dreams are but butterfly wings

dreams are but butterfly wings

they flutter and scintillate in sunlight bright

fascinate and tantalize

and vanish in few days

Psycho Bug-word to the wise

Besides assiduously avoiding the Bandersnatch and the  jaws that catch, we  need to be contantly on the alert for “persons of interest” and ever aware of the “terrorists in our midst,”  but must also be on guard  for the  invasion of alien species  overtaking the native environment.  Somehow we’ve lost the  basic skills to communicate life’s lessons and timeless instruction through myths.

Myths, we tell kids, are fairytales. Nonsense.  Stuff of fluff. Fantasies.

But myths are really the greatest way of timeless communication regarding life’s secrets. Wouldn’t it be  ever so much better to concoct a story about the Psycho Bug who did an amazing trip on   deathcap mushrooms (fliegende pilze), than to  rant on about the dangers of psychedelic drugs?

So here’s the Psycgho Bug who tripped too much on the locally available, nonUSDA-approved mushrooms that grew out in the woods at Srbsko.

Once there was a Georgie Boy of Srbsko, who against his mother’s insistant warnings, took an avid interest in the local flora and  fauna. He collected mushrooms and experimented in a myriad ways to consume them. He had them fried, frittered and sauteed in butter sauce.

He ate them for breakfast with his cornflakes. And occassionally, when he was bored, he had them in math class when the sun shone too strongly through the prison windows of his school.

It wasn’t that he was a juvenile delinquent or a bad boy. He was just plain bored and people didn’t understand the brilliant ideas he had in his head.

He was just so addicted to their bright red color that he couldn’t get enough of them and finally his poor little  buggy brain fried.

His mother cried. The  local hospital sent her such a bill that she couldn’t pay it in  a thousand years and the police wrote up a report that  needed  clipping shears to shorten it.

And none of this really had much effect on poor George who was only delirious without  them.

But the gods, being  as malevolent as they are, heard the poor woman’s tears and saw the police report that needed the clipping shears, and decided that something had to be done.

“You see that,” snorted Juno, who was never known for any kindness whatsover, “He’s breaking her heart.”

“Right-o,” replied Mercury, who is supposedly a patron to all things mercurial, including health, “So he is.”

Jersey Tiger Moth Euplagia quadripunctaria

“Well, do somethng about it,” Juno retorted. “It’s  in your department since we all know that the feelings of ecstasy are ephemeral.”

“Right-o,” said  Mercury who vanished without explanation.

And so from that day, to this, you can find the Psycho Bug flying about in the weeds at the back of your garden

or hanging about down in Srbsko

And of course, his mother  was left with all the bills, but  was relieved of funerary expense.