Castle Rock

Lord of the Flies inspired. 

Castle Rock

They foraged, they swam,

they dug at the base of roots,

they willingly refused to take showers—

pioneers. They pinched, they washed,

they splunked clay rocks and drew

self-portraits on the riverbank,

deformed and bleeding onto the

ferns and salamanders watching their every move. 

It wasn't a particularly novel idea,

an exploratory committee. Who cared if the sun 

stopped nourishing their skin, stopped

the freckles from peeking out under the dirt? If the 

waves would devour the moat, and then the castle?

Ralph laid it first: a trap, made of 

weeping fig branches and bordered with fall leaves,

the veined kind, in wet loam and roots.

The pig, broken hind legs and a button nose, 

looked too tranquil, too experienced, too domesticated

to be the catch. "Release it," Jack said. Another 

would come. More fitting of the mantle, a stronger

metaphor. In hazy loops they circled: smoke, 

ships, and triage. Then it happened. Simon found 

the alter, but by then the factions had crystallized,

and the island hung from a mere outcropping.

The fury of the decay! It was inevitable, but 

not unexpected. Swarms chewed the

skin, exposed the ivory structure underneath,

and the wind outlined holes in construction. 

The last to erode was the plaque on each tooth, 

strangely perfect, bits of line bisected and erased.

Suckers from a weeping fig pushed 

its pairs above the undergrowth, from under.

The dead bobbed in the water, but who 

was to say it was to each his own? What of poor

Piggy, stomach acid spilling onto the 

colorful sand near the kelp?

They conquered, stockpiled branches on

hilly plateaus, created an illusion.

Charlatans—they jeered on instinct, roared,

danced. The fire and smoke, it washed out
the clouds, hid the beast from plain sight.
Cadavers. The entire island was covered in cadavers.

When help arrived, all they saw was red, indigo, 

bleached conch shells; a choir of the lightest minds.