{"id":10637,"date":"2022-04-27T20:35:06","date_gmt":"2022-04-27T19:35:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/stuartpoetry.art\/?p=10637"},"modified":"2022-04-27T20:35:06","modified_gmt":"2022-04-27T19:35:06","slug":"two-short-stories-about-tennis-ladybirds-revolution-marx-and-engels-tussy-and-laura-and-a-picnic-on-beachy-head","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stuartmillerosborne.com\/index.php\/2022\/04\/27\/two-short-stories-about-tennis-ladybirds-revolution-marx-and-engels-tussy-and-laura-and-a-picnic-on-beachy-head\/","title":{"rendered":"Two Short Stories about Tennis Ladybirds Revolution Marx and Engels Tussy and Laura and a picnic on Beachy Head"},"content":{"rendered":"

A Bath Full of Ladybirds
\n<\/strong><\/p>\n

Harriet Jane Kendall would travel over twenty miles to the next town to play tennis<\/p>\n

The reason for this was that the local tennis facility has been infested and destroyed by the blue ladybirds<\/p>\n

Harriet partnered the a vicars son named Gordon in doubles tournaments and occasionally partnered his identical twin Gordon<\/p>\n

The only difference between the brothers was that one adored God and the other was an atheist<\/p>\n

Quite often when they showered together after a game Harriet would discuss the fundamentals of her deep beliefs only to realise that she was speaking to the wrong brother and that the other one was reading his Bible nearby with a faint smile on his face<\/p>\n

The railway station was about twenty minutes walk from the tennis centre and as she walked towards the station<\/p>\n

Harriet could see how the green ladybirds had covered the town hall<\/p>\n

Although a recognised pest the green ladybirds posed no threat and were largely ignored by the authorities<\/p>\n

This unnerved Harriet as she sensed that all ladybirds were dangerous no matter their colour.<\/p>\n

The carriages of the local trains were designed as if they were the interiors of non-conformist chapels with plain pews and little decoration on the walls<\/p>\n

Often Harriet would sit in front of the vicar of her town and his timid wife and on each occasion she would observe that the vicar would hang a pair of black underpants around his neck (possibly his own she hoped)<\/em>\u00a0to obscure his clerical collar<\/p>\n

The vicar whose name was Thompson always read\u00a0Das Kapital<\/em>\u00a0on these journeys and would pray furiously to the author<\/p>\n

The house where Harriet lived was roughly halfway between the two towns so when the weather was agreeable she would alight at the station furthest from her town and walk by the sea<\/p>\n

If it was warm she would paddle and on the days when the tropical breezes arrived she would swim all the way home<\/p>\n

Whatever the journey or the conditions of the sea Harriet would always bathe when she arrived home<\/p>\n

She would rest in a bath full of red ladybirds and contemplate her day and the times not distant before the ladybirds arrived when she would bathe in the perfumed waters of the town and dust herself in exotic powders<\/p>\n

The days when she partnered semi-professional tennis players in notable tournaments within the county which were often televised for the benefit of minority audiences<\/p>\n

But since the invasion things had changed and the claustrophobic lives of the ladybirds had been accepted and considered normal<\/p>\n

Occasionally Harriet would deliberately crush a ladybird between her fingers or underfoot a task that she found unpleasant but necessary<\/p>\n

She would disguise her crime by abandoning the carcass so it would never be traced but felt under suspicion when doing so<\/p>\n

But many were guilty of the crime even the identical twins often boasted of their revolutionary acts but unlike them Harriet had already been corrupted by the tiny creatures and knew that if her crimes were traced that her weakness would be exposed by her infestation<\/p>\n

So like many tennis players in the small coastal town she adopted a mask of obedience which although false fooled the majority<\/p>\n

In a metal box which was securely hidden in a shed at the concrete works Harriet held a supply of poisons which when the time arrived would cause great damage to the invaders but she would not win any war alone and resistance was still fragmented and pathetic<\/p>\n

One of her tennis racquets had a hollow stem that also carried poisons which although harmless to tennis players were lethal to ladybirds<\/p>\n

Each time she travelled with the war racquet in her tennis bag she knew that she was taking a risk but it was a risk worth taking even though she had been corrupted by the tiny creatures<\/p>\n

Occasionally when the night was quiet she would look at the Delacroix print that she had attached to her bedroom wall<\/p>\n

It was most probably the most well- known of all his paintings<\/p>\n

Liberty Leading the People\u00a0<\/em>a simple title easily translated from its original without a loss of meaning and although the painting celebrated the July revolution of 1830 in France its message was the same nearly two hundred years later<\/p>\n

Harriet would occasionally if she could not been seen loosen the cotton ties of her nightdress and expose her breasts<\/p>\n

She would then lift up her poisoned racquet and look at her fellow revolutionaries and lead them forward<\/p>\n

Harriet would not hold this pose for long as she soon felt the tightness of her internal corruptions<\/p>\n

But for a while the freedom felt good and she knew that one day she would be involved in the revolution that would expel the ladybirds (of all colours<\/em>) from her coastal town and beyond<\/p>\n

It was day that she feared and looked forward to in equal measure<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

The Daughters of Karl Marx
\n<\/strong><\/p>\n

Do you realise that two of the daughters of Karl Marx killed themselves
\n<\/em><\/p>\n

Tussy in 1898 and Laura in 1911
\n<\/em><\/p>\n

We were sitting on the grass at Beachy Head and were enjoying a picnic on another fine June day<\/p>\n

I do not think that anybody will end themselves today
\n<\/em><\/p>\n

How sad that one should want to end themselves in such a fashion<\/em><\/p>\n

To be smashed against the savage rocks below and transported to Hell by the savage savage sea<\/em><\/p>\n

Do you know that Fredrich Engels had his ashes scattered from these very cliffs
\n<\/em><\/p>\n

I believed he visited this area frequently in his lifetime
\n<\/em><\/p>\n

In a way it was quite wonderful that his ashes drifted for a while in the Eastbourne winds and then settled forever in the timeless sea
\n<\/em><\/p>\n

Gerty toasted me with her glass of sparking lemonade<\/p>\n

Such deep thoughts poor Gordon imprisoned by his thoughts of eternity and a day let us be merry and enjoy this passive day as winter is far away and that is it is the time to consider Karl Marx\u2019s poor daughters and the last wishes of Fredrich Engels<\/em><\/p>\n

Drink your lemonade I made it this morning especially for this day and enjoy the warmth of my company and the southerly breezes of this enchanted summer\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n

\n

2018<\/em><\/p>\n

\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A Bath Full of Ladybirds Harriet Jane Kendall would travel over twenty miles to the next town to play tennis The reason for this was that the local tennis facility has been infested and destroyed by the blue ladybirds Harriet partnered the a vicars son named Gordon in doubles tournaments and occasionally partnered his identical […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-10637","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stuartmillerosborne.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10637","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stuartmillerosborne.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stuartmillerosborne.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stuartmillerosborne.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stuartmillerosborne.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10637"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/stuartmillerosborne.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10637\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10638,"href":"https:\/\/stuartmillerosborne.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10637\/revisions\/10638"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stuartmillerosborne.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10637"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stuartmillerosborne.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10637"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stuartmillerosborne.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10637"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}