Within the Kettle

[Walrus Warwagon]

A collection of scrolls, containing images of various critters often imitating humans, and short stories.

[Walrus Warwagon]

The crane descended.

Smoke and paper, ink and dust, led his steps from the outer steam into the lower dry.

In the dens and burrows, the crane met two badgers. One scratched too often, the other smelled of vinegar, both spoke in strange tones. But neither bared teeth. They welcomed him into the dry.

The crane did not mind the filth. He walked with slow feet and careful eyes, learning how the lowest nests are built.

There, where even frogs blink upward, he remembered: The bottom is foundation from which towers arise.

The crane left the burrows before belonging.

[Walrus Warwagon]

The crane rose from the dry. 
In the steam, he met a mole with old eyes. 
Together they walked into the wind. 

Together, they soothed the stingers, calmed the clunkers, 
and shielded the bleaters. They hid tiny flame. 

They reached the place where grass clashes with silk on stone. 
They took the side of grass, and so silk had to burn. 

The crane then was sad, for he loved silks, 
but the leaves must fly where the wind blows.

[Walrus Warwagon]

The crane came to a ledge where birds gathered. 
One was a dog, dressed in canary feathers. One was a canary, real and bright, who spoke in clipped chirps.

He took their feathers before his name was asked. 
He put on the colors and walked the paths. 

He read the signs, stamped when they stamped, bowed when the wind bent low.
It was not yet spring.

[Walrus Warwagon]

The crane poured without pouring.
The kettle sat among canaries and herons, clanging over how long is too long.

The crane shifted his tail, and spoke many a single line.

The canaries chirped. The herons flapped. The page was still.
They scratched, circled, and pecked... and found themselves drawing what was already there.

At last, quiet. The kettle cooled.

And the ink was dry.