The buff-tailed myrtle had just finished its morning warm-up exercises when a swarm of triple-banded dirndls appeared and demanded breakfast. ‘I don’t have anything to give you,’ said the myrtle, ‘but I could sing.’ The dirndls eyed each other as she began to vocalise in her inimitable style. After a few seconds they flew off. ‘Philistines,’ she muttered. Over-ripe zongla fruit lay rotting on the forest floor. She slithered up to one and began to chew on the fermenting pulp. Dreams of a world in which all creatures ate nothing but fruit and there was no predation or competition, food being abundant, filled her thoughts. Zongla fruit invariably had this narcotic effect on her. She began to sing a wordless composition of her own devising which evoked images of such a world. Soon she fell silent, a sudden movement nearby having caught her attention. A large creature was on the prowl, a short-eared margolot judging by the earthy smell, and she froze, trusting to the fact she was as crinkly as______* to protect her against discovery. If only zongla fruit could make her invisible, she thought, so that she could move through the world without fear of being molested. After a while the intruder moved off and she resumed her chewing. She could hear the dirndls off in the distance demanding breakfast from some other creature. Why they did this she couldn’t understand. Everyone knew they had no digestive tract. Was it a macabre attempt at humour?
*The author had intended to use a simile here but the green-tailed myrtle is such a bizarre creature nothing came to mind.
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Simon Collings
Picture Pale prominent
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