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The Cat Barked . . .

March 21st, 2008 · 10 Comments

Flash fiction by Joe Barr

The cat barked.
That’s the first clue. Standing on the ceiling, that’s the second.
I say it out loud. I want to hear it.
“Something’s wrong!”
I hear it, or I think I hear it. I’m dreaming, or I’m delusional. Or I’m in some really strange place. I hope I’m dreaming.
I look up. There’s a hardwood floor, an area rug, furniture, and a fireplace, with a fire. The damn flames are reaching in my direction.
I look down. I don’t want to think. My feet are on what looks like wallboard. I kneel. I tap the white surface. It has the hollow sound of wallboard between studs.
As I look around, I see a skylight. I walk over to it and see a blue sky and some clouds. I kick the damn thing and my foot shatters the glass, and follows the glass out the window and towards the sky.
I’m falling…

Tags: Joe Barr · Flash Fiction

10 responses so far ↓

  • 1 Bill Schroeder // Mar 21, 2008 at 11:48 pm

    I don’t know about the cat barking, but Joe does! Hey that didn’t hurt at all.

    Good to see we are growing. About 15 of us at the meeting on Thursday. Don’t let the time past to submit your Anthology items ,and 2 or 3 or more won’t be too much. Good to see everyone and some new and long ago faces.

  • 2 Bill Schroeder // Mar 21, 2008 at 11:57 pm

    I want to keep Joe off my back. Not sure how to place something on this site so it goes here. If anyone has a problem with that, so be it!!

    AMBITION

    Hurry, hustle, make haste, fly
    become the she, the he, the hero within
    Reach, extend , thrust, plunge
    shatter, smash, pull down, wreck, metamorphize
    Make yourself whirl against arrogant ridigity before the windup
    hurry…….

  • 3 Bill Schroeder // Mar 22, 2008 at 12:01 am

    I like that little thought. Oh thats the one I just placed on line. Damn! Always do like what I write so I commented on it, and besides I have to hurry….

  • 4 Mary Ann Eils // Mar 22, 2008 at 10:33 am

    Joe Barr is a talented writer, dancer,& photographer. When you read some of his stuff, you might think he’s weird, well he is, but you couldn’t find a more awesome person in the confines of a 4×4 outhouse. He is also the recipient of the little know LARD SUCKING PIG award.Joe is now and forever will be one of the worlds favorite people.

  • 5 Joe // Mar 22, 2008 at 11:58 am

    Mary Ann, you Wicked Vamp, You have me howling.
    My problem, I don’t know whether to say Thank You, or defend myself.
    :-))

  • 6 Eric McMurtrey // Mar 22, 2008 at 6:17 pm

    I guess I never understand things the right way.

    I honestly thought it was from the perspective of a housefly. Little bugger wouldn’t have had any idea it was actually a ‘dog’ and not a ‘cat’. Sideways of that, the whole world would be upside down if he were on the roof :)

    Ah… Maybe my brain don’t work right, but the piece definitely does. It gave me something to enjoy and smile about while it was being performed at the meeting.

    How could I ask for more? :)

    My compliments.

    Eric

  • 7 bill schroeder // Mar 22, 2008 at 7:04 pm

    Now there is a unique, darn swell idea! Here goes my shot. The Cat Barked continued…….

    I’m falling and the cat barked again and howled. My eye goes up, yet my intellect sees only down. Dispair fogs my senses. I land. My consciousness sways. My mind’s eye cascades lower to view the depth. As surly it sees above me. A fall from grace, dejected, sad, lost. I perceive that now! Yet once again the barking……

  • 8 bill schroeder // Mar 23, 2008 at 12:09 pm

    With gals like Mary Ann Joe, you don’t need any enemy. It’s well she clarified her intent about the Lard Sucking Pig comment. Don’t you just love her!

  • 9 Rick McCluskey // Mar 23, 2008 at 1:04 pm

    The last time I heard anything as complex as Joe’s Thursday night flash fiction, was a Yardbirds song (circa:1966) call Over, Under, Sideways, Down. The second half of the verse went, Forwards, Backwards, Square is Round.

    Back then it took me several hours of listening to figure out what the verse meant. Now forty-One years later, Joe comes along with this. This time it took three days of reading to figure it out.

    Congrats Joe for re-capturing the Hippie geneneration mindset. Like Paul McCartney said, it’s looking at the world through a fish eye lense.

  • 10 Joe // Mar 23, 2008 at 3:35 pm

    OR…
    Might he be dreaming?
    Could he be delusional?
    Is he on drugs?
    All of the above?

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