For a Season

(a poem) For a season?    he’d said. Meeting her gaze,    holding it this time. For a season.    I won’t trap you in forever. For a season,    his words twinkled like chocolate stars,     his face was the first she saw in the morning,     his words the last she heard at night. For a season,    she struggled beneath him.Open your eyes, he’d… Continue reading For a Season

sparkle

(a poem) You sit there,     regal,     graceful,     fluid as time itself, You sparkle, Your every word a proclamation of love and light,     every movement a songbird’s note,     floating thru the open window on a spring breeze, Cherry blossoms land in my lap. The audacity!     How dare I sit here, while you sparkle so?

Rapid Transport

June 2022 Flash Challenge, Day 13 The smell of falafel is always the first thing I notice in the Cairo terminal; recirculated air is laden with the scents of parsley, mint, cilantro, and garlic. The bustling hallways of disembarking passengers and the vendors selling their falafel, hummus, and baklava. I woke on a sleeping couch… Continue reading Rapid Transport

Ache

(a poem) The day breaks,  I should get up.  Simmering expectations float and bob in the sea of consciousness that is me.  I am the sea.  The tide rolls in,  The tide rolls out, Leaving precious and unimaginable treasures upon my sandy beaches. Here a memory,  There a forgotten face,  What’s this? An idea of… Continue reading Ache

Glitch Mendelsohn

June 2022 Flash Challenge, Day 9 I hurry my pace and steal a glance behind me. Damn it. They’re still there, the three teenage boys following me. Again, I allowed myself to forget that I’m an eighteen-year-old girl. What is my name this time? The body might be 18, but its rider is much older.… Continue reading Glitch Mendelsohn

Gargoyles

June 2022 Flash Challenge, Day 4 “I think they are supposed to be guardians or something, right?” Kimberly says, peering upwards at the three buildings that make up the bulk of our burb’s central square. Ken looks ready to speak again. “Go ahead,” I say. “While symbolically linked to defense, their original purpose was to… Continue reading Gargoyles

Papa

June 2022 Flash Challenge, Day 3 Uncle Kenny never rises before noon on the camping trips. So far now, it’s just me, Cheryl, Adam, and dad, finishing our breakfast of bacon, eggs, and toast. The cool air and the smokey smell usually make me feel giddy in the mornings. That isn’t the case this morning.… Continue reading Papa

Finding Harry

An addict returns home.   My most recent overdose triggered mom’s stroke and death. I’ve been gone almost nine years, but now I’m back at the farm with Dad. I will stay here a bit, try to find my legs, figure out what’s next for me. I’ve struggled with the black dogs of depression my… Continue reading Finding Harry

Becoming Proust

Reflections on living three fifths a century     But old age, to begin with, has something in common with death. Some face it with indifference, not because they have more courage than others, but because they have less imagination.“ Marcel Proust, Time Regained – I am slowly turning into Marcel Proust. Okay, that may… Continue reading Becoming Proust

An Ugly Chair

Ordinary horror in the mundane The chair sits awkwardly in the shallow corner between the fireplace and the patio door (it’s a small apartment), shrouded under an ugly brown, queen-sized blanket I bought years ago on my way to a meditation retreat. That year we had a bitterly cold winter, and the retreat center was old… Continue reading An Ugly Chair

Desert Highway

In the end, the most surprising thing about the video was how no two people ever remembered it the same; it was a modern-day Rorschach test. It was only three minutes twelve seconds long, but people saw different things when they recounted what they had watched. One thing almost everyone agreed upon was the video… Continue reading Desert Highway