Magnolia

Dream Animals:  Pamperasaurus Horizontalus
by Fredrick Zydek

My grandfather believed that most things to which
we conform were initiated by nonconformists,
that each of us entertains angels, and that when
winter piles up on the back porch old men may
assume pamper rights.  He expected excessive
indulgences, leisurely coddles, and to be humored
even when so deep in complaint his face turned red.

No one knew the  nature of his formal education,
but he was once overheard in a conversation held
with a Roman Catholic priest that he would not be
treated as if uncredentialed also meant uninformed.
He believed that the Feudal System isn’t so much
dead as practiced from a greater distance than before.

He wasn’t so much spoiled as catered to.  The planets
themselves seemed to line up in his behalf.  I once saw
the old milkcow curtsy just because he called her name.
It is to these lofty heights these creatures aspire.  They
need to be waited on, served, doted over, and lavished
with the kind of attention that helps them forget how
ordinary it is to be alive - how sublimely ordinary.