(A is for Aberration)
A True Incident from Childhood
The shed at the bottom of our garden was normally a quiet place of tidy tools and the comforting smell of fresh wood shavings. It also housed Dad’s lawnmower, a workbench, a rusty spade, and Mom’s collection of fancy yard decor, vintage flower pots & planters. But last week, something new arrived: a large burlap sack, slumped like a sleeping giant in the darkest corner.
It wasn’t fastened tight like a proper feedbag; instead, the neck was folded over, as if trying to contain something wide awake and restless.
The three of us–me, Elizabeth (age nine at the time), also known as “Liz” to her friends though I much preferred the name “Zee,” Leia, who was then seven, and my older brother, Ben, who just turned twelve that fateful Autumn–were instantly captivated.
Ben, being the bravest (or so he claimed), was the first to poke it with a stout tomato stick. It didn’t groan or rustle to life like a waking tramp. It just sat there, plain brown and unassuming, yet radiating a strange, unsettling energy.
“What do you think’s inside?” I whispered, clutching tight my stuffed rabbit, Boba. Yeah, both my parents were hardcore Star Wars fans at the time. I was almost named Mon Mothma if that told you anything.
Ben shrugged, his usual swagger a bit diminished.
“Dunno. Maybe potatoes? Dad said he brought some new ones for spring planting.”
But it didn’t smell earthy and starchy like potatoes. It didn’t smell like anything ordinary. Instead, it had a faint, metallic tang, like a forgotten coin that had been buried too long, mixed with the cloying sweetness of rotten fruit. And sometimes, if you listened very carefully, you could almost hear a low, humming sound emanating from its depths, a wasp-like drone that made the hair on my arms prickle and stand up . . . like ice crystals.
We started visiting the shed every day, our quivering fingers hovering near its limp neck but never quite daring to touch it. We tried to figure out what was inside. We imagined shimmering gems, stolen from a forgotten elfin king. We conjured images of tiny, winged creatures, trapped by an evil wizard. But none of our stories quite fit the heavy, oppressive feeling that the sack seemed to exclude.
Then, one night, I suddenly woke up in a cold sweat. I had dreamed of a dark, brooding sky made of long spirals of immense teeth, gnashing, and a cracked, grey ground that shifted like a million tiny spiders. There was no logic, no rhyme or reason, just a terrifying, overwhelming sense of dread. Shaking, I crept into Ben’s room, finding him sitting up, wide-eyed and equally paled.
“I dreamed something awful,” he stammered, his voice barely a whisper. “Black ribbons that were alive . . . moving like snakes . . . and they were singing ‘One, Two, Buckle My Shoe’ backwards.”
When we checked on Leia, we found her huddled at the foot of her bed like a scared little mouse. Her big brown eyes were bulging-wide and glistening with tears as she tightly clutched her plushy duck.
“I had a bad dream about the shadows,” she whispered, her voice trembling like a leaf in the wind.
Ben and I exchanged worried glances, and I knelt down beside her, while trying to bring a reassuring smile to my stiff face.
“What kind of shadows?” I asked softly.
Leia shifted, glancing over her shoulder as if expecting something to jump out. “They were . . . dancing of the walls. They whispered my name.” Her tiny voice wavered, and I couldn’t shake the chill that slowly wormed its way down my spine.
I still remembered that night, when a harvest moon hung low and crimson like a giant wolf’s eye, shining through the upper windows. When Ben and I were hurrying toward Leia’s room, we both heard strange dry whispers and rapping that rattled the windows. We both thought it was the wind at the time, but Leia would say much later that it was the shadows come to life.
“Shadows can’t hurt you, Leia,” Ben said, trying to sound brave.
“Yeah, nothing to be afraid of,” I agreed. But just saying that only made me feel more uneasy. “They’re just hollow shapes, like silly ghosts.”
But Leia only shook her head. “They wanted to play . . . but I didn’t want to.” She pulled her duckie even closer, as if it could protect her.
That was when both of us realized then: the sack wasn’t filled with seed potatoes or precious jewels or even magical creatures. It was filled with freakin’ nightmares.
The worst freakin’ nightmares imaginable.
Each night after that, for about a fortnight, the nightmares became even more bizarre, more unsettling. I dreamed of forks in the road sprinkled with thousands of glowing eyes, judging me silently. Ben dreamed of a world where the colors were all wrong, where the blue was sharp and jagged as a jigsaw blade, and the yellow tasted like sour dirt. We couldn’t even describe some of them property; There were things that didn’t quite make sense, things that defied description in known languages even.
We started to avoid the shed, but the nightmares followed us back, sneaking into our sleep like silent spidery shadows. We felt them swirling around us, tugging at the edge of our consciousness like hungry feral dogs.
One afternoon, we were playing with pick-up sticks in the garden when we saw Dad heading toward the shed, a shovel and heavy work gloves in hand.
“I’m moving that goddamned thing,” he announced, his voice unusually subdued. “It’s giving me and Mom the creeps, too.”
We then watched nervously as he hauled the sack out toward a deep hole he had dug at the base of an old oak tree near the edge of our property. Quickly, he dropped it in, covering it up with a large mound of dirt and rocks. He didn’t say anything else as he turned back to the house, his face tight and worried.
That night, the nightmares were gone. We slept deeply, without the gnawing anxious dread that had been our constant companion.
We never spoke about the sack again, not really. But sometimes, when I looked at that old oak tree, I couldn’t help but wonder if the nightmare were still down there, just waiting to be unearthed by another unsuspecting soul. And even to this very day, I still hoped that the dirt was thick and heavy enough and that the oak tree grew strong enough, to keep those things buried forever more.
Because some things are better left undisturbed, especially those things that don’t make sense, those things that come from beyond the edges of our understanding–those things that are stuffed away in an old burlap sack in the dark corner of a shed.
''Liz Van der Zee
Murre let Literary Magazine
Murre let University Press
Spring 1989, Volume 35
(B is for Bugbear)
The Bag of Grey'
A bag of grey, all rough and old,
It sits inside the barn so cold.
No straw it holds, no grain, no seeds,
But something there, you must take heed.
(Chorus)
Oh, the bag of grey, don’t touch it near,
For whispers rise and fill with fear.
It’s marked with knots, in tangled plights,
And holds a darkness, day and night.
They say a farmer, long since gone,
Found it nestled at the dawn.
He touched it quick, a curious soul,
And lost his laughter, lost his whole.
(Chorus)
Oh, the bag of grey, don’t touch it near,
For whispers rise and fill with fear.
It’s marked with knots, in tangled plights,
And holds a darkness, day and night.
So if you stray, and see it loom,
A burlap shadow in the gloom,
Turn back your steps, and run away,
From all that sorrow, comes to stay.
For once you touch, you’ll know the cost,
Of what the bag of grey has lost.
And you might join, within its fold,
A tale forever to be told.
Traditional children’s song and nursery rhyme
Unknown origin, first recorded in the Republic
of the Americas in 1805.
(© is for Cracks)
News clipping from the Union Town: Time-Standard,( September 30, 2003)
In a shocking turn of events that has left the citizens of this small, yet historically rich community reeling, a severe weather system swept through Curtisville late last night, toppling several ancient oak trees that have stood for centuries, serving as silent witnesses to the town’s evolution.
The tempest, which arrived with little warning, unleashed high winds and torrential rains, uprooting the iconic trees in the heart of Curtisville’s main Adela Park and along its beloved tree-lined streets. Eyewitness reports describe harrowing scenes as branches cracked and groaned under the immense strain before giving way–some crashing down mere feet away from passersby.
Lifelong resident Margery Cartwright expressed her profound sorrow over the destruction.
“These oaks are not just trees; they are a part of our town’s heritage,” She stated in a press conference early this morning. “Many of them were here long before Curtisville was established and have seen generations of families grow and thrive. Their loss is felt deeply by all of us.”
Among the others devastated by the loss was a local historian, Dr. Malcolm Williams, who has spent years collecting stories about the trees’ significance.
“The oldest of the fallen oaks dated back to the early 1700s and was believed to be a gathering place for the First Nations people who were the earliest known inhabitants of the region,” Dr. Williams noted, his voice heavy with emotion. “We’ve lost a critical link to our past that cannot be replaced.”
In total, reports indicate that at least thirteen monumental oaks either had fell or suffered severe damage. Crews from the Parks Department have been mobilized, working alongside local firefighters and volunteers to remove dangerous debris while assessments of the remaining trees are conducted to ensure public safety.
(D is for Details)
Text from The Poison Chain: The Documented Facts in the Case of Otherworldly Revenge, by Herb D. Tillinghast (Murre let University Press: 2014, (p. 40):
“The September 30th article, written by the Union Town’s longtime editor, a stoic man named Arthur Jenkins, detailed the destruction caused by the unprecedented storms that had raged through the night. Winds speeds had reached levels unheard of in Curtisville’s history, and the sheer power had finally brought down the venerable oaks.
“In a later commemorative piece, he would write of the trees’ long, proud lives, of the secrets they held within their vast numerous rings, and of the mourning he, and the whole town, felt at their enormous loss.
“‘They were more than just trees,’ Arthur said in a later interview with NPR, ‘They were our landmarks, our guardians. They were . . . Curtisville.’
“The accompanying photos, taken by freshman photographer Sarah Miller for the Curtisville High School’s The Heron’s Eye Journal, showed the immense scale of the fallen trees. One shot in particular, was especially haunting: the roots of the largest oak, ripped from the earth, resembled a giant, skeletal claw reaching towards the sky.
“Both articles, however, didn’t capture the full extent of the situation. What the Union Town couldn’t print were the murmurs that had begun to snake through Curtisville in the aftermath of the storm. People spoke of strange, residual energies swirling around the fallen oaks. Some swore that they had even felt a faint, rhythmic pulse emanating from the exposed roots, a heartbeat that faded with each passing day.
“Hemlock Boisvert, the town’s lifelong eccentric historian and self-appointed keeper of the local lore, claimed the oaks were not just trees, but a connection to a time long before the arrival of humans, a time when nature reigned supreme. He believed that their fall had disturbed an ancient balance, and that the consequences were yet to be seen. He spoke of the ‘Ancient Ones,’ the beings who have cared for the trees before humanoid life forms claimed the land, and warned that ‘They’ might not appreciate their disruption. His words, usually dismissed as the rambling of an elderly eccentric Boomer, held a strange weight in the somber atmosphere that draped over Curtisville.
“In the meanwhile, construction crews began the arduous task of clearing away the debris, using heavy machinery that seemed almost sacrilegious against the fallen giants. But as they worked, things . . . changed. Tools would mysteriously malfunction. Workers would report feeling dizzy or disoriented near the oak stumps. A strange, sweet fragrance, not of decay but of something almost floral, hung heavy in the air.
“Authorities later attributed the unusual effects noted in the area to a mere combination of equipment failure and a nearby gas leak. However, upon further examination, workers maintained that the equipment was functioning properly and that no gas leaks were found in the vicinity of the oaks.”
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