Angela's Dream Poem by Tom Arnone

Such strange fat fireflies so early in the month of Beltane, pondered Angela, as she watched their ephemeral light brighten then fade. Was she ken to a mutation from some radioactive mist or super acidic rain? Or, more simply, a mischievous neuron in her prodigal imagination played.

It was kind of scary, she thought, for how unspeakable would they become by summer? Angela waved her arms chaotically, hoping to obfuscate their sense of direction. Running home, she collapsed on the toilet and performed a thorough lavation to refresh and calm herself - whilst a single, stealthy flyer wangled and buried it's exoskeleton deep within her shorts, without suspect or detection.

There it waited, nestled in her warmth like some grotesque, undefinable blur. Her sleep was a nightmarish kaleidoscope of aerial motion over meadows and fields of variegated flora and shambling human/insect hybrids that feasted and festered upon her. Angela's brainiac intellect lay suspended in the grip of a changeling's aura.

She woke in warm light, instantly relieved that the interminable night had ended. Her eyes appeared befuddled, for the sun was now setting in the pastel-painted west. Angela proceeded to crawl on the bed in vermicular circles, and then she ascended into her final epitaph... in the digestive fluids of a companion lightning pest.

Copyright (c) 2003 Tom Arnone
(Revisions 2009,2012)