Dear Momma and Papa - The Surreal Circus Flash Fiction Contest

Dear Momma and Papa

Hi, Papa, how are they hanging? Are you and Momma still swinging from branch to branch in the trees? Or, Momma, did the Holy Order for the Conversion of Gorillas manage to hit you and Papa each in the arse with those bloody anesthetic darts? If not, I guess Sister Angela is reading this letter to you right now as she tries to inch closer with her finger on the trigger of the dart gun.

Hello, Sister Angela! I thought you'd like to know that my butt is still numb from where you hit me with the dart. I never did reach that damned banana you were holding out to tempt me to get closer. Please say a big Hi! to Father Adolf for me and tell the old fart that he was probably right ... running away from the Blessed School for Apes to join the circus didn't bring me enlightenment. Even though Charles Chimpanzee said it would! Only goes to show that you can't trust those bloody chimps! They'll do anything for a banana. By the way, are Charlie and Father Adolf still having fun times in the hammock hidden behind the garden shed?

You might like to know, Sister Angela, that I did find enlightenment, in a sense. When I started off with the Washington Nude Circus I could sometimes be glimpsed in the limelight - dressed only in my baggy underpants and fishnet stockings - kicking up my heels in the chorus line. But I went on to really hit the big time as the nude star attraction on the trapeze. Hanging by my feet, and clutching a sobbing clown in each hand, I'd hurl the screaming buggers head first down into the holey safety net. The electors went wild when when my aim was off and the clowns wholly missed the net. And the politicians almost loved that as much as me swinging high above the snarling lions and pelting them on the head with coconuts. But I guess, though, Father Adolf won't care about any of that. I expect he's still disappointed that I didn't stay on at the Blessed School for Apes ... to head up the Blessed Order of Missionary Storm Troopers and lead the assault on the Swiss Guards in his planned coup de tat of the Vatican, with him being installed as the Holy Fuhrer.

But if you're reading this, Momma and Papa, I guess Sister Angela held out one tempting banana too many and got close enough to hit you in the arse with those damned darts. Then I suppose the Blessed School for Apes taught you to read and write before shipping you off to the eastern front. I hope you're enjoying Stalingrad. If not, just desert and join the KGB as peace-loving spies to be sent to the USA. There you can sign up with the CIA and help with funky renditions and neat stuff like mystery flights direct to Camp Belta in Guano Bay, Cuba. But remember to fly Qantas! They serve banana smoothies and teach you how to bend bananas.

However, if you're still reading this to them, dear Sister Angela, please don't mention any of this to Father Adolf. Then my video tape of him unfrocking in the confessional as you pole danced wildly in the choir loft won't be posted on the Vatican website. You see, I don't want anyone to know that I'm now living in a laid-back condo in the Ape House at the Perth Zoo. Oh, by the way, please say hello to George Gorilla for me. I assume he's still having sleepovers in your cell after the frantic laying-on-of-hands sessions ... and how do you put up with the bugger's snoring? That's another video the Vatican would go ape over.

But should you be reading this dear Momma and Papa, don't believed a bloody word that Sister Angela told you about me. Everything but the good parts are damned lies! The jealous bitch begrudges me the Doctor of Divinity degree that I bought on line from the Boston Zoo. I believe it's located next to some cat house called Gather, where they dish out brownie points for drivel in a trough. Good stuff for sticking the snout into, I heard. Anyway, I still have to write my Defense Department dissertation before I'm officially a certified holy Joe from the Boston Zoo. My doctoral thingy will be on the religious morality and medical ethics of using bananas to lure defenseless gorillas close enough for them to be shot in the arse with a dart. I'm sure someone will make it into a movie like Gorillas in the Piss. And don't believe anything, dear Momma and Papa, that the talking drums might say about me. It's not Tarzan thumping the bloody things but Father Adolf!

Tarzan and Jane live in the condo next to mine, overlooking the muddy pond where Herb and Harriet Hippopotamus get down and dirty. Mind you, what Tarzan and Jane do in full view on their balcony gets the gawking chimps frothing at the mouth and going plain berserk. You'd think that they'd look the other way or at least help the gangling orang-utans dig the escape tunnel under the zoo fence. Actually, it's headed straight towards the greengrocer's outdoor table on the far side of the passing highway ... old Luigi displays a huge pile of yummy bananas there. Enough for hundreds of smoothies!

But that's enough from me. Bugger the tunneling! I'm about to pole vault over the zoo fence, strap my battered suitcase onto the back of my banana-yellow motorbike that I keep in the visitors' car park and head across Australia. I'm going to Queensland, where a lot of Queens and other royalty bend green bananas. I've accepted a Banana Land job test driving the bent ones. And I get to keep the rejects!

(986 words)