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# tales for dreamers: take a penny, leave a penny
- URL: https://thedreampedlar.com/tales-for-dreamers-take-a-penny-leave-a-penny/
- Published: 2023-02-23T15:37:26.000Z
- Updated: 2023-03-26T01:09:31.000Z
- Description: Give the talking skull a penny, and he will reveal to you a life secret. But do you have enough pennies to hear all that he has to say?
- Author: Anitha Krishnan
- Tags: tales for dreamers

![black skull with a post-it stuck on its head, saying 'take a penny, leave a penny'](https://thedreampedlar.com/content/images/2023/02/34.-take-a-penny-leave-a-penny.jpg)

tales for dreamers: take a penny, leave a penny

It begins with a low rumbling noise.   
The sound of something far away.   
Like thunder in the distance.   
Or water tumbling off the vertical slopes of a cliff.   
Rolling towards me urgently, surging in intensity.

And if I listen keenly for a while, tuning out the rest of the world, I can begin to discern the chuckles and the words and then the sentences and what they mean.

And I wonder from where all the words of wisdom are being hurled at me.   
And I look around to see the the grinning skull talking to me.

His grin is evil, his laughter hideous, his eyes hollow with bottomless depths, but there is a sincerity in his words, which makes it hard for me to ignore him and walk away.

The post-it stuck to his forehead says mysteriously, 'Take a penny, Leave a penny.'   
I deposit a coin in front of the skull, and he tells me a life secret.   
I fish for another coin in my purse and place it by his chin.   
He shares another life secret.   
He is eager for more pennies, and I for words of wisdom, and that makes him garrulous.

When I run out of pennies, he says he can trade his secrets for mine.   
The rule, however, is to take only as much as I can leave behind for him.

Momma says the talking skull is a big, fat liar and that I shouldn't trust him with my secrets.   
So I am thinking maybe I could trade in my stories instead.   
I hope he will like them enough.