BOOK III.
Frog Soup
[1] Once upon a time in a timeless state of mind, there was the Pumpkin Headed Son of Earth named Jack. He resurrects tall and high from a pumpkin patch with Gospel, the vampire bat, hanging from the stem of his mind; and with also, a cross to bear.
Jack: [2] Gospel, resurrect. I find myself a cross to bear. A seed that is in my head takes on a hardship and finds himself a blackhole where his soul had once did sit. I must go inside of myself.
[3] Gospel expands her stretchy black wings, pilots flight through Jack’s left eye, eyes the soulless seed, leverages it open like a clam, and then pulls Jack inside of himself by the roots of his feet.
Jack: [4] What is this folly, Gospel? Look at this garden. They have toy rocket ships and shiny red plastic race-cars sprouting where the flowers are meant to spring. You, there! (Directed at a flower.) You are the only blessed gift of thy Mother’s Nature that I do see. What is your name?
Falter the Final Flower: [5] I am Falter (Coughs.) the Final Flower.
Jack: [6] Explain to me this blemish, and why your life is duly spared. Surely you must be wise to have lived through catastrophe.
Falter: [7] Catastrophe, this is. Wisdom has bestowed me this blessing, but a witchy curse is what it unduly scales. I am the symbol of life, and so I am the last of it. I am the world, and so I am the tick-tocking clock of Father Turtle Time. As you have a bat called Gospel that swings on your stem, I have three swinging petals on the stem of my own. One for the hours, one for the minutes, and one for the seconds in time. In time, the final petal will falter loose, and I will falter to death along with the death of this faltering world.
Jack: [8] Where has she gone, the Mother of All Things? There are toy rocket ships and shiny red plastic race-cars sprouting where the flowers are meant to spring. Justify this.
Falter: [9] (Coughs.) It is not justifiable. The beings of this world have disappeared and slaughtered the grandeur of Mother Nature away from themselves and more importantly – out of themselves. A day dies away and up sprout the new bunch of toy rocket ships and shiny red plastic race-cars where the flowers are supposed to spring.
Jack: [10] They do not take kind in these plastics, do they?
Falter: [11] For the blink of an eye, they do, and then it is onto the next thirsting. They have become like dogs who pursue their own tail. They eyeball and chase and pounce and race, and when they encase… Well, they have their tail to face. It is a pseudo joy for a timeless chew. They gnaw on it for a speck, grow tired, and then they pursue for another licking. Mapping in circles is their only compass, and so no one moves a hair. Like a lost toy, it is a lost world. Do you have the frog soup antidote?
Jack: [12] I do not think that I do. What is this frog soup that you grumble on?
Falter: [13] Please, do take this plastic rock from my side so that I may hunch as to not be a fraud and pretend healthy. (Coughs.) Through the acre and up the hill is Golgotha, the plastic boulder that is manifested like a skull. It is up there that you will find Rip the Rat, the undertaker undertaking the Graveyard of Newborns. Store in your head this plastic rock, which is an empty symbol for an empty world, and plug it into the missing tooth of Golgotha’s smiling mouth. Rip the Rat will learn you on the frog soup.
[14] A petal falls.
Jack: [15] I will because I will.
[16] Gospel the vampire bat takes the plastic rock, pops Jack’s top, and puts it in his head. He then pursues the adventure through the acre and up to Golgotha with Gospel hanging from the stem of his mind.
Rip the Rat: [17] Halt! I care not how tall you are nor that your head is that of a pumpkin. Halt, I say! Halt!
[18] By the stem, Gospel twists and pops Jack’s top, and Jack yields the missing tooth of Golgotha, Rip Rat’s smiling skull.
Rip: [19] Why, it cannot be… It is the missing link… Ha! Halt the halting! I will ajar, for you, the gates.
[20] The gates ajar and Jack walks.
Jack: [21] This place… There are so many…
Rip: [22] Hamsters? Treading around in their little plastic spinning wheels?
Jack: [23] Millions.
Rip: [24] Six million, and counting! There are blubbleheads popping every second!
Jack: [25] Blubbleheads?
Rip: [26] Why look, here are two passerby’s now…
[27] They are odd plastic people which Jack will describe to you, the reader:
Jack: [28] What are they? There is empty air filled where their hard skulls are supposed to rest, and they wear a grin the size of the crescent moon! Such large teeth they have, so white… So… Plastic…
Rip: [29] Like the hamster’s wheel!
Jack: [30] And yet they have a waterfall of fleeing water falling from their fragile eyes and flowing down to where their rubber cheeks have pirated the habitat of their rosy real cheek bones. These blubbering blubbleheads are going to flood the world!
Rip: [31] They will because they will. Scarce is there a seeker, and so scarce is there a blubblehead that does not pass by I.
Jack: [32] Pass by you? What are the loins of your lands?
Rip: [33] Golgotha the Smiling Skull is the base for the Graveyard of Newborns.
[34] Now, if you pursue well enough to tweak your lens and adjust your dials, you will spy out the baby newborn hamsters erecting from the ground of the garden in the graveyard. Hey look, there’s a few now…
Jack: [35] It is so odd to see these hamsters born and birth out of the Divine ground like that, but I am as blind as a bat as to where Mr. Death is collecting his toll.
Rip: [36] Do you really capture no death here, pumpkin headed son of earth? Why, it is the millions of hamsters running within the millions of wheels.
Jack: [37] These hamsters are not deceased, Rip.
Rip: [38] These hamsters are the deceased, Jack.
Jack: [39] Explain your cringing words.
Rip: [40] The dead blossom here at Golgotha, The Graveyard of Newborns. These hamsters are the souls of the beings that pass – R.I.P. They had chased in the world, and so they must regroup and tread the plastic wheel as a hamster for a hamster’s lifetime, contemplating how to make their next skin a more righteous one for God. Do you have the frog soup antidote?
Jack: [41] I do not think that I do. I had hoped that you might.
Rip: [42] Please, where Golgotha had forgotten a tooth, I resided a plastic ball as replacement. Do take the plastic ball, which is an empty symbol for an empty world, and reverse it with the plastic rock, which is also an empty symbol for an empty world. You will put the plastic ball in your head and travel up Misery Mountain. Upon the quarter that is casted with Lady Dark you will discern a grotto. This is where world meets shell.
Jack: [43] Shell?
Rip: [44] Father Turtle Time. He treads and paddles along the weeping ocean of timeless tears with this unholy world propped up on his holy shell. He will learn you on the frog soup.
Jack: [45] Once my venture is peeked, what shall I do with the grotto?
Rip: [46] Like the frog, make the leap.
Jack: [47] I will because I will.
[48] Gospel the vampire bat takes the plastic ball, pops Jack’s top, and puts it in his head. They make way up Misery Mountain and greet the grotto.
Jack: [49] I will because I will.
[50] …And jumps.
Father Turtle Time: [51] Oh, you are visitors! Hey, hi, how do you beings do? I’ve never had visitors before; this is so lovely.
[52] Father Turtle Time jerks the unholy world off of his holy shell, catches it in his fins, and begins to dribble it like a basketball.
Father Turtle Time: [53] Such a hollow ball this one is! Such a time to be alive! (Sighs.) I rarely find any balls this dense.
Jack: [54] You are causing earthquakes. You must stop dribbling the ball.
Father Turtle Time: [55] Stop! Ha! This is the most fun I’ve had in years! (He spins the world on his fin.) I will not.
Jack: [56] You are causing twister-disasters and devastation, surely you must not do this.
Father Turtle Time: [57] Wherefore art thou my partnership in this responsibility? My ball is light and empty, Jack. Is this my doing?
Jack: [58] Well, no, but it does not help.
Father Turtle Time: [59] If they had only helped themselves, this world would be reaped with golden stock, stuffed with light, and aglow with extravagance. It would be heavy loaded with wisdom and seeking and finding; crammed and completed with zest and the mysterious charm of life. But these beings forget what life is all about. They take part in fuzzy beliefs, and the beliefs that they fuzzy in, they believe not with a reddened heart. They are full brimmed of uncertainty, while they singe the mask on their face of being so sure. Truth has gone amiss, and so it is a lost world like a lost toy.
[60] By the stem, Gospel twists and pops Jack’s top and Jack yields the plastic ball.
Jack: [61] Here, bounce this. (Tosses it to Time.)
Father Turtle Time: [62] (Dribbles ball.) I can only dig this for a moment in my time.
Jack: [63] Why so?
Father Turtle Time: [64] No possession can last in one’s heart, do you not know this, Jack? Desire is a fading thing. Once it is collected, it is evaporated just as fast. It is not really what is wanted; it is decoy like the scarecrow who scares the crow away from the fields of fruit. Fear not and let go of it, for it does you not good to track yourself aimlessly around in zeros. Do you have the frog soup antidote?
Jack: [65]I do not think that I do. I hoped that you might.
Father Turtle Time: [66] Please, do remove this rubber glove from betwixt my shell and my fin; it is garbage, but we will birth it useful. Take the rubber glove, which is an empty symbol for an empty world, and carry it in your head to Sin the Sly Serpent. He resides as priest among the plastic fruit tree at Blubblehead Cathedral, which is their devout church of worship. He had always yearned for a glove, so perhaps I can make it his Time. Hop onto my tail and I will resurrect you back from whence you came. You will take the gold brick road and it will trek you directly onward to Blubblehead Cathedral. Sin the Sly Serpent will learn you on the frog soup.
[67] Falter’s second petal falls.
Jack: [68] I will because I will.
[69] With the glove in his head and Gospel hanging by the stem of Jack’s mind, they are resurrected and put onto the golden brick road. They arrive at Blubblehead Cathedral and greet Sin the Sly Serpent who is wrapped around the plastic fruit tree.
Sin the Sly Serpent: [70] So… You want to see the god… Do you?…
Jack: [71] He resides here? Then I will enter in and sort out what is wrong with this world.
Sin: [72] Sure… You will…
[73] Jack jogs the staircase and enters into Blubblehead Cathedral. He scurries back in a flash.
Jack: [74] It is a bar of gold. I am sick to my stomach.
Sin: [75] See… I told you… Look… Here are two worshippers now…
[76] Two Blubbleheads pass by having a conversation:
Mr. Blubblehead: [77] Well I just don’t –
Mrs. Blubblehead: [78] — Know? Were you going to say ‘Know’?
Mr. Blubblehead: [79] No. I was going to say, well I just don’t really –
Mrs. Blubblehead: [80] — Understand?
Mr. Blubblehead: [81] Care.
Mrs. Blubblehead: [82] I think I might wear –
Mr. Blubblehead: [83] — Socks? Socks, right?
Mrs. Blubblehead: [84] A wig.
[85] They enter into the cathedral.
Jack: [86] What is with these blubbleheads, they are jumpy with judgements. What is the meaning of an ear if one does not take kind in it for listening? These beings spew reaction from the guts of their stomachs and not from the attention of the hearts in their beating chest. Surely, they are self-dooming.
Sin: [87] Jump. Judge. Judge. Jump. Where is the control?… Where is the discipline?… They are out of control and so they hop and leap with jumping jumpy judgements to control. Situations, expectations, calculations to appease one’s reputation…
Jack: [88] Surely this is a twitchy fig that must be bent, broken and burned.
Sin: [89] Until then… Gold is your god…
Jack: [90] It is your Time, Sin.
[91] By the stem, Gospel twists and pops Jack’s top and Jack yields the rubber glove.
Sin: [92] So it is… Slip it here… Please…
[93] Jack slips the glove next to Sin’s scaly side and Sin’s side sprouts a hand that swells the rubber glove.
Sin: [94] Well, well… Now I can bless…
Jack: [95] Bless me on the frog soup, Sin.
Sin: [96] The frog soup is no blessing… Why… It is the voodoo of all jinxes, Jack. It does kill before death and does not thrill within life; it is a rat-trap and the blubbleheads of this world have welcomed it as their annual slimy supper… It drains their stomachs void while pretending to feed… It surrenders their precious Father Turtle Time while pretending to cure wasted time… It is a curse to the psyche and a psychological vex to their hovering Spirit above their squirming souls. They have adopted it as nature, naturally, yet it is unknowingly the faltering tower of Babel that they have adopted… Do you possess the empty symbol of this empty world, Jack?…
Jack: [97] In Father Turtle Time, I have possessed three of them. The plastic rock, the plastic ball, and the rubber glove that you possess.
Sin: [98] There is a fourth in your head, and so you must venture to The Nest. Through the Witches Forrest and passed the cast iron benches you will see yourself a mansion with many rooms; it is Mr. Blubble’s, who is the mayor of the town of blubbleheads. He is rich, and so the soup serves selfishly cyclical there. The frog soup is delivered from the frog’s nest – the rainbow box in the living room where nothing lives…
Jack: [99] In the presence of the rainbow, what will I do?
Sin: [100] You will it, so you will know it…
Jack: [101] I will because I will.
[102] With Gospel hanging from the stem of Jack’s mind, he sets off for the Witches Forrest, sits for a break on the cast iron bench, and let’s himself inside of Mr. Blubble’s mansion. He sorts out where the living room where nothing lives is and finds the family of Blubbles in a drooling hypnosis as they sit and watch The Nest, which is the rainbow box.
Jack: [103] Enough of this nonsense, you are lacking movement of mind. Surely this is no way to spend your precious Father Turtle Time.
Mr. Blubble: [104] A freak like you telling a Blubblehead how to live?
Mrs. Blubble: [105] Look at that fat stupid head of his, Blub, he knows nothing about life.
Jack: [106] So much judgement… They crucify the one who tries to give them salvation…
[107] The frog soup song comes on:
“Frog soup, frog soup,
It’s time to consume frog soup.
Open your mouths, it’s time to dine,
The Blubbleheads lick to kill their time.
Slurp up, Blubs!”
Jack: [108] This song has destroyed my psyche and damaged my aura.
Son Blubble: [109] Supper time!
Daughter Blubble: [110] I’m so thirsty!
[111] Harken now to what happens hither, a change in the tide of this fairytale being fairly told. The rainbow box quakes and levitates, it stretches and forms, molds and morphs, and from the center where it’s soul should rest it reaches out a webby green hand attached to a slimy green arm with a gooey fish scale scaling off of it. The hand holds the ladle that has been dunked and doused with the toxic frog soup. The Blubbles all lean in for a family slurp.
Jack: [112] Nonsense. (Jack knocks the ladle to the Divine Ground.)
Mr. Blubble: [113] Rodent!
Mrs. Blubble:[114] Roach!
Son Blubble: [115] Serpent!
Daughter Blubble: [116] I will murder this seed head!
[117] With claws for carving and knives for skinning, the family of Blubbles ambush Jack in a psychotic frenzy for disturbing their desire.
Jack: [118] So much anger… They crucify the one who tries to give them salvation… I know what to do.
[119] Jack hooks the frog arm with his own arm and is yanked into the rainbow box. With a frog limb stabbed to a stick and a cauldron brimming of bubbling green frog soup, Jack finds a little red being, with horns and an arrow tail, who weeps.
Jack: [120] Lo… Devil.
Luci: [121] (Sniffles.) Luci.
Jack: [122] You are blubbering like the rest of them? My, even you are assisting in the flooding of this world!
Luci: [123] I cannot help but to weep away my sorry sorrow for these stupid sobbing sucking slurpers of uncivilized scamps who would syringe my soup if they sought. But these blubbleheads don’t seek for anything! They put up no battle, no sword fight, no left-hook, no nothing – they have forfeited life! Where is the drive to put a halt to the ladle that I serve? I would say that the drive drove out of them, but that would imply that the car had even once revved! It is not my fault for feeding, it is their fault for consuming. They slurp on my soup because it is my duty to stuff their minds full of mush, as it is their duty to turn me away and seek higher knowledge. No one seeks, and so the frog soup is served. It is a lost world like a lost toy. Do you have the empty symbol for the empty world, Jack?
Jack: [124] I am empty with empty symbols; I carry no more.
Luci: [125] Nonsense. You possess the antidote within your head. Figure it out.
Jack: [126] The symbols? But they are all empty. Surely, there is no antidote within an empty symbol from an empty world.
Luci: [127] Nonsense. You possess the antidote within your head. Figure it out.
Jack: [128] I find in my mind a relation of two, but the rock does not exist with a ball and glove.
Luci: [129] What was the plastic rock used for?
Jack: [130] For the Graveyard of Newborn’s base… Ball… Glove… Glove… Bat?
Luci: [131] An empty symbol for an empty world…
[132] Falter’s third petal falls.
Jack: [133] Gospel! You’re the antidote!
[134] Jack takes Gospel from the stem of his mind, steals Luci’s pseudo frog limb, sits Gospel in the bowl of the ladle and shovels her through the rainbow box of every living room in the world.
[135] Jack’s seed cures.
Jack: [136] I will because I will.
ABRACADABRA.
Written by JackOBat