Al is in Pun-derland

This silly piece is an attempt to stir Lewis Carroll from his eternal sleep. I hope it fits in with the "madness" theme.

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Debilitated and breathless, Al stopped abruptly on realising that he wasn’t being followed. He had been running for a while now.

A high wooden door with huge knobs stood nearby. Besides the door itself, there were no walls. A mayhem of voices could be heard on the inside.

A sign read: “State Cabinet. Enter if you May.”

He knocked and the doors creaked open. On the inside, he saw a garden of colourful ... things. As he moved closer, they turned out to be sticky notes.

“Power to the people ...”, read one “ ... lower electricity prices now!”

“For the people, of the people, by the people!” said another, “Faster Internet!”

A woman dressed in flowers was sitting on the far fence with an eager crowd around her.

The guard startled him: “You May sit down. After all it’s the month of Maying!”

“Don’t you mean the month of May?”

“Maybe”, smiled the guard, “It’s a free country as long as you can pay your way!” He then laughed conceitedly and began humming: “Pay your way in May, they say! May you pay your way every day!”

Al sat down on one of the many benches laid out. The old lady next to him gave him a quick glance before returning her attention to the proceedings. A voice boomed from somewhere:

“Remember citizens, it’s the Question Hour, and we will take only odd questions!”

Al exclaimed: “Why?”

The old woman gave him an amused look: “Cause we’re an oddience and May is an odd month with odd number of letters in it!”

“Oh!”

“Can we have May the fourth declared a public holiday?”, someone asked.

The floral woman muttered loudly: “Must be an alien”, and then grinned, “I may or may not consider it!”

The questioner sat down in dismay.

“We have had enough of Democracy! When is the final version being released?”

“It may or may not!”, came the reply.

So it went on, with the floral woman replying: “May or May not” to every question.

Al turned to the old lady and said “Why is she on the fence?”

“Well”, replied the lady, “She is the May-er after all!”

“Don’t you mean Mayor? And what’s with the flowers she wears?”

“Oh, you’re so dumb! Those are Mayflowers, my dear!”

Al nodded, unknowingly. “Is she a good Mayor?”

“Who knows! It’s only the first of the month. But she’s a Mayonese so she’ll be fine!”

“Mayonnaise?”

“Same thing, really! By the way, the army guy who came to March was terrible!”

Al decided he didn’t understand elections. Besides, he had to find his way home before sunset.

He stood up to leave when the old lady cautioned him: “Be careful of the exit poles ... oh, and the ticks!”

“Ticks?”

“Yes, the Polly Ticks! They get under your skin, suck your blood, and you don’t realise until it’s too late. Hard to get them out then!”

Al left with the guard’s song following him: “This May, no dismay. No mayhem, this May, ahem!”