Month: March 2015

Drabble Challenge — My Word

/ mannixk / 3 Comments

I decided to take Chuck Wendig up on another challenge because a) it’s fun, b) it gets me writing something and c) this one was short and tricky! Write a little piece of fiction in 100 words or less. It’s called a “drabble”, and here’s my drabbling today:

 

My Word

“I give you my word,” he says.

What a leap of faith we take — to trust words. I took the leap with Jake, five years ago on our wedding day. I believed my Mom, when she swore I wouldn’t always feel as hollow as I did the day our baby died.

Then there’s this man, with his rotting teeth and red rimmed eyes. Even through my blouse I can feel the cold blade against my belly.

“Give me your purse and I give you my word, I won’t hurt you.”

I have no choice but to leap.

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poem: Flight Song

/ mannixk / 2 Comments

I’ve recently discovered and become rather enamored with the work of American-British poet Robert Peake. On his site he has a poetry prompt thingamajig, which randomly generates words to use in a poem. I was feeling a little stuck today in my writing, so decided to see if this tool could fix me up.

I tried for ten words and got: hens; undulating; harp; agreed; anew; expectations; treasures; encounter; ham; reefs.

This is what, and who, sprung to mind and I decided to post it as it came.

 

Flight Song

 

It was agreed that Vicky would get out

before she knew how to crawl.

Sitting on the filthy shag rug

in a soggy diaper

listening for treasures in the harp-string

melodics of her mama’s voice.

Gooey smile

answering her mama’s invocation.

 

Yours will be a life anew,

hummed Vicky’s mama to her

undulating babe on the rug.

You’ll hit green summits,

plunge to skeletal reefs.

Encounter men with a natural knowing

of how a woman should be touched.

Have expectations

of being loved.

 

No truck stop life for my babe,

crooned Vicky’s mama to Vicky.

No serving up fried hens and greasy ham,

prying slimy fingers off your hips

when you come to refill the coffee.

No wearing some stranger’s old coat

to fend off that shrieking January wind.

I ain’t gonna buy you a mockingbird,

Vicky’s mama sang,

but I am gonna teach you

how to fly.

 

 

March

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February is gone. The longest shortest month, especially this year. Rally for March — the strong verb month. The month that moves forward, takes charge. The month that starts in the dead of winter and forges to the start of spring. The cleaner what wipes up February’s sloppy romance, the heartache, the emotional frenzy of births and deaths, the bone-cracking cold and the still-late dawn. March is a month of madness — not lunacy, but anger. The month that fires us up for something better. Brighter. Lets us shake out the rage, the hurt, the sorrow. Burn away. Readying ourselves for April’s revival.