LESTER

just a tale from my youth

                                LESTER                                   
                                       
old man sam had a son, lester, older than my sister and me,
large freckles across his nose, a “funny” crooked smile...
we were the only  kids, except for sam’s baby goats,
living within a 15 mile radius, so we spent a lot of time with lester
sometimes he terrorized us, sometimes we played,
mostly lester caught bugs, all kinds of bugs,
lady bugs, potato bugs, pill bugs, and spiders,
even those nasty mean biting centipedes...

lester examined each captive
so carefully, so completely
with his sanctified
ornately handled magnifying glass,
then he killed each one,
one slow stab with
his hand made consecrated
pearl handled straight pin sword...
then, with a razor blade scalpel,
lester sliced and studied each bug
like a forensic pathologist examines
a murder victim...
after hours of minute inspection
lester  would bury each segment,
each piece, head, heart, leg,                   
in a separate grave in sacred  hallowed ground,
his personally blessed burial mound
beneath an alder tree in the goat pasture
while kids played so completely unaware...

imagine the deliberate ceremonies required
to entomb each leg,
of a hapless centipede
so carefully skewered and hewed
in a separate grave,
marking each with a tiny twig cross,
a single miniature flower petal to cover every crypt...
years later i learned lester had become a very successful psychiatrist...

  i guess he landed on his feet?

Reviews

[dan]

jeannemarie, Again you mesmerize me with a fascinatingly told story-poem. Lester was what my parents used to call "a complex kid," and it wasn't meant as a ringing endorsement. But all of his exploring, his attention to detail coupled with the desire to learn likely served him well in medical school and psychiatric training and practice. Thank you for a bright light shining on a dark day. take care...dan

[jeannemarie coulter]

what you say is probably true about lester, and thank you for reading my words and responding, dan

[Amber Lily]

Wow... now that's an interesting story. While reading through I was wondering if he would turn into a killer at the end or maybe a scientist. But psychiatrist was even more surprising! Some people where just born to do strange things, and this just happened to lead him to his future. Very well written :)

[kclyaine]

That person must have an Asperger's Syndrome for he is quite obsessively interested in a single object or topic. But further studies must be shown to qualify the person having ASD. In short, I enjoyed your work really well. But I'm not quite sure you had that in mind. Maybe, he's just overly obsess with bugs but with that kind of concentration, he must be special.

[....................]

seems like Lester had a curiosity beyond that of a normal kid but through it, learned to pay attention to detail...i bet he made a great psychiatrist...a great story, my friend

[jeannemarie coulter]

thank you for reading and responding with helpful words