What it is and What it Shall Become
Many readers of this blog return daily in an attempt, I think, to decipher its meaning. As the author of the blog I note with alarm a spreading sense of purpose elsewhere and a more relaxed standard of meaningfulness indemic here. I further worry that fans from Bulgaria, Japan, Korea and Chile are reading in order to improve their English comprehension while readers from Canada, other than Quebec, report the obverse. Thus I conclude that the greater your proficiency in English the more confused you are as to the nature and purpose of this blog whose “lit-blog” categorization remains in constant peril.
A long time ago I wrote a story called Fat Maggot. Fat is a young maggot when he leaves the city and ventures into the swamp. He’s captured and brought before the ruler of the swamp, Mojo Toto. Mojo has written hundreds of poems which he reads aloud to ducks, snakes, and other creatures. When he finishes reading the ducks paddle off, the snakes slither away and Mojo is left with that empty feeling that a captive audience is no audience at all. He needs feedback. Mojo reads his entire collection to Fat. In exchange for his freedom, Fat promises to find a publisher for Mojo’s poems and return with a fistful of reviews, maybe a New Yorker piece. There were in those dark days no blogs.
Needless to say a story that contains over one hundred poems at some point ceases to be a story and becomes a book of poems. Thus Fat Maggot, ostensibly a story, is a book of poems. This blog, supposedly about books, is actually a soap opera. Wellington Leg, like Fat Maggot’s mythical city, is a tiny place populated by people whose entire universe is the size of a flower blossom. The blossom is in the garden of Mrs. Willa Mayhew of River Road. When she prunes her flowers she sets off cataclysmic events, earthquakes, floods, hurricanes. At any moment she might seize her clippers and lop Wellington Leg into oblivion…
Well, let’s hope not. The trial of the century is under way and the Earl stands accused of Barratry. The Romans are building their causeway from the Isle of Mitch and DCI Borchardt is determined to find a publisher for Wellington Leg Confidential. The Dowager Princess has eluded the Detroit PD and the Literary Faire will be hosted by Hizzoner Jimmy Stones. It ain’t over until the battle dinghy Forthright sinks beneath the waves of Gastropod Alley.
The above does not explain all that occurs here. What about the hogs? They come and go rustling in the fens. DCI Borchardt chases them and fulminates about them, but he cannot catch them. Wellington Leg adapts. Fat Maggot’s epic journey is all about adaptation. Perhaps over the course of time some of Mojo Toto’s poems will appear here if adaptation occurs and I learn how to use the excerpt feature. As this construct dangles by a thread we know that Mrs. Mayhew can obtain clippers at Lowe’s or Home Depot and bring this blog to a swift and inglorious end. As Mojo warned Fat: the vanity of man brings him through the bracken, past the guardian ducks and chains of lily pads; he sinks to eye level where all is revealed.
July 12th, 2006 at 7:07 pm
“A long time ago I wrote a story called Fat Maggot. Fat is a young maggot when he leaves the city and ventures into the swamp…”
Is this true? (Not the story, but the claim that you wrote such a story.) Or are you confabulating again?
July 13th, 2006 at 8:10 am
The formal title was “No One Asked You to Come” which was a banner behind Mojo’s throne. Fat had to wait his turn behind a German tour group captured after their Kombi threw a rod.