The Other Kids

Furry hands sing nightmares. Sounds the same but the voice is not your own. It’s beyond the end of your arm and within the television screen.

You do believe in the promise of a place where the air is free.

Innocent of Nixon. Satisfied with less. Lessons of alphabets and numbers so early in the dream. Now Cookie Monster fangs puncture veins. Ernie and Bert spread the Body Fluid Plague. Big Bird molests pre-schoolers lost in the alley.

Wake up howling inarticulate. Stuck back in the living room. Mother and father, married then, argued quietly in their bedroom.

Copyright 1995, held by author.