Ron Torrence - Issue 36

Ron Torrence’s life has been a search since he was a child. For a mother’s love, which he never had because his mother didn’t like him. For understanding of the Holocaust and WWII, which has marked his soul to this day. For freedom from irrational, phobic fears which over the years, with help from others, he’s finally achieved. His search for meaning has led him through world literature, the renowned artists, composers, the clockwork universe, spacetime, the quantum world, studies of the mind, ever deeper into his own mind. Since his twenties, he’s poured his feelings into writing. Prose initially, then short stories, then poetry, along the way plenty of nonfiction. He published his first short story at 50, first poem at 80. Even so his fiction, poetry and nonfiction are widely published.

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Interlude

a barefoot man walked to a village

by the sea of an ancient land with

an even more ancient history

he immediately climbed the

highest minaret in the city, itself

incredibly old, and began to sing

it was the most beautiful voice

anyone in the kingdom had

ever heard, then or since

his singing spread joy everywhere

when before there had been

only hardship and misery

record crops were brought

in, and new stores and

businesses opened

with gratitude the citizens crafted a

soft pair of slippers to ease the old

man’s long climb up the tower

one evening when he climbed

the minaret, a wave surged

revealing a golden fish

the fish swallowed the old

man whole and plunged

to the bottom of the sea

people everywhere wrung their

hands and wailed, afraid poverty

and suffering were certain to return

the more excitable citizens tore

off their clothes and plunged

into the sea with despair,

but the wave came back and out

jumped the fish to gently return

the old man to the minaret

refreshed his golden voice soared

beyond anything anyone had

heard then or ever since.

meanwhile the king and his

entourage lived in a sumptuous

castle overlooking a lush highland

the meadows were filled with

ponds where they copulated with

abandon, changing partners recklessly

the people’s prosperity and happiness

had completely escaped the king’s

notice, but not his sons

a murderous pair of psychopaths,

they took turns trying to kill the

other, if not the king himself

each had built a network

to spy on the other, the

king and the people

for years the women kept the

little man alive by fooling

the spies at every turn

but luck is a harsh goddess,

a door left ajar lead to a spy’s

fingers at the little man’s throat

thus it came to be when people

gathered across the land

the minaret was silent

the old man’s shoes were

found set side by side

filled with his ashes

when the shoes were committed to

the sea, the golden fish breached

the surface to take them home

meanwhile the depraved older

son killed the king, his own

brother and their children

his was a reign of terror inflicting

misery and death upon the people,

an era of darkness lasting 500 years

and so it goes, a war between

love and hate, the opposing

poles of human fate,

when the battle is joined

hate invariably butchers love,

the handiwork of merciless kings

perhaps a golden voice will arise

recalling joy, however briefly, like

music through mists of the sea