He woke this morning confused, disoriented; crawled from bed, threw on yesterday’s clothes, fresh socks, summer sneakers, and ran out the back door, past his mom.
"Slow down!" she yawned, then "Eat something!" but he didn’t respond, just picked up his pogo stick to hop down the street as his neighbors hollered "Good Day, Sir Pogo Master," amused with this, the only child on the block, and he bounced along the yellow line from one curb to the other, into the neighbor's yard higher, higher, higher; up and over tall trees and low clouds, up and up into space before dropping again, ears popping, stomach plunging, until at last, he reached his street, long shadows revealing dusk had arrived.
He pogoed his return home until forced to stop for the strange man that appeared before him, falling from his toy as he looked up, up, up at the top-hatted fellow, eyes full of awe.
"There you are," the man said, to which the boy replied, "Here I am," to which the man replied, "You missed so much," to which the boy replied "So did you," then the strange man stroked his lopsided, gray-speckled beard.
"How do we fill it in," he asked, "all that lost time between you and me?"
The small boy shrugged, took the man’s hand, and together, they strolled down the street, backward, of course, so they could watch their ends meet in the middle.
Jenny Morelli is a NJ high school English teacher who lives with her husband, cat, and myriad yard pets. She seeks inspiration in everything and loves to spin fantastically weird tales. She’s published in several print and online literary magazines including Spillwords, Red Rose Thorns, Scars tv, Bottlecap Press and Bookleaf Press for five poetry chapbooks.
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