French Ultramarine Blue
Denying that I slept in my chair became a ritual of horses. The manager would come up the aisle and rap my throat and say where are you and I would point at my eyes and tap the piano keys. This was good schooling, they’d say, getting us up and jumpy for the farm, there are tough people out there and they are going to show you a tough time.
You aren’t demonstrating the barn’s full of problems, rat told them. Just that you are one.
He got put on the grapes. That was the big punishment but I did all I could to get put on grapes. Sit along the vines and pluck the dead fingers back to the buds. You will see the value of this cleansing, of the cut vine.
No, said rat. I’ll make wine.
They put him in the tower. This was a big tree that guarded the lower jungle and in the off-season provided safe passage for lightning. The managers would ring up the vines. Have you come to your senses, have you decided you will be profitable the way these trees spread their leaves.
And rat pulled the vines up and whistled for the harpies.
I never saw whether they came, but I did sneak in after the dark and leave shears on a lower trellis.