A TASTE OF REDWOOD

 

...They entered the forest from the south end of town, descending into the cool lush darkness of the redwoods via Maloc’s Pinto looking for and finding the good pullout that they wanted. Shouldering their backpacks they steamed up a hillside rife with emerald fern and green redwood twigs turned to the rust duff of decay, until they reached the trail that took them out of sight from locals and tourists alike driving in occasional cars on the winding road below.

Maloc led. Unseen strands of spider web encountered on his arms and face assured him of the trail’s disuse. Multi-colored mushrooms of vivid orange and red and bright white mushroom ghosts dotted moss of neon green. The hollow tok, tok in the upper reaches of the trees and bold swoop of wings announced a raven or two...

 

 

 

...Crossing the vociferous creek I accidentally slipped all the way up to the cut on my leg. The way the body on my back shifted in the pack felt repulsive.

I saw a mushroom in the woods–fat, saucer-like, chalky, looking like a moldy white discus jammed in a tree. The fungus on the mossy bark reminded me of my own burden. Envisioning myself back in the cave, holding the alien in my arms, I was struck with the image of an alien pieta. Hosts of images assailed my mind. It was as though a mask had been removed from the world. In the most distinct and profound manner imaginable I felt a sense of the perennial presence of magic...

 

 

 

 

 

...Some point soon after I tripped on a banana slug scrunched up to the size of a foot stool. It left a wet smear on my pants leg with a beefy audible slap. The dirty yellow body, dotted with black over-ripe spots, moistly oozed as it stretched across the trail in the span of several seconds, four obscene and canny horn-like feelers bobbing on the end of the bulging hood as it lurched into the primordial fern with skin dimpled like an elephant’s...

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

...Hopping over some brush not far from The Burl Barn, I saw on the road roll into town a masked man clad in motley, cap and bells. There were harlequins and mimes, Shields and Yarnell. Sonny and Cher ponderously pedaled the Yellow Submarine Sandwich. The Captain and Tennile worked the Hieronymous Bosch and Loam eight-wheel Pullman car with mustered diligence, looking like fish with legs on a green shag carpet as they labored up the steep hill into Madrani.

             
Aboard the Danish Inquisition, the Grim Reaper Ballerina conveyed a contraption consisting of various torture devices and glazed rolls. A UFO on wheels rolled by with a hatch at the top propped up. The driver pedaling away inside wearing a Richard Nixon mask hunched up his shoulders and flashed sudden peace signs.

             
It was Local-Motion Days’ Promenade of the Odd. Up the street past Just Desserts was the road to Mrs. Hutle’s. That was where I had to go. She was the only one who could help me. Everything’s riding on her. I’ve been at her place about an hour now, writing...