THE STORY TELLER

prose and poetry

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THIS IS A PAGE OF SHORT PIECES AND A COUPLE- O- POEMS

SCROLL DOWN FOR THE GOODIES. ALL PIECES BY KEN LEHNIG

THE ASSASSIN ken lehnig

I don’t walk in the light anymore. They know that I'm out here, they just don't know who I am. What I am, is not what I once was . I have become.

I started out in my youth doing what I'm doing now. It was my temperament that made me perfect for the job. The terror and unending horror of Vietnam did its work on my mind. There was no shock or post-traumatic syndromes for me; hell was my home as it had always been. I reveled in the slaughter and mayhem. It was right and proper that there be good guys and bad guys. I was the gunslinger, the one in the white hat knocking on the door of the Black Pajamas. I was their demon, their terror, and a perfect nightmare. I made the war my personal reason for living.

When I left the leash of moronic Generals, playing at greed and politics, and set out on my own, my world opened up. I hid during the day and ravished at night. When I had killed my black soul's quota I came back to the army. The demon with waist length hair and a string of ears around my neck walked into a camp asking for a hamburger and fries. I was arrested after putting three soft and ridiculous MPs in the hospital. I knew them for my own, which was the only reason to let them live. An insightful Colonel saw to it I got my hamburger and fries, avoiding a slaughter, and invited me to take a trip home. I was debriefed and my stories checked out. When all the talking was done and I had spent a year in a quiet and solitary way, I calmed down and time took the feeling of dread from me. I was no longer a demon. A demon must live knowing that the light will consume him and all their deeds must be done as quickly as possible while the dark still exists. It is a desperate and frantic life but if you are a doomed thing it's the only life you have. I was left with just myself.

I tried to go home. I became lost in alcohol and drugs. I fought my way up again to the light. God had use for me and I was redeemed.

When they called me, they said my skills were needed to protect an unstable world. With perfect irony it was my skills that the world needed. I did that duty, of course, with a new coolness and resolve. The demon was gone but the killing tools remained. All that was needed was a new morality, one that served me first and my controllers second. I insisted on accurate files on my targets and I made the choice to hit or not. If I found that the files lied I told my handlers that I would hunt them down and kill them. They believed me and on occasion that was, indeed, necessary. My code of ethics and morality demanded it. I became the instrument of the God of the Old Testament. I became invisible. I faked my death so that I could make sure no assignments went out that were unjust. Those agents who took those assignments I terminated. The world could not suffer the unthinking beasts. I would take contracts by drops and proxies. Some agents I did not kill, for when I looked in their eyes I knew their souls. These few I made disciples. No one knew , anymore, who was doing the work. They didn't care as long as it was getting done. I took files and contracts from all governments and became judge and jury. The same rules applied for all contracts. If the handler of any country gave me a file that was full of lies or devious machinations then they and their superiors would die.

I soon tired of the method and sought evil on my own. Regimes, secret societies, and governments rose and fell at my hand. I became the angel of death and the instrument of righteousness.

There were perks. I was wealthy. I funded medical research and found cures so that as I took I gave back. I kept one such cure for myself. I found the remedy for aging and death. The men and women that found this panacea sadly had to die. This was a cure that this poor and deluded world must not have.

I am in my three hundred and twenty third year.

The world began to work. No one in power dared do wrong by a standard that the powerful learned to know well. They feared my retribution. I was their nightmarish myth. I became their incentive to make the world a better place. I was dread and very much alive in the world. I was the inheritance and the bane of the rich and powerful. These few and select became servants to the world. The last shall be first and the first shall be last.

I became still and quiet once more. For awhile.

They came to stay not to visit. They had watched and avoided my personal attention for too long. I knew of them and their agenda for most of my live. At first it was the realm of the hopeful and lost; or the poor knowing souls wrapped in secrets and sadness. So many in the past, breathing their last at my skillful hands, confessed that all the stories were true. These beings have always thought they would have their way with this world. It was the projects I funded that got their tiny nostrils in a twitch. They knew someone would find what I had already found. It was longevity that was the secret to our leaving this big blue marble and they could not have the human race discover that secret.

They came to live in disguise. They now live among us and have found their way to the seats of power. I have terminated many of their agents over the years, because of their vile meddling. They do not fear me because they have no souls. They seek ours.

The Devils reside with us and I am ‘still’ no longer.

I will teach them fear.

End

She Walks in the Moonlight ken lehnig

I had the chance to know her on a sultry summer night

In the trees some ten years gone

Eyes dark luster shinning like black pearls

Skin like porcelain gleam

Won me over and had me done

She cries and walks in the moonlight

She only walks in the moonlight

Her cold gentle hands touched my face

Whispered sweet and clear

Breathe that stills the time

But it’s a weary nighttime dream

One the sun forgets like the taste of fine red wine

The moonlight stole her color

Silvered hands across my face

Red lips that promise wonders

She and I in this place

I gave and she takes my name

Hers won't be heard in the sunlight

Night must turn the red rose black

She sings her sad story about her dark loves sweet betrayal

Cold tears fall upon my brow

She cries and walks in the moonlight

She walks in the moonlight

I had a chance to know her on a sultry summer night

In these trees some ten years past

Now I have no name in the sunlight

Night must turn the red rose black

I can never go back

She cries and walks in the moonlight

She walks in the moonlight

I cry and walk in the moonlight

I walk in the moonlight

I STAND Ken Lehnig

I stand in the middle of the world

As shadows ebb and wane

My thoughts like tides awash

Opinions and regrets leave stains

Whatever real, long last and sad

I stand in the center of the world

I turn north- south- east and west

Looking for some path buried in ruin

A map or scroll, queer words at best

No help given bodes bare and dismal

I stand at the end of the world

I hear naught in the whispered wind

The ocean has its hidden songs

The earth bares my unnatural weight

But will not hold my thought for long

BIRTHDAY NIGHT 1957 ken lehnig
( a true ghost story )

Birthday Sunday before holiday Monday
Pineapple up side down cake made perfect in a broken pan
Homemade ice cream worked up in a summer eve
Ate till my stomach and head hurt- alka seltza found
And then the dread of bed time, my brother and me
To a third story room next to an attic dark
One hanging bare light bulb stark at the top
Up there with too steep and narrow stairs
Two doors atop, one to our room, one to the attic - locked
We stepped up each night slow and afraid
Something was up there waiting and watching
In the plain room with sloping ceilings
Plain with bunk bed, drawers and toy chest
Mine the top next to the curtain-less portal window
That looked down to the street lit dim
Sleepless sweat and fretted in that moonlit room
I prayed the prayers the priests taught me
Then lest unheard prayed to the mother moon
Just as my covers pulled down with a jolt
And I screamed quietly for fear of being heard
And I fought with bloodless hands
A losing battle over foot board straight and gone
My covers leaving - cold was I - body and soul
And in terrors grip I fainted away
Then up, I heard a voice say …Come down…come down
Ken, come down… the voice said over and over
I shook in fear at what haunted my room
I turned to the window with regained strength
There in the dim midnight light
Was me - bouncing a ball - was me - dressed in my clothes
On the moon silver street was I - gesturing me down
Come play with me…come down… come down!
No… I whispered …I would be lost… The voice said … You would be found.
Come to me… The demon with my face and clothes - said.
I sobbed and collapsed in fevered exhaustion
When I awoke in the morning's light
My bed clothes drenched and I thankful
To Whoever heard my desperate prayers
I climbed down from my bunk's perch
And there upon the toy box were my covers
Folded neatly and mocking my terrible fear
My little brother woke and said
"I had a weird dream." as he wiped his eyes
"You were down on the street playing with a ball
Saying over and over…come down…come down
And there was something - scary in our room."

STAIRS ken lehnig

I have walked down so many halls all one to another. Not a person or sound except the sad moaning and weeping that echoes off the featureless walls when I am desolate. But I stroll endlessly on and on. I have walked for years it seems. Walked in search of my immortal soul, lost in a memory barely held on. So endlessly hard this task. I never swerve. I don’t sleep .I don’t rest for there is no relief from the fatigue that permeates through me and weighs me down.

Then there they were…what branch of corridor did I stumble into to meet this horror? Stairs!

It was the stairs that made me even less. It was the stairs that took my nerve. Comfort I took in the sameness of this place, this hellish place. I take the walk to clear away the sins of life. I took it not for a simple race, but held it in patience to atone for all life’s mourning strife. No person have I seen these untold years. No person to try to justify the reasons for my actions or those choices that ended in disaster or disappointment. Where are those who orbited me, those more important than I did ever know? Where are those souls I dominated or those who dominated me? Where are those people to whom I lied and cheated? There is no one to see my repentant tears, no one to stand-to judge and call out my penance. Not one person to tell me... why? Can I not give my version, my lies, my truths, my worthiness and my wretchedness? Where is the Judgment, where is the Throne for me to kneel in disgrace? Where is the welcome Fall to earned flame? Just this endless gray, this forever corridor and then these cursed …stairs.

And now I crumble in the mist of eternal gray staring at these stairs. I fear …it grips me and holds me down. Yet I can no longer walk pondering these eternal questions. I have run out. I haven’t one thought other than wondering at the nature of these stairs. I can’t bring myself to take one step up these too bright tiers. Dear God, did you put me here to learn-to realize some revelation? But none has come. Life affirmed or denied have I pondered and have come to no answer. It was not all bad or all good. Some things happened to me and I was carried along in a current. Some things I did myself from anger or did without regard or care. Some I held true and some I denied. Some things I did for the best and bore the sting of misunderstanding. I took some to me and threw some away. And for all my mussing no answer came to me. For the good I did was shadowed by the weight of rue and woe. I wasted much in depression, in tears of regret and in a self-image carved by the eroding winds of life to which I had no great skill. Should I be blamed for the recklessness of my youth, the selfish and blind single-mindedness of my middle years or the cynicism of my aged self? How else? But no Judge have I …just these lighted stairs and a crippling fear. So I ask in a simple prayer " Dear God where do these stairs go?"

End

THE TROLL OF LAMPSWICK BY KEN LEHNIG

The bridge at Lampswick has always been there

And the Troll to the capture of small children too

Though the folk tolerate the small tragedies

For the Troll bring them fame it’s true

They thought to be finally rid of him

And they offered an Urn of pure gold

Many came and ask what task to do

Then left when they were told

All but one,a young women fair

Who went to the Troll to talk

He came from a shelf under the bridge

When across it he did walk

He asked her what soul had she

To take on such a fearsome task

For in truth he was an awesome brute

She stood quite tall, then spoke at last

I know your deeds my handsome Phooka

You spread the lies about yourself

About how you eat the little children

And wait there upon your shelf

But only mistreated children disappear

The truth is stranger still

You gather them to your Fearie home

Just under this very hill

You give them love and wholesomeness

For in this world they had a lack

You give them truth and the way of things

When grown you give them back

Lords and Ladies every one

The pride of human kind

With warm memories of their childhood

And the love they did find

For an ugly Troll who hid himself

To become their one true father

A teacher of love and the wisdom ways

No one could take them further

The Troll sat down and began to cry

For all she said was true

She said don’t cry my fair prince

For I have come to marry you

With such a family grown so large

By the neglect that’s in the world

A woman’s hand could well be used

With this from the Troll smoke did curl

And there stood before her a kindly man

Fair of face, strong and straight of limb

For all his love the spell was cast

Again to the man he once had been

He lost his child one sad sad day

And chased her to the nether lands

He saw the care her little soul received

Yet still he made his demands

When those who guard that Kingdom fair

Saw that he did not belong

They sent him back quite quickly

In the Troll form he held so long

But he knew of the other worlds

Some cold some like paradise

So he vowed to help the children

Who suffered their parents vice

When one who came loved him still

In spite of his awful looks

Those who guard the Kingdom

Opened up the treasured book

And gave him back his former shape

And forgave his one grieve borne trespass

For they, these two, had found the whole

And through the Fearie gate did pass

To gain the children Underhill

And bring them to this side

To live a fair and goodly life The Lord and his new Bride

Dancing on a pin ken lehnig

You got it on the road-running from your man

You did a lot of talking- but he didn't understand

That’s when the black hat- dealt you a royal hand

Pick up a buck or two- you'll make it anyway you can

So you sing-

I think I'm an angel

Dancing on a pin

Tell me what is right

Tell me what's a sin

I think I'm good at losing

I'd surly like to win

The city was your dream- you came with all your love

You were tall dark and sexy- and fit like a glove

But the good things in life- the angels may take away

Looking for a better thing- in the noise and the fray

It's all just a dance- just step to the marks

The best you could ask for- is to just have a part

Write your songs in sadness- seek tears to deter

The stars still may ring- eternal the eon long answer

So you sing

Dress up in bright colors- Feed pigeons in the park

Now your living on the street- scaring demons in the dark

It's so easy in your mind- than the whirl of the world

You make up the rhyme- the melody and the word

So you sing

A thing upon my skin.

(I have always been a bit of a hypochondriac- I don't miss the irony of my current situation. I wrote this poem as a way of laughing at myself.)

Doctor Please

Doctor please.

What is this thing that grows upon my skin

That goes away and comes back again

As if I wouldn’t see it pretending to be me

Once here upon my front and then swings alee

Doctor please

It taunts with itches then hides away

In a crease or fold yet I find it anyway

The Doctor says 'tis a passive benign tab

Cut it, freeze it, send it, willy -nilly to the lab

Doctor please

I would rather walk the Titanic's icy decks

Than live with this lumpy gruesome speck

So prescribe some balm libby- medi-goo

One that will do what it says it will do

Doctor please

Maybe find it roaming on my burdened back

Silent blue and brown a cunning tack

Cross your arms - tell me thy prognosis true

What in the world should a person do

With a thing that grows upon my skin

That goes away and comes back again