#jujito

As Algy turned the pages of his book of verse, he could hear a gentle, soft rustling just above his head. It was hard to be quite sure, because the forest was alive with peculiar noises of all kinds, but Algy was almost certain that there was someone there.

However, the rainforest foliage was tangled and dense, and at first he couldn't see what kind of creature might be making the noise. But when a ray of sunlight suddenly burst through the green canopy, Algy thought that he caught a glimpse of a little brown monkey glowing in the sunshine, peering down at him from a precarious perch on a massive leaf. A vague memory drifted back to him… wasn't this the same little monkey he had encountered in a moonlit dream on his very first night in the forest?

Rubbing his eyes, Algy looked again, but the sunlight dazzled him and the complex layers of leaves played tricks with his senses, so that he was able to imagine that he saw all kinds of things that might – or might not – really be there…

As he looked back down at his book, the leaves above him rustled again, and Algy thought that he heard a hushed voice whispering, but so very quietly that it could just have been his imagination. "Turn to page 62," it seemed to say. "Turn to page 62."

Flicking through the wee volume until he found that page, Algy looked up at his hidden companion and smiled, for this is what he had read:

Be not afeard; the isle is full of noises, Sounds, and sweet airs, that give delight and hurt not. Sometimes a thousand twangling instruments Will hum about mine ears, and sometime voices That, if I then had waked after long sleep, Will make me sleep again: and then, in dreaming, The clouds methought would open and show riches Ready to drop upon me that, when I waked, I cried to dream again.

[Algy is of course reading Caliban's famous lines from Act 3 Scene 2 of The Tempest by the late 16th/early 17th century English playwright William Shakespeare.]

Algy scrambled up, up, up through the dense growth of the rainforest, struggling to see where he was going in the dim green half-light beneath the foliage, but doing his best to follow the calls of the little monkey Jujito, although his furry friend was somewhere out of sight far above him.

At times Algy got tangled up in twisting vines which seemed designed to catch and trap fluffy birds, and at times he was scratched by the exotic but vicious spiky leaves of plants whose names he didn't know, but eventually he began to see a bright gleam of golden light shining down through the canopy, creating mysterious ever-shifting patterns on the trees all around him.

Hurrying upwards with increased pace, Algy suddenly emerged into glorious sunlight, and found himself amid a sea of greenery at the very top of the forest, with a beautiful sky high above that was painted in soft swathes of ultramarine and bright cerulean blue. And there was his little friend Jujito, clinging to a leafy stem and chattering away merrily, obviously as relieved and happy as Algy was himself to be out in the glorious sunlight and fresh air at last…

Algy trudged on and on through the forest, in the direction which the frogs had indicated would be the most likely to lead to a river where he could launch his inflatable boat. Algy was hoping that, as most rivers lead to the sea, he would be able to float downstream to the mighty ocean, and then paddle across the waves to his home in the wild west Highlands of Scotland. He realised that such a plan was a wee bit ambitious for a fluffy bird, to say the least, but it was the only plan he had, so Algy continued to trudge on…

Until he was brought to a sudden stop in his tracks, that is, for as he pushed through a dense curtain of trailing vines and foliage, he suddenly saw the little monkey of his dreams sitting boldly among the ferns in front of him. Dropping his inflatable boat and poetry book in astonishment, Algy stared at the little fellow…

Having wished to keep his brain occupied while trying to make his way through the rainforest, Algy had spent much of the day rehearsing more passages from Shakespeare's plays in his mind while he stumbled along. So when he was suddenly confronted with what he assumed to be a figment of his imagination, it was only natural that he blurted out:

"How now, spirit? Whither wander you?"

To Algy's surprise, the mischievous little creature winked its eye and replied:

"Over hill, over dale, Thorough bush, thorough brier, Over park, over pale, Thorough flood, thorough fire; I do wander everywhere Swifter than the moon’s sphere."

"I don't doubt it!" said Algy with a big smile, for not only was the response correct, but he was quite sure that in this case it was true. "What's your name?"

"Jujito," the little monkey answered, and then added:

"Either I mistake your shape and making quite, Or else you are that shrewd and knavish sprite Called Algy…"

Algy chuckled. He could tell that he was going to have fun with Jujito, whether he was real or not 🥰

[Algy and Jujito are quoting lines from Act 2 Scene 1 of A Midsummer Night's Dream by the late 16th/early 17th century English playwright William Shakespeare.]

A collection of distorted memories🌀✨