Mr. Smith the Pirate-Killer, Part 1

A boy sat on his grandfather’s lap.

The grandfather said,

“Always remember:

the idea of a sunflower is the only thing about a sunflower

that glows in the dark.”

Twenty years later the boy is a man,

and this man owns a house,

and in this house there is a table with one drawer,

and in this drawer is a book with three hundred first pages,

and every page is blank.

And every night before he goes to bed

this man takes the book out

and stares at the pages until just before he starts to feel like a weirdo,

because this man is very afraid of seeming like a weirdo

(although he lives alone).

Now this man has a goldfish,

and one day the goldfish says,

“hey, every day you take out this book and look at it,

why don’t you write something for once?”

And so the man takes out a pen and writes,

“the day I take advice from a goldfish

will be the day that I escape from my awful life.”

And no sooner does he put down the pen

when a giant boat crashes into the side of his house,

and a ship captain leans over the rail and says,

“I need you to fight pirates with me!”

So the man closes his eyes and whispers,

“The idea of a sunflower

is the only thing about a sunflower that glows in the dark.”

And when he opens his eyes, the ship is gone.

-

Several years later the man becomes rich and famous

from the publication of his first novel “Mr. Smith the Pirate-Killer.”

He is lonely and spends most of his time at the zoo.

He is particularly drawn to the penguins.

In this zoo, the penguins live behind windows,

and every day hundreds of children walk by and tap on the glass.

Now there is this one penguin, right,

and he is known to be a very patient penguin,

but every penguin has his breaking point,

so one day he politely says,

“Excuse me; will you please stop tapping on my glass?”

And one of the kids says,

“What are you gonna do, fly away?”

Now the man knows that nobody responds to a challenge

like an angry penguin,

so he waits until nightfall

and the moment the clock strikes midnight,

he sees the penguin spread his wings,

run as fast as he can,

and fly away.

He watches the penguin get smaller and smaller in the distance,

and he closes his eyes and whispers,

“The idea of a sunflower is the only thing about a sunflower that glows in the dark.”

And when he opens his eyes, the penguin is gone.

-

Several decades pass.

The man decides that he has been lonely long enough,

and goes in search of a wife.

Now he has heard of this young woman, right,

and this young woman has the biggest nose in the tri county area

and every time she walks down the street, everyone yells,

“There goes nosy-Nellie!”

and the very day that the man goes to visit her,

she gets fed up and says,

“I’m going away. I’m going away and I’m never coming back.”

And a little boy says, “where are you gonna go?”

and Nosy-Nellie says,

“I’m gonna go where the bumble-bees fly as high as eagles,

where the streets are still cobbled,

where people open doors for people

and noses come in all different shapes and sizes

and everyone smells great

and food is free

and autumn lasts until spring

and nobody calls you Nosy-Nellie if you have a big nose.

I’m gonna go where clouds gather into the shapes of the alphabet if you ask real nice

and ship captains often ask you to fight pirates with them

and sea-sickness is not a thing,

where sunflowers glow in the dark

and the words ‘me’ and ‘you’ rhyme,

I’m gonna go where everyone understands Shakespeare

and nobody ever calls you Nosy-Nellie

even if you have the biggest nose in the tri-county area.

I’m going there and I’m never coming back.”

And so the man closes his eyes and softly says,

“The idea of a sunflower is the only thing about a sunflower that glows in the dark.”

And when he opens his eyes, the young woman is gone.

And no one in the tri county area ever saw her again.

–

Now he is old, and he sits on a bench by the ocean.

He concentrates on feeding the seagulls.

Suddenly the seagulls fly away in a burst of squawking and feathers

and the man looks up to see a large wooden ship with a ship captain leaning over the railing.

By the captain’s side is a young woman with a very large nose

and circling the mast with wings outstretched is a robust penguin.

The ship captain says, “I need you to fight pirates with me.”

And so the old man boards the ship

and they set sail in a direction that isn’t particularly north or south,

and not exactly east or west,

and they sail and sail for days and days,

and one night,

when it is the old man’s turn in the crow’s nest,

he sees the faint outline of land,

and a vast meadow of sunflowers faintly glowing under a very dark sky.