John Riley

Dark Door
 
Some are dreams, some are not, is what I whisper as the tiny door opens and rows and rows of domed tombs stretch farther than I can see, as though fleeing to the horizon. Between each tomb a tiny human, dressed in what was once their finest black mourning clothes, stands reverently beside a tiny mound of ash, and the question, the only question that matters, is why are the tombs so large when the dead are so small? In dreams and beyond dreams this is beyond an answer, which leaves nothing more to see as the dark door closes.
 
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Water Circle
 
Our people lived here, beneath the fire, where the cooling lake earned its right to stay. Teams of freshly birthed children filled the night. During the auctions of the finest coloured silks, each one stretched wider than the next, thousands of dwellers from all the centuries came to make bids. The silk was so beautiful and rare the adults panicked and in a few moments the children were brought forth to chant: “There are no more silks! No more silks!” In the stillness of the dark the children stood sturdy until the sun returned. Moths fluttered in the blending light.
 
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Great Migration
 
I watched from the dry hill as a small group of forest people walked across the plain, perhaps heading toward the river, or farther on toward the coast across the huge landscape, in search of food and better weather. What if I joined them? If I grew sicker and the boils and scales continued to climb up my legs and onto my stomach, eating my flesh until I was skinless, would the group have wise ones who knew death is always a few steps away? What would my new people think of the world that remained when I was gone?
 
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Our Feet Fly
 
We are instructed to stand at attention until the man in a white coat, a doctor we assume, nods his head and we begin to walk across the street toward a row of trees. We have not been told what type of trees they are. I have decided they are hazels. We keep our eyes straight ahead and keep our minds focused on not flinching because we know, everyone knows, that a spinning wind will grab us and carry us away before we reach the stand of trees. We will be lifted back across the road and when the wind stops we will tumble to the ground from a safe height and be back to where we started. We are not paid, we're volunteers, and each of us has a secret the man in the white coat will never know. It could be a heartbreaking job, to be rejected by the trees, to not be allowed into their small forest but we love the trees more each time they toss us away. Each day, as the trees reject us, we see more clearly: the road, the strong summer leaves determined to stay with their tree, the wide expanse of open field behind us, the man in his white coat trying his experiment over and over. There are no more illusions and our senses are at peace. 
 
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Broken Cup
 
People have mouths and eyes and ears, and houses have doors and corridors and windows, and towns have wires and streets and alleys. In all of these places, there is always an unlucky one and in our town the unlucky one is the pleasant boy who is burdened with the mistakes of others. He thought of what a burden it was to carry the mistakes but one time and the thought quickly pushed him away as though saying, “This thought is not for you.” Once, in the soft part of the evening, he was instructed to search a grand garden for a missing item. It was a task he couldn’t possibly hope to complete successfully. The dignified men and women who stood on the terrace and scrutinized him as he searched knew it was an endless task. It was a splendid gathering, from which, like rockets, laughter flew out of their happy mouths, and on that substantial day the pleasant boy broke the handle of the painted cup a guest handed down to him to be used to place the object he was hunting inside. Now, forever, the broken cup will be in the garden. There are always things that remain strange to him, but he understands that dignified men and beautiful women are envious of his willingness to be comfortable with strangeness. It was neither here nor there, their admiration, he decided, and he easily forgot the broken cup's location. The pleasant boy continued on hauling his mistakes, and the mistakes of others, being continually pulled down and thrown back up, free in his uselessness, whether lauded, blamed, in pieces or whole.
 
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Miscellanea
 
The seizing of a sum burnishes the numbers ciphered, green and fertile, blooming documents to say I am. The same papers that will gather at the feet of my ghost, leaving me with I was, while I leave you as empty as ambition. These are no mere calculations, my love. The seizure of my accumulation is not enough to waylay your coming dread. Your strong back will wither; hunched, you will equal the miscellanea cataloged. Diseases. Despair. Disgraces. The growing estrangement of your left hand from your right. My final addition will soon be done and differences will deplete the sum. Take that, and that, and that! Take the white lilies, the lotus blossoms, take the roses for the river to cross.
 
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John Riley is a teacher and editor. 10,000 Words, a collection of 100 of his 100-word prose poems was published in 2023 by EXOT Books. He has also published poetry and fiction in The Comstock Review, Smokelong Quarterly, Literary Matters, and other journals and anthologies online and in print. He has been nominated for The Best of the Net. He has also published over forty nonfiction books for young readers.