Six Fables…
by Martha King
March 2005

A writer spins plots in the most condensed forms possible. they are stripped of description and comment; they simply outline a sequence of exchanges. she gradually looses the ability to make herself write them out as stories. every time she begins to work on a story, she makes instead other new condensed plot pieces. the obsession increases. she finds she must carry a notebook, so she can write wherever she is. eventually, every daily activity—things as simple as walking to the corner for a bottle of milk—triggers another miniature plot. which she stops to write down. she is unable to go on with her daily life.

A girl who is considered a model child in every way is locked into a closet by her elder brother one Saturday morning. he lets her out that night, overcome by guilt he cannot express, because the whole family has gone through the day without ever realizing she was missing.

A man who has been urged to join a club by his psychiatrist joins a pacifist movement. he leads daring demonstrations against nuclear submarines, nuclear power plants, and army recruiting centers. he is arrested several times. his sense of himself as a loner intensifies. he becomes a leader in the movement, manipulating others and spurring them to acts of defiance he no longer participates in. when he is confronted by the angry girlfriend of a young man who has been permanently injured by police at one of these demonstrations, he tells her he has no wish to be cannon fodder or to be part of any kind of group.

A doctor has hired a young homosexual as his office secretary. his sympathy was engaged during the job interview when the young man told him about his struggle to accept himself and live openly as a gay. the doctor discovers several months later that the secretary is impersonating him after hours to impress his sexual contacts. recognizing how the young man had flattered him into acting against his instincts, and how susceptible he is to being flattered, the doctor feels morally responsible for the misconduct. instead of firing the secretary, the doctor has new office keys made to keep him out of the office after hours. he gives the secretary less to do and hires a part-timer to handle some of the work. his behavior becomes more and more peculiar in his effort to avoid the necessary confrontation. what will rescue him?

A painter has been given a very well-produced solo exhibition at one of the city’s biggest galleries. the show gets the full treatment, and so does he: good reviews, crowds everyday, invitations to here and there, and, best of all, the gallery sells every picture. for the first time in his life, the painter is flush; he decides to treat himself to his first trip to Europe. when his jubilant friends have left him at the airline lobby, and he has walked though the jetway to the plane door, he turns and stops. why am I leaving what I’ve worked so long to have? he thinks. he walks back up the ramp—and is promptly arrested.

            For more than three hours, he is questioned, searched, questioned again; all the passengers are made to disembark; luggage is disemboweled; the bomb dogs are brought in to sniff.

            When he finally rejoins his friends very late that evening, he tells them it was worth it not to go.

The daughter of a world-famous scientist makes friends with the son of a small-town photographer in the country town where the scientist and his family are spending summer. both fathers are delighted. the photographer because he hopes the famous man will be helpful to his son; the scientist because he approves of the sturdy American values exemplified by the photographer’s simple aspirations and lifestyle. (he does not approve of the private school his wife sends their children to.) both fathers speak so approvingly and at length about this friendship that the children fight viciously. subsequently both of them lie to their parents about what happened.

 

Martha King edited the poetry zine Giants Play Well in the Drizzle and The Northern Lights Poetry Chaplest Series. Her poetry and prose have appeared in numerous publications and anthologies, and her books include Seventeen Walking Sticks (Stop Story Press), Weather (New Rivers Press), Monday Through Friday (Zelot Press), and Little Tales of Family and War (Spuyten Duyvil). She lives in Park Slope.