The Legend of the Dog-faced Woman

Animation based on detail from Triptych of Earthly Vanity and Divine Salvation, painted by Hans Memling c. 1485

Every year there is a date
on which all parents hold a feast
they eat and drink and celebrate
a certain hairy, monstrous beast
who growls as bad kids meet their fate
so listen up as I relate...
the Legend of the Dog-faced Woman.

Once two kids of Satan's spawn
an evil boy, the girl a bitch
came upon a magic thorn
with which they pricked a sad old witch
and that was when the curse was sworn
and thus it was that then was born...
the Legend of the Dog-faced Woman.

When children disrespect their mums
or fail to listen to their dads
when kids forget to wipe their bums
or won't switch channels in the ads
or scream or sulk or suck their thumbs
tell them a tale, and here it comes...
The Legend of the Dog-faced Woman.

Brothers dreaming

This story is loosely based on reality. At the age of about nine, during a strange and memorable dream I called out to my brother to come and join me. One of my biggest regrets is that subsequently I never got around to asking him about that night. Nor will I, at least not in this life — he died three years ago, at the age of 58.

Oh and one more thing: please ignore the title "Nanofauna" on the music video (it's a long story). "Portal to Forever" is a much better title. You might want to crank up the bass.

Once upon a night, a nine-year-old boy named Cain dreamed he was soaring like an eagle in the skies above a land so beautiful that he wept with joy.

He felt so full of wonder and delight that he called out to his younger brother Abel, asleep in the bunk below. Cain wanted Abel at his side, flying through the air of that mysterious land. Cain knew in his heart it would be a long time and a far way before he’d see those colours or hear that music again.

The next morning Cain felt off-balance. He was happy and excited, as if he had discovered a great secret that would change everything. But he was also angry and resentful that he had to get up and go to school. He wished he could just go back to sleep and resume the magic dream.

Abel woke up that morning feeling hot and dizzy. Their mother, Eve, took one look at his pale sweaty face and said “no school for you today sweetie, you must be coming down with something.”

Then Cain said “he’s faking, it’s not fair…” and Abel said “am not!” and Cain said “liar liar your pants are on fire!” and Abel said “well your pants smell like poo!” at which point Cain flew at his brother in a rage, throwing punches as hard and fast as he could.

Ninja-boy and the clouds

In the dead of the day the ninja crept like a wounded hyena toward its prey. No clouds crossed the sky; the ninja wondered why. He had always wondered where the clouds go to die: a practice that had cost him dear over the years. The times, for instance, when as a boy he had turned to his father and plaintively enquired, "Oh where do the clouds go to die, daddy-san?" only to receive a swift box about the earhole, and the stern rebuke, "What the crap are you bleating now, shit-fer-brains? Jus' eat your rice and shut the fuck up!"

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Happy Campers

The Burial of the Sardine, painted by Francisco Goya (1746-1828)

The Happy Campers encountered the Scum of the Earth at the Crossroads of Perplexing Coincidence. The Happiest Camper said to the Chief Scumbag, "Good day to you, kind sir. What a happy day, is it not?"

The Chief Scumbag grimaced then replied, "Get fucked asshole!"

"Oh dear," said the Happiest Camper, "I do apologise if we have offended you and your friends in any way."

The Chief Scumbag frowned, hawked a gob of yellow-green phlegm upon the ground, then snarled "You offended your own mother the day you were born, Camper Boy! Now get the fuck outta here before I tear you a new one!"

"My, my, my," said the Happiest Camper, "you seem to be a tad tetchy this glorious god-given morn. Why don't we all thank the Creator for the many blessings bestowed upon us. Now, let us prey!"

And with that the Happy Campers fell upon the Scum of the Earth like ravening wolves until every last scumbag was dead and every drop of scum sucked from the face of the Earth.

Except for one little boychild scumbag hiding behind a tree. But not for long. He was found and brought before the Happiest Camper.

"Who are you?" asked the boychild scumbag with understandable trepidation.

"We are elongated ridges on the floor of each lateral ventricle of the brain," replied the Happiest Camper, leaning forward to slit the boychild's throat with a kris.

How I got my Bad

Once, when we were little, Jonnie and me were playing and Jonnie got hurt, and started crying.

I started larfing. Jonnie hated that, when you started larfing at him. Then mum came and blamed me for everything and said she was going to tell dad. And I got really upset and screamed at mum and pushed her … Can't remember what happened next, but anyway, that's how I got my bad.

Since then my bad's got worse, a lot worse. Like when I was waiting for a taxi and then a taxi came and a girl tried to steal my taxi, and how she screamed and cried and…

But anyway, that's how I got my bad, and that's how my bad got worse.

And now I'm scared 'cos my worst is still to come.

Dust to dust

Old wizened trees gazing on forever
their eye-leaves slowly drifting in a velvet haze
extend their praise to blackness
while the grass tips bow with the wind
a thump is pounding closer and closer
the sound of footsteps come
to cut and hurt the trees until their wizdom-sap
oozes like thick black blood
but the creatures smile with glee
their pointed features pointing, their laughter steady
they suckle and suckle and suckle
until satiated they fall to the ground
the trees are not bothered
they've been through worse, have many stories to tell
they are saddened though
by the steady vampiric suckling of life
due to which the earth is salted and white as ice
its crystals are shimmering like diamonte
and this is the place
where I SCREAMED
I was growing, ever changing
a very promising maiden
the orphanage near the woods
thought so at least
the woods so close to hand
it would be natural to become inquisitive
so i waltzed out with all my possessions:
just a matchbox
and an old economically unacceptable coin
what happened next and why i am undressed
my money gone and my body black
the charcoal crumbles
and the wind blows me away in the breeze.

Words and art by J.

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The Summons of the Amulet

The gang were all there, in their usual spot behind the trees at the south end of the school grounds. They were talking about good ways to commit suicide and Tom said injecting air into your veins ‘cos that gives you a heart attack, and that’s how Bruce Lee died but they never found out who did it though.

Then Piggy said eating yourself to death, like in that movie where they ate and ate and ate and the one dude got sick and starting farting until they forced him to eat mashed potatoes and then they all screwed these hot young babes with ice cream and chocolate sauce dripping all over them.

The younger boys, JJ, Nose and Weasel said “Wicked!” and “Fully sick!” Nose got his name from the size of his nose. None of them could remember how Weasel got his name.

Just then the boys noticed Tom’s step-sister Suzie approaching. Her pale skin was dotted with freckles. She wore her frizzy red hair in pigtails. Her eyes lay deep and green behind spectacles with lenses the thickness of coke bottle glass. She had just turned seven and in her hair she wore one of the cute little bunny hairclips that daddy had bought her on her birthday.

A bad, bad feeling

Paulie was a skinny little kid with ginger hair and no friends. He lived with his mother in a ramshackle cottage on the wrong side of the tracks. His father had died in an industrial accident a few months after Paulie’s birth.

The kids at school teased him a lot. They called him “mommy’s boy” because his mother waited outside school most afternoons to walk home with him, or take the bus if they didn’t feel like walking.

Paulie’s love for his mother ran deep. She was always doing things for him, looking after him, helping him do his homework, stuff like that. And every year on his birthday she would bake him a cake and give him a present (even though they didn’t have much money) and sing “Happy Birthday” so that he could forget his troubles at least for one day.

Paulie knew the date of his mother’s birthday, but for one reason or another he never remembered in time to make her a present or a card. Her birthday would come and go and a few days later he would realize he had forgotten yet again. He would feel really bad about that, but only for a short while and then the bad feeling would go away.

One day at school it suddenly came into his head that it was his mother’s birthday that day. He was ecstatic that he had remembered. In art class he made a beautiful birthday card for her. He felt proud of himself for remembering, and he could hardly wait for school to end so he could hug his mom and wish her happy birthday.

dark sprite

What dark sprite pursues you down those corridors of ice,
that endless, lead to nowhere but the fear within your heart?

Dare you name the creature that has stolen your joy,
and insatiable in its fury ever thirsts for more?

We remember you in the golden time,
before the fall, when your soul untrammelled soared among the stars.

Please don’t go away; don’t leave us only with memories of your fierce dark mind,
the mysteries you create, the paths you tread where none has gone before.

I wrote this poem with a particular person in mind. Over a relatively short space of time, the person's personality and behaviour changed from light to dark, from loving to angry and hostile, from joyful to resentful, from kind to cruel. We've never found out what prompted the change, but we suspect it was a specific episode/incident in that person's life. It has been heartbreaking to witness.

Published in AWAREWOLF and Other Crhymes Against Humanity for kindle, tablet, smartphone or e-reader.

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Cheeky little devil

The Devil Torturing Souls as well as Being Tortured Himself in Hell”, painted by the Limbourg Brothers, from Les Très Riches Heures du duc de Berry, 1411-6

Little Jonnie stood at the entrance to Hell, bright-eyed and bold as brass. In his left hand blazed a flashlight. In one pocket was a box of matches, in the other were spare batteries for the flashlight.

Lacking maturity and being well-schooled in folly he audaciously demanded an audience with the First of the Fallen.

“Can’t you read?” growled the Gatekeeper Demon in Charge, pointing to the sign.

“Firstly,” responded Little Jonnie, impudence oozing from every pore, “How can I abandon something I never had to begin with? Secondly, how can Hope be abandoned when she already has been left behind in her unbreakable house? And thirdly, I haven’t entered yet, have I? You’re blocking the way.”

The Gatekeeper Demon shook his long, twisted horns with irritation. He didn’t know what to say. He had never before encountered anyone or anything like this impertinent Young Person, so self-possessed and not at all afraid.

“What is the meaning of this, young man?” spluttered the Gatekeeper Demon. None too bright at the best of times, the Demon's perplexity rendered him temporarily incapable of performing his agnostic duty.

“The meaning of which young man?” asked Little Jonnie provocatively.

“You! You, young man! I believe I’m talking to you!!” The Gatekeeper Demon’s coal-black face turned as red as a boiled lobster.

“Believe? Don’t you know for sure?” asked Little Jonnie wickedly.

Can't do nothing properly!

One day dad went into McDonald’s for a burger but it was quite busy and he had to wait in line. Also, the teenage staff weren’t very efficient: one was flirting with a boy, another was talking on her phone, and another was just plain slow and useless full stop.

Dad got more and more impatient. He had a terrible hangover and all he wanted was a nice greasy burger to throw to the pain in his gut.

Finally, he got to the head of the queue and grumpily placed his order but was told it wasn’t ready and could he wait a couple minutes. That got him steaming mad.

Malicious Damage

At 01:45 hours plain-clothed Transit Officers from the Asset Protection Taskforce patrolling Run 5990 observed two male juveniles applying graffiti to the vestibule interior of Carriage 858. Officers detained the offenders and de-trained at South Dowling Station requesting police attendance.

The older juvenile, T. requested that his parents be contacted. The younger juvenile, D. stated he could not provide an address and would be unwilling to accompany his parents.

Police attended and cautioned the offenders re Malicious Damage and Draw/Write/Affix Character on Crown Property.

The parents of both offenders arrived on the scene.

Police advised that both offenders due to their age would not be issued with an Infringement Notice. Police issued both offenders an Official Caution. Upon receiving the Caution T. was released into the custody of his parents. However D. took flight from the scene and egressed through an unlocked security gate onto the track.

The driver of the late-running 04:25 applied the emergency brake but was unable to draw to a halt in a period of time of sufficient duration. Details were recorded in the Incident Ledger according to Protocol 23 s. 1-2.

The parents were assisted by Officers and Police at the Scene.