THE CANDLE-MAKER AND HER KNIGHTS QUESTING

THE CANDLE-MAKER AND HER KNIGHTS QUESTING, by Kelly Peach, with audio by The Bard

 

 

The candle-maker wears a silken gown

Of blackest ink and broidered gibbous moons

And shiver sta
rs. The candles, lowered down

With supple wrist while humming mirthless tunes,

Are dipped in iron vat of paraffin,

Some bacon fat, and amber wax from bees.

Without a care, she tells the knights within

Her boundless chambers standing ill at ease

Their newest quest to find the keys to fit

The door of nacred castle floating high

Above in Land of Summer Clouds. Such writ

Beyond is meet for them to signify.

 

The clanking paladins on horse approach

The way and halt. The lacquered Purple grim

With battered shield and whispered self-reproach

And grimmer Gray, his dented visor scrim

To all he sees, dismount and gaze at sheer

Escarpment.  Rusted sword and broken lance

Are left behind with other shoddy gear.

The weary coursers hobbled, wait perchance,

 

In nearby verdant lea with limpid stream.

The templars errant scale the cliff in frayed

And filthy quilted coats and did beseem

Two bloated spiders climbing palisade.

They crest the rim then gather sticks, begin

A small and sadly crackling fire to warm

Their bones. The sky is deeper blue than in

The Ocean’s deathly calm before the storm.

A brief repast of cheese and wine and soon

Recline on ground for snoring sleep and dreams

Of dragons slayed as half a mimsy moon

Arises. It sails through whimsy veils and beams

With pallid luster. Morning comes a pink

And orange smear with castle floating high.

Its splendored battlements a blushing brink

Above the rosy line of land and sky.

The men awaken, see the keep on clouds.

They rub the sleep from eyes and travel west

To reach the citadel on billowed shrouds.

They walk all day toward their sacred quest

But pacing forward only pushes back

The lofty fastness.  Gloaming finds it just

As far away. In granite cul de sac,

The noble knights espy in whirling dust

A wizard long in beard awaiting them.

Fatigued and mystified, they ask, “Dear sir,

Consult your sorcerous, refulgent gem

And tell us please, what magic spell it were,

Will carry us to yonder castle’s keys?”

“No magic’s needed,” said the thaumaturge,

“Because the beams of ashen moon do seize

The airy edifice and, tethered, merge

 

It with the near horizon, simply stalk

It through the night. Then climb, when close enough,

A silvered ray to reach the castle walk.”

With faith renewed, the questers, slip and scuff

And stagger through the dark to argent thread

Connecting skying keep to ground. Again,

Two swollen spiders climbing overhead

Arrive at heavy, rusted gate and then

They see the glowing keys are hanging there

On brazen hook. The Purple grimly lifts

The golden skeletons and back they fare

To candle-maker’s cottage where he gifts

The keys to her. She puts them in the bowl

With all the others. Infinite, it pends,

This stick of flaxen wicks. She dips them whole,

They don’t increase, and questing never ends.

 

________________________________________

Kelly Peach lives in the beautiful Upper Peninsula of Michigan. He hikes, reads and collects books, and bakes. His author’s website is mkellypeach.com; Twitter is @MichaelPeach. He has work forthcoming in Suicid(al)iens, 42 Stories, and Calliope.

What can be said of The Bard?  This:  Long ago, the mists of time parted. An unheard-of figure emerged: a wildman; untamed and howling. His brute savagery was a marvel to all. He fled into the wilderness and passed beyond memory. During the commotion, the Bard also emerged. He also fled into the wilderness but he came back when he got hungry.