Flying Island

Lunaticular by Stephen R. Roberts It’s always up there waning and waxing. Making faces out of shadows or vice-versa, cheese, or no cheese. Hiding rodent-like by day. Peering down at night, a big eye during harvest, or maybe later in the season, after heavy snow, with silver fantasies ricocheting off every branch. Yet ricochet isn’t the right word; it’s too reminiscent of bullets. And there was only one silver bullet. The Lone Ranger had it. Or was that his horse? In a moonstruck language, Tonto’s greeting may have been the word for werewolf. And werewolves can be killed by silver bullets. Or is that vampires? No. It’s normal looking people sprouting coarse hair from every pore, and blossoming into wolves when the full moon rises. There’s a poem about it the old gypsy lady chants as clouds drift over the pock-marked surface, and Lon Chaney Jr. rips his shirt to shreds. It’s something about wolfbane blooming, which must be lovely for all the syncopated loser...