost! -- and all would be lost, would truly be lost, but for the fact that we know, Mr. Pajamas and good old Billy Boy and I, that we don't exist, and wouldn't make a very good meal for a hungry shark nor very good victims for an evil storm at sea, and so while we float -- seeing the shore coming upon us through the driving rain and the cresting and crashing waves -- rather more confident about our fate than we would be if we did exist, we gather our wits about us for the briefest instant, and manage to say a prayer together for those of you who do exist, those of you who face peril and suffer and lose. We, mere cartoons, admire your strength and your humanity.
      Still and all, we must admit -- Billy Boy, Pajamas and I -- now that we've reached this imaginary shore and are saved and can go back and join our friends at the carnival tonight after our great ad- venture, that we're very happy we don't have to be you, because we doubt seriously you would have made it to shore and safety. But then, on the other hand, you might not have been so foolish to rent that skiff in the first place, eh?



THE MAN WHO DIDN'T KNOW ANY BETTER

--for Magdalena Mango

      There was once a man who didn't know any better. He was a poor man and could ill afford to be wasteful but, you see, he didn't know any better. When his shoelace broke, he threw away his shoe. When his shirt and trousers became dirty, he burned them. When he took a bite off the carrot he had brought with him for his lunch, he found it impossible to take a second bite, because on looking at the carrot he recognized that it was no longer a carrot, since it wasn't shaped like a carrot anymore, and therefore he tossed the worthless thing into the gutter. He was amazed to see a beggar seize upon it and gobble it down with such relish, and thought to himself how sad it was that the poor beggar didn't know any better than to eat that orange stick which wasn't a carrot. But, of course, it was he who didn't know any better. This was how he lived, and this is why he was a poor man. And if you remember this, Magdalena Mango, you will never be cold in the winter, you will never go hungry, you will never be poor. No one will ever say of you that you were a person who didn't know any better.



THE SEVEN SHEIKS

--for Sam

      Long ago in a faraway place there lived seven sheiks. Because the people could not decide which sheik was the best sheik, all seven of these sheiks ruled the kingdom, one on each day of the week.
      The Monday sheik was a quiet, hopeful sort of man who, though it was not widely known at the time, allowed his wives and scribes to make most of the decisions of state. He signed the decrees they presented to him for signature. He wore his most chic sheik robes as he took his afternoon stroll through the capital and visited with his people. He was a sleepy sheik and rested well at night, and remained hopeful that whatever mistakes he made during his day in power the Tuesday sheik could set right. He was very well liked by the people. And, in fact, it so happened that his wives were women of good judgment and his scribes were discerning, and nothing that the Monday sheik did brought his kingdom harm.
      The Tuesday sheik, who was a cousin of the Monday sheik, enjoyed the sound of his own voice, and not without reason, for his voice was a beautiful basso profundo, perfect for the speeches he so loved to make from the palace balcony. No one minded that he said nothing of substance when he spoke because no one noticed, so convincing was his voice, and so laced with fascinating metaphors and fanciful rhetoric were his famous speeches. He stood in the white light of the desert sun and waved his hands and all fell silent while he orated for an hour or two or three. He never asked for the people to respond to these speeches. It was enough for them to lend him their ears. He knew that to ask them to lend him more than ears was to tempt fate. And the Tuesday sheik was not one to tempt fate. The kingdom fared well under his rule.
      The Wednesday sheik was a bachelor. He had little time for affairs of state, and was far more concerned about affairs of the heart. The back door of the palace saw plenty of comings and goings on Wednesday. The people knew very little about their Wednesday sheik, who preferred to remain behind drawn curtains, a figure of mystery. Rumor had it he was not a terribly handsome fellow, but no one knew for sure. None of the many girls who had been seen leaving by the rear door of the palace was willing to say anything about this sheik, though a wise beggar who lived by the palace garbage bins swore he'd never seen the same girl come back twice. Since the Wednesday sheik had no time to attend to matters of government, he did nothing to bring mischief to his people.
      Thursday was tax day, not because the Thursday sheik was greedy, but rather because he was illiterate -- and not being able to read he took it upon himself to count. And oh, how the Thursday sheik loved to count! Early in the morning he would send out his tax collectors who went from door to door exacting the modest sums that were due from every citizen. By noon there would be stacked on the Thursday sheik's table piles and piles of copper and silver and gold coins, and you may rest assured that there was no happier man in the kingdom than the counting sheik, who counted these coins one by one by one. By sunset he would be finished with his task, and the tax collectors were summoned once more and instructed to return all the money to the good citizens of the kingdom. Because the people knew that by midnight they would get back the coins they had surrendered in the morning -- duly counted by the Thursday sheik --they made no complaint about these activities, and the kingdom remained peaceable.
      The Friday sheik enjoyed eating. He enjoyed eating lamb kabobs, he enjoyed supping on tender goats and chicken vindaloo. He adored the exotic fare that visiting dignitaries sometimes brought to the palace as presents --the shrimp scorpio from the envoy of Athens, the duck Nivernaise from the minister of France, the tangy meatballs from the nuncio of Lebanon: these sent him into ecstasies. Now, of course, his weakness for tasty morsels was known abroad, and many were the heads of other states who devised schemes to trick this hungry sheik into making unwise concessions that would ruin his kingdom, in exchange for, say, unlimited supplies of deviled ham, or creamed pickled herring. All these plots, however, came to nothing because Fridays were not the time for negotiating treaties or signing documents. Fridays were for eating and drinking and then digesting.
      The Saturday sheik was a deaf mute who was also blind and had no sense of smell. Little was accomplished on Saturday.
      The Sunday sheik, on the other hand, could speak, could see, could hear, could taste, could smell. And, as you might have guessed, the Sunday sheik liked to get things done. He was made of different mettle than the other six sheiks, and rather frowned on the various ways they chose to pass their single day in power. Unlike the Monday sheik, he was not a hopeful man, and trusted no decisions made by any other person than himself. He was loath to make speeches, and didn't see what good could come of communicating with the people, and thus more unlike the Tuesday sheik he couldn't have been. Love he considered a nuisance, and he had neither wives nor eunuchs nor any interest in pitch and woo. He thought the Thursday sheik was a fool to give back the tax money he'd collected and so carefully counted. Unlike the Friday sheik, the Sunday sheik was ascetic --a tall, gaunt man who lived on rice and water because he was careful of his personal wealth and hated to waste money on something as fleeting as food. After all, he thought, once you've eaten it you no longer own your food. So, Sundays were days of tremendous activity in the palace. Battles against neighboring kingdoms were planned, as were laws to bring criminals and rascals throughout the land to justice. Plots against the Sunday sheik were uncovered--whether they existed or not --and foiled. Plans were drawn up to erect a great statue of the Sunday sheik in the central square of the capital, though the monument had never been built, since statue makers always rested on Sundays.
      Indeed, everyone rested on Sundays except for the Sunday sheik, and this was the source of his single discontent. He enjoyed his day of ruling. He knew that he was the most able of all seven sheiks. It tormented him that for all his work and genius nothing much could be enacted because no one in the kingdom was willing to lift a finger on their day of rest. Try as he might to convince the other sheiks to trade their day with him, none of them would have it. They were all content with their days, and saw no need to change. So he was left to his own devices, and labored away in the palace right up to the final hour of the night, when he had to extinguish his lamps at the stroke of the clock that announced that Sunday was no more.
      After the seven sheiks died, the handsome and aggressive son of the Sunday sheik assumed control over the kingdom, and before his generation were able to pass along the mantle of power to their sons and daughters, poverty, famine, hatred and grief had swept throughout the land. It didn't take long for the kingdom next door to come across the blowing sands and defeat the son of the Sunday sheik. As the Friday sheik might have said, it was a piece of cake.



COWBOY

--for Emmet and Michal

      We get on our guns and sperrs and amunishen belts and we get on our horses next. It is not so bad to be one of us cowboys.
      The plains is a big place to ride on. Sure we got are cactus and sure we got are rattlers. But im a cowboy and sure as shooten I aint scerred of no snake.
      So I get on my pony and I ride and ride. I got my saddle blanket, I got my knife with sheath, I got my gun and amunishen belt, I got my chaps.
      I run into trouble. Cause theres awways trouble on the range.
      I dont shoot cause im a peacable cowpoke, but I tell you I sure could have spit.
      It was disgusting what I saw.
      It was too disgusting to tell you.
      Id rather disscribe to you my saddle thats so finely tooled. I got her down Mehico way. And my bandana is red juss like its sposed to be. And my bed roll is warm. And my bacon and corn bred and coffey tastes pretty darn good in the mornen. And my belts got a silver buckel.
      And my rope is long, cause thats what kinda cowboy I am.



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