An Enchanted Quest
(Picks up where A Colorful Quest left off)
The more Henneth searched the more the cave walls
wavered, transforming as he breathed perfume
where floated rose’s kiss and a promised fall
onto a bow-decked bed, veiled by no doom,
just a mosquito net; no love mirrored
there, just a door closing and a demon,
pink carnations in hand standing silvered
by a garden path, book in hand, reason’s
flown as he follows, his sword’s grown heavy
in his hand; mind’s traffic stalls; thoughts, their thrum
quiets, as ability to resist
the enchanter wanes; his sword’s dragging hum
can’t break the spell he’s under, but enlist
aid by reaching out to she who slumbers,
anonymous, as she trips lock’s tumblers…
~ ~ ~
For most of history, Anonymous
was a woman; one whose rising from ground
in disregard; in pastel she’s all trussed
up and corseted in courage she’s found.
No weapons for her, she’s got a bowl full
of buttons and thread enough to button
up the foulest enchanter; the rightful
cave’s owner, its her energy that’s spun
into this farce; in theory, one good shove
ought to catapult the fool captive free.
She’s the element of surprise, this dove,
not that she needs it, she was young and free
when history was a caterwauling
baby–or is that a real babe crying?
~ ~ ~
She pauses to listen but echoes fall
silent; they risk not her ire and the urge
to check dies out as she walks to stop all
the madness that’s about to here converge.
A minute’s run puts her deep into spells
any man would have to hack through with swords.
A basket of pale purple pears compels
her to pick it up and toss it towards
an emaciated thing practicing
dark arts, making it scream as its matter
disintegrates on contact thus cleansing
the air, leaving his victim in tatters.
“What just happened?” he asked though shaking still.
“Buddy, you followed a thing made of swill.”
~ ~ ~
Henneth tried to process her words but no
sense could he make of them not from his view.
She yawned and stretched, “if you want food, you know
how to cook it, grate’s over there. I’m through
here, stay as long as your gear hold out, Dear.”
She left then, stepping out into Storm King’s
snowy tantrum, at which she paused to sneer.
“This the best you got, you cotton crowned king,
you moldy, cobweb addled, beardless twit!”
The wind snatched her words and flung them to its king
whose apoplectic fury loosed a blitz,
frosty hounds bent on a long glacial freeze.
She seized them, hitched them to a cart and soared.
“I’m anonymous woman, hear me roar.”
~ ~ ~
Henneth watched all this in perplexity.
Though bards had long maintained millennium’s
children, known for their anonymity,
oft dispensed with names; future’s premium,
they said, but that seemed sad to Hen, that name
should be forgot as pow’r massed to protect
one’s independence, forgoing all fame —
but then what did he know ’bout detection?
Perhaps the path she trod was link enough
to the world that names were just letters read,
their meaning carried forth while off the bluff,
the letter was tossed never to be read
‘gain by anyone, not e’en the owner,
who has no interest in a loaner.
~ ~ ~
The sword’s glow pulled him, like beaver to den,
his mind to back to the reason for this quest.
Listen he did but no baby’s cry then
did he hear that hour or the next, that pressed
him to search as the air chilled, but he found
no baby, not ’round that last bend, just a kid
goat, curled up and freezing; it’d made the sound.
He had no milk to give, but warm the kid
he did as he munched dried venison, tough
as shoe leather, teeth crackingly salty,
but food nonetheless and drank from rough
streams that formed their own lanes while his faulty
mind tried to work through it all; blanket wrapped,
the goat kid and he, dreamed of trees and napped.
to be continued in A Starlit Quest, tomorrow.
New Year, New Quest….
Join me every day for 116 days for a quest of a different sort. An offbeat, humorous rendering of Shayari’s magicked miles as seen through a regular Joe (who’s having a midlife walkabout) and the misfits he meets along the way. His life’s never going to be the same. Shayari might not be either.
Part adventure and part travelogue, through hapless Henneth you’ll get to see a whole lot more of Shayari and its Enchanted forest.
~ ~ ~
Sarn and his family are taking a brief hiatus while I work on publishing their first full length novel, tentatively titled Enchanted. You can read drafts of the first 15 chapters by hitting up its TOC page here.
If you miss them or missed parts of their holiday adventure, you can pick up a copy of their holiday novella:
Stars and Angels Sing
Originally published at melindakucsera.com on January 8, 2016.
