My Daddy Used To Tell Me Not

Books Lie, He Said. God Dont Lie. No, Said The Judge. He Does Not. And These Are His Words. He Held Up A Chunk Of Rock. He Speaks In Stones And Trees, The Bones Of Things. The Squatters In Their Rags Nodded Among Themselves And Were Soon Reckoning Him Correct, This Man Of Learning, In All His Speculations, And This The Judge Encouraged Until They Were Right Proselytes Of The New Order Whereupon He Laughed At Them For Fools.

The Soft Black Talc Blew Through The Streets Like Squid Ink Uncoiling Along A Sea Floor And The Cold Crept Down And The Dark Came Early And The Scavengers Passing Down The Steep Canyons With Their Torches Trod Silky Holes In The Drifted Ash That Closed Behind Them Silently As Eyes.

A Goodlookin Horse Is Like A Goodlookin Woman, He Said. They're Always More Trouble Than What They're Worth. What A Man Needs Is Just One That Will Get The Job Done.

This Is My Child, He Said. I Wash A Dead Man's Brains Out Of His Hair. That Is My Job.

He Imagined The Pain Of The World To Be Like Some Formless Parasitic Being Seeking Out The Warmth Of Human Souls Wherein To Incubate And He Thought He Knew What Made One Liable To Its Visitations. What He Had Not Known Was That It Was Mindless And So Had No Way To Know The Limits Of Those Souls And What He Feared Was That There Might Be No Limits.