Rikki Once Tikki Now Taviless

Painting by Rick Mobbs


rikki once tikki now taviless

Oh, Naomio,
де ви? Ти зник в самій тонкої в важнічать

I was hoping for an emotionally clear space
before heading out later in the week.
Instead, I am frazzled to frizzled nub.
And very short, too.
Much shorter than I used to be,
notwithstanding all the years I have spent
trying to grow up. I am shorter now
than I have ever been,
except when I was smaller.
I think I am down to about 3 feet, 11 inches.
I am looking up at the people
I used to look down on,
just like they said would happen
if I was not careful about the things I said
and did, and the ways I said and did them.

I must have said some awful things,
because I am even shorter now
than I was a few minutes ago.
My feet don’t reach the floor anymore
and I have to keep sliding this laptop
closer to the edge of the desk
because my arms don’t go as far as they used to.

Well, I think I had better say good-by
and go look for that pill
that will make me taller.
The ones that mother gave me
didn’t do anything at all.
But I have found some other ones
that did all kinds of crazy things,
made me tingle all over, weep, throw up,
fall into fascinated gazination.
There was one that turned my body into a wave,
a long, extended one. It was so long that
the front of me lost track of the back of me
and I had a hard time particularizing myself again,
and when I did, my particles were mostly
in Egypt and I had to put them back together
on the fly since apparently upon arriving
I managed to really piss off the locals.
I had to gigolo myself all the way back to America –
which took a while because I wasn’t very good
at it and because my particles were still
arranging and rearranging themselves,
which scared the ladies
or the occasional gentleman
I was lucky enough to find.
I got slung overboard from a cruise liner once
because, while particularizing,
an ear and seven toes fell off
and the woman wouldn’t stop screaming
when she found them in the bed.
The crew didn’t like it
and made short work of me.

But I made it back somehow.
I am having to jump on the keys to type now
so I am going to say goodbye
and go look for a large dung beetle
to carry me to the medicine cabinet
to look for those pills
while there is still time.

Я тебе дуже люблю, naomio.
Your Little Rickie once tikki tavi
but now so diminished.
My tavi fell off and my tikki is starting
to feel loose, so I’m gonna git gone
before the whole mess evaporates,
like Charlie’s did, last Thursday.


Rick Mobbs July 2009

Posted as prose over on Mine Enemy Grows Older
Line breaks by Glenn Buttkus