The Seeing

April 30, 2021Na'ama Yehuda Anecdotes of Life, Life and love, Muse and Flow, Reflections, Writing Tags: belief, CCC, Creativity, Death, Family, Flash Fiction, grandparents, Life Lessons, Micro-fiction, Visitor 27 Comments

“When I die,” she’d say, “I will not be truly away from you.”

Both sides of the statement used to worry him when he was little.

“Will I see you?” He once fretted. It was the day they had buried the pup who did not last the night. The runt who never whined and did not wriggle by the time the sun awoke. They’d laid the tiny bundle under a small mound of dirt in the yard. And it was lost to sight.

“In a manner of speaking,” Grandma had replied, untroubled. “For not all seeing is done with eyes.”

He did not understand her then.

Or when she died.

He wasn’t sure he understood her still, with many years passed.

Her absence a hole in his heart.

Then he came across the giant burl.

And he felt her in it. Waiting. Smiling. Seen.

He carved her out.

For Crispina‘s Crimson’s Creative Challenge

Best Of All

April 28, 2021April 28, 2021Na'ama Yehuda Anecdotes of Life, Life and love, Muse and Flow, Poetry, Reflections, Writing Tags: 100WordChallenge, Best friend, connection, Flash Fiction, Friday Fictioneers, Making the most of it, Micro-fiction, Photo prompt, Poetry, Relationships, Reunion 51 Comments

It rained. It hailed. It stormed. It flooded.

It none of it mattered.

They laughed. They sang. They danced. They huddled.

They had a chance to reconnect.

In all the ways that mattered, and in some they hadn’t quite dared hope for, yet came true.

Oh, they were cold. And after a time, hungry.

But still the stories flowed. The tears, sometimes. The laughter. Oh, the laughter!

Best of all, the others who would otherwise pass by,

Who would pass judgment,

Did not.

Because the weather

Protective in its dreary wetness

Let them be.

Let them love.

Made it perfect.

For Rochelle’s Friday Fictioneers

Photo prompt: © Dale Rogerson

Initiation

April 25, 2021April 25, 2021Na'ama Yehuda Anecdotes of Life, Life and love, Meditations, Muse and Flow, Reflections, Writing Tags: Accolyte, CCC, Creative writing, Flash Fiction, Intiation, Mentor, Micro-fiction, New Beginnings, Photo prompt, Rite of passage, Writing Challenge 18 Comments

“Close your eyes. Feel the levers of the earth move with you,” Moria deposited the words like diamonds lined on velvet cloth.

Lianne obeyed the first. Tried hard for the second. But all she felt were the tremors in her body, bare skin shuddering against penetrating morning chill. And the fear.

“Breathe in the cold, breathe out the worry.” The old woman’s voice affected little compassion, yet there was no shaming in it. Just instruction.

Lianne tried, but her shaking only intensified. Perhaps I am not ready, she fretted.

“You are ready,” Moria stated.

Lianne gasped. Could her mentor read her mind?

“No, but I’ve seen enough initiates.”

The elder’s chuckle, puncturing the solemn task, somehow eased Lianne’s mind. Her body calmed. Her eyes relaxed behind the wrap. Her toes curled around the softness of the mossy ground. The bottom step offered a damp welcome.

“Better. Now climb.”

For Crispina‘s Crimson’s Creative Challenge

Her Ants

April 24, 2021Na'ama Yehuda Anecdotes of Life, Current events, Life and love, Muse and Flow, Poetry, Professional Development, Reflections, Speech Language Pathology, Writing Tags: Briefly, Creativity, Daily grind, Focus, imagination, learning, Making do, Poetry, Restless, Weekend Writing Prompt 22 Comments

(Photo: Hans-Peter Gauster on Unsplash)

She has ants

In her pants.

Restless thoughts

Writing plots.

No surprise

Her brain fries,

Daily grind

Flying blind.

For Sammi’s Weekend Writing Prompt: restless in 19 words

The Bobblins

April 21, 2021Na'ama Yehuda Anecdotes of Life, Life and love, Muse and Flow, Reflections, Writing Tags: 100WordChallenge, Creative writing, Flash Fiction, Friday Fictioneers, Interpretation, Micro-fiction, New Beginnings, Photo prompt, Possibilities, Science Fiction 51 Comments

The moon hid on the night they lit the Bobblins. Nature’s cold dark shoulder. Though Gary said it was Luna’s way of lending them the main stage free of luminescent interference.

Renee still felt a shudder run down her spine.

It was the depths of it.

The weight of memories that bobbed and swayed and listed ever so slightly over the mirrored pond.

Even the wind ceased. For the moment.

Was it, too, leaving the stage free of routine rustling, the air’s microphone open to the whispers of the babies, cocooned in color coded pastel uteri, waiting to be born?

For Rochelle’s Friday Fictioneers

Photo prompt: © David Stewart

New Neighbor

April 17, 2021Na'ama Yehuda Anecdotes of Life, Funnies, Life and love, Muse and Flow, Writing Tags: being yourself, CCC, Eccentric, Flash Fiction, Just for fun, Micro-fiction, neighbors, Photo prompt, Siblings, Uniform, Writing prompt 14 Comments

“What on earth?! Have you seen her?”

Molly looked up from her coffee. The swirl of mocha infiltration on the milk froth in her cup was fascinating. She licked her upper lip, tasting calm and morning.”Seen who?”

“Her!” Abby flicked her head urgently in the direction of the kitchen window.

“Do I have to?” Molly pouted. Her sister was altogether too excitable. Surely there was naught wrong with sitting idly with one’s breakfast. However, she could not recall the last time Abby did anything but gobble down her toast, gulp her tea, and pop right up in search of dishes to wash, counters to wipe, cabinets to put to order, or lists to make.

Abby’s chest rose in what was certain to turn lecture.

Molly sighed, stood, and craned her neck to see. White uniform. Red crosses. Pink rubber gloves. “Oh, her? Sheri. Our new neighbor. A nurse or such.”

For Crispina’s Crimson’s Creative Challenge

Uncanny

April 17, 2021Na'ama Yehuda Anecdotes of Life, Life and love, Meditations, Muse and Flow, Photography, Poetry, Writing Tags: Creative writing, Holding on, hope, light, Nothing is Impossible, Poetry, Spring, Tenacity, Uncanny, Weekend Writing Prompt 18 Comments

Photo: Na’ama Yehuda

There was a mystery

To their madness.

An uncanny sense of

Doom.

But she did not flail

Afraid

In darkness,

Whilst she could spot a petal

Bloom.

Instead, she watched

With rapt intention

As life suffused

Their eerie

Gloom.

For Sammi’s Weekend Writing Prompt: Uncanny in 39 words

Tiny Tidings

April 11, 2021April 11, 2021Na'ama Yehuda Anecdotes of Life, Life and love, Muse and Flow, Reflections, Writing Tags: Anticipation, CCC, End of Winter, Flash Fiction, flowers, hope, Micro-fiction, Photo prompt, Primrose, Spring, Tenacity 11 Comments

The dreary times were soon to pass.

No matter that her breath still steamed both outdoors and inside the drafty house. No matter that her red fingers barely bent with swelling and that the chilblains on her toes still burned and ached and itched. No matter that she took so long to warm come night that she almost despaired of sleeping.

The dreary times were soon to pass.

She knew.

True, it was still frosty.

But the cold was dying.

She knew, because the ice formed only on the very edges of her washbasin and because what frost adorned the ground in the morning would transmute into miniature mirrors of dew by the time the sun rose higher in the sky.

And because she saw the primrose.

Blooming.

Out there.

In audacious glee.

If the tiny flowers could endure the remnants of frigidity, so could she.

For Crispina’s Crimson’s Creative Challenge

Spree Time

April 10, 2021Na'ama Yehuda Anecdotes of Life, Life and love, Muse and Flow, Reflections, Things Kids Say, Trauma and Development, Writing Tags: Adversity, Creative writing, Dumpster, Flash Fiction, Food, Forage, Life Lessons, Micro-fiction, Poverty, Survival, Weekend Writing Prompt 23 Comments

(Photo: David Libeert on Unsplash)

No wallet? No problem.

He’d lived without one as a child and did not remember being hungry. Or at least, not so hungry that he could not muster energy to wrangle grub from whatever lay around.

His grandmother had taught him. Raised through famine she had become an expert forager. There were few edible things she did not recognize or know how to procure.

“If you’re awake, you can find food,” she’d say.

He was awake.

It was time to dumpster dive.

For Sammi’s Weekend Writing Prompt: Forage in 82 words