Secret Stories
By
Dwight Peters
Secret Stories
by Dwight Peters
Copyright 2014 Dwight Peters
Contents
The Man Who Turned Into A Garden
A Shadow Play
Famous Orphan Girl
The Value Of Simplicity As Told To A Deaf Turtle In The Voice Of A Tomato
Wildman
Hero
This Story Stinks
Music Of Body’s Footsteps
Perceiving Doors
An Oak And A Shepherd
Everyone Deserves A Little Celebration
Naked Reading
Don’t Be Suckered Into Worrying
The Third Nipple Is Never Blind
Gypsy Girl And Woman
Portrait
Be Movie
Parentage
Chip Dip
The Excitement Of Silences
Days Over When They Begin, The First Quiet Breaths Of Morning New
Normal Dangers
A Self Sacrifice
Ocean’s Tide
The Philosopher And The Stranger
The Killing Of A Bad Man
Over As Well As Under Development
The Eye Of Acquaintance
The Wait
Alone Again
Nature Walk
An Interview With A Social Worker
The Gift Of Strength
A New Fullness
Documentary
Introduction
Reality Show
Amuseum
Don’t Ever Settle For Simply Settling When Settling Down
The Reason For Rhythm
I Was Wrong
It Is Essential To Know This
Prescription
Touch, To Know What Giving Is
A To-Do Today
Touchdown
Potty Training For Potty Mouths
You Are Beautiful Inside Your Insides
Prehistoric Urges
It’s Okay To Have Vision
The Man With A Mirror For A Face
The Woman Who Was The Earth
Children Can Be Cruel And Everyone’s A Child
Travel Time
Wild, Western, Cowless, Cower Less Man
Untitled
Audience
Crane
Sightseeing
Internet Cafe
Water Music
Fire Music
The Salty Madness Of Mixed-up Nuts
Ash As Fire
Wave Goodbye, Wave Hello
Meditation On The Smiling Beautiful
The Man Who Held His Breath And Became A Cloud
Workforce
Street Smarts
I Would Drink An Entire Volcano While Walking In The Middle Of An Ocean To Create An Island Paradise For You. But Wait, Don’t You Know You Are My Island Paradise?
Letter Written At A Café In Bright Sunshine
The Philosopher Says Hello
Impossible To Bear
The Smite Of The Melted, Smitten Smiths
Seems, Stitches
Art Tune
Intimidate. Intimate.
All The New/Old Rage
Modern Medicine
What Was Theirs Is Now Sometimes In Some Ways Mine
Many Bodies To Consider
Log Ick
Doing It
Redicktionism
A Cliché Story With Or Without People
How Much Humiliation Does It Take To Become Humble?
Lesson Plans
Marriage
City Life
The Smiling Scent Of Lavender Above The Clouds Becoming Fragrant Moonlight
The Philosopher And The Crazy Person
Bedtime Story
At The Height Of Being Grounded
What A Lovely Day
She Is A Painter
Peak-a-boohoo
In An Open Bedroom
Bees At Bear’s Knees, Bear At Bees’ Knees
The Light Of Love Through Space And Time
An Honest Discovery Presents Itself
The Secret Of The Sad Dog
Nothing Normal Is Normal, Normally
Pet Friendly
Flowers
Sea. Transparent. See.
The Man Who Turned Into A Garden
A man became weak from the stresses of his life, so soon his body was unable to fight off the invasive organisms that healthy bodies fight off. But something very different happened to him. His body began to change a lot in a very unusual way.
The first change that he noticed was a patch of grass on his back. Then, soon after, he found a small flower behind his knee. After this, there was so much all at once: some thyme grew on his arm; under his chin was an eggplant the size of two of his chins; there was a large bunch of grapes on his head; and there was a green bell pepper on one shoulder and yellow one on his other; also, he was confused by the rutabaga that he had to trim from each his ankles one morning to get his shoes on because he remembered rutabagas were root vegetables. And over the next few weeks and months there was a lot more: parsley, figs, green beans, dill, lemons, zucchini, basil, spinach, plums, rosemary, tangerines, kale, asparagus, cilantro, cherries, and a few hot chilies that stung a little. All this and even a lot more grew until nearly all of his body was full and lush, and he had more vegetables and herbs and fruits than he could ever imagine figuring out what to do with.
Somehow most of his stresses didn’t bother him anymore. His neighbors would come over often now, and they would talk and laugh and drink a tea made from some chamomile that had grown on his stomach. On the small round dining table that he placed next to the front window of his home, he kept a pair of gardening shears; and, when his guests were over, he would give them some of the vegetables, herbs and fruits that had grown from him. One day, as he went out to a farm to give what he could to a family whose farm wasn’t able to produce much, he let their cow chew some grass from his back.
Since all of this began, he noticed that he had been going to bed earlier and waking up just before sunrise. He would sit at his table looking out the window at the dark, feeling happy and fortunate, waiting for the sunlight.
A Shadow Play
He kept seeing only half of his body whenever he glimpsed a shadow of himself. And it wasn’t sliced by length or width—he would look and see a collection of scattered parts.
After he lost her, he said and said that it felt like he had lost a part of himself. This feeling of loss undermined his ability to function in the basic daily things he always did. It was more than he was ever prepared to consider and be able to figure out a way through. The experiences that had made up his world were no longer possible. His world was severed.
He asked himself what he could possibly do to put himself back together again. After a few months of trying to answer this—when he barely fed himself, rarely washed and stumbled to the few places he actually did go—he found what he thought was a solution. He decided to live entirely in the dark.
Immediately, he moved to a house in a rural area and covered all the windows so no light could get in. He took out all the light bulbs. He bought sunglasses that covered his eyes and the areas around them completely, applying duct tape over the complete surface of them; wearing them always, except when he washed his face—but, as he did that, he kept his eyes shut hard. He learned to do everything without seeing and never left his house, having his groceries delivered. He tried to see himself only in the way where he still was what used to be, telling himself that his shadow needed to be removed.
Famous Orphan Girl
A father died and left his teenage daughter orphaned and in debt. All but a few
of his things were seized by creditors at the time of his death. Her father was famous and anything of his was worth a lot of money.
As she got older, the woman had to sell her father’s personal items and gifts to her that she was able to keep.
By her mid-twenties, the woman was incapacitated by having lived her life around people who didn’t see her as anything beyond her being part of her father. She loved her father deeply; but was not sure what to do to take care of herself because she was unable to discover how to go out into the world and live: her memories had taken on a physical presence and battered and bondaged her.
After she turned thirty, she barely left her home, living off of what savings she still had from selling her father’s things, all of which were now gone, having sold one thing and then another until there was no longer any of her father’s things left. She went out rarely. She ate little. And she couldn’t meet anyone without them talking only of her father; none of these people ever noticed anything wrong because they never listened to or saw her.
Most of the rest of the woman’s life was spent living off of money from selling small bags with pinches of her father’s ashes in them. This was the only way that she could figure out to survive. It only took a couple of sales a year to give how much it took to get by. One person even put the ashes in water and drank them, wanting to be more like her father.
When the ashes too were gone, something changed in her, though by now quite old, within a few months she got married, adopted a child, and started working on something that was meaningful and wasn’t based on what people saw her as.
The Value Of Simplicity As Told To A Deaf Turtle In The Voice Of A Tomato
After years of accidents that have formed my personality—where I have been forced to accept that I am making sense of the world, but doing it one disaster at a time—I have finally found my way to be capable of telling you this story.
One day, as I hung growing happily attached to my vine, I fell to the dirt and suddenly became a mouse—scaring myself. Instantly, I found myself running through a monstrous field full of what seemed to be similar to what I had just been. As I got to the edge of all the vines, I paused from the shock of all this. And, when I did, I was cut into many awful pieces by a large machine.
Instantly, again, I changed and became dust and was blown into an old